Members of The Good Time and AACLC volunteers at this year’s Thanksgiving meal box pick-up gathering.
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Thank you — First Baptist Church of Glenarden, Pastor John Jenkins and First Lady Trina Jenkins, the Good Time Gang in Gambrills, and Lee Goode a.k.a. DJ Dynasty for generously providing 26 Thanksgiving meal boxes with turkeys for low-income Literacy Council students throughout Anne Arundel County! This was the third year that the church and The Gang have donated meals for our wonderful students. Each student received a frozen turkey along with a box containing a variety of vegetable sides and an apple pie.
Anne Arundel County Literacy Council is participating in the
Maryland Charity Campaign.
MCC is a workplace charitable giving program, providing MD State employees and retirees the opportunity to support causes they care about. October 5 – December 14, visit
https://mcc.maryland.gov/ and click on “Give Now” to participate.
Our MCC charity code is 52-1479101.Thank you for your support!
Mario enjoys meeting people from all walks of life, and he is excited to be part of the AACLC staff team.
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Mario joins us on the AACLC volunteer staff as an ESL Student Coordinator. He has been a tutor since 2017, lives in Annapolis, and speaks a little Spanish. Here’s a brief introduction to Mario:
Born in Quito, Ecuador in 1958, Mario and his family immigrated to America when he was five. He was the first in his family to graduate from college with a B.S. in Biblical and Cross-Cultural studies from Columbia International University in South Carolina.
Mario has been married to his beautiful Iranian wife, Nushi, for 43 years. They have three young-adult children who are married and have blessed Mario and Nushi with six amazing grandkids.
Mario has had varied work experience. He was a Missionary in Pakistan as Literacy Administrator early in his career. He worked in professional sales in the commercial hardware industry for years. He also held a staff position at a megachurch in Montgomery County, Maryland as one of its pastors. After much contemplation, Mario decided to resign and move to the Eastport community in Annapolis — a positive change in life when one of his daughters attended the United States Naval Academy.
Currently, Mario is semi-retired, proactive in running a short-term rental business along with managing personal growth investments for future retirement. He loves working with a diverse community and has a very strong inclusive mindset to make a difference one person at a time. Mario enjoys meeting people from all walks of life, reading, researching, walking, biking, cooking, and spending time with his family. He is excited to be part of the AACLC staff team.
In September, local Instagrammer and book lover, Caroline Vogan, @readersandexplorers, was inspired by our book fair. She offered a “Books for a Cause” giveaway. Through Instagram, Caroline gave away a selection of great books while encouraging donations to the Literacy Council. She raised more than $100 for the Council — this is enough to buy materials for tutoring at least two students. Thank you, Caroline and reading community! Caroline shipped books all over the country.
Thank you for your support of our book fair earlier this month! We raised a little over $5,700 for our adult tutoring programs in Anne Arundel County. These funds will make it possible for us to help low-income adults pursue their goals in literacy, math, diploma studies, ESL learning, and more. A tremendous team effort and lots of community support made the event a success.
We’re posting more book fair news and photos from the big day.
With Many Thanks,
Jane
Jane Seiss, Executive Director
Anne Arundel County Literacy Council
410-926-5797 (cell)
director@aaclc.org
The event was held just outside Discoveries Library at Annapolis Mall in the Crate & Barrel Court on Saturday, October 16.
A team of 40+ volunteers stored, sorted, and transported books, set up tables and displays, ran the event, and cleaned up afterward. We sold hundreds of gently used books and held a wonderful raffle for three beautiful gift baskets.
Westfield Mall donated the use of the courtyard space and its community center for the book fair. The Discoveries branch of the library loaned us book carts for our children’s book displays and also hosted a bookmark-making craft table for children. East Coast Advertising Specialties donated the Literacy Council tote bags that were so popular that day.
Thank you to the many tutors, supporters, friends, and family members who stopped by to browse and buy our books!
Thank you, volunteers — we couldn’t have done it without you!
Thanks to all of our reading enthusiasts for their donations from throughout Anne Arundel County (and beyond)!
We couldn’t have done it without you:
CLICK HERE for more about our fabulous sponsors and CLICK HERE to read about a special Instagrammer, Caroline Vogan (@readersandexplorers) who helped us spread the word.
“Reading tutor Jan Booth holds up one of the sheets handed out by the Literacy Council Dinner’s featured speaker Ray Williams who happens to be her student. The writing on the sheet depicts what words might look like to someone with a learning disability like Williams. They can appear out of order, backwards or like Chinese characters. Her other student, Brian Martin is just behind her.” Sharon Lee Tegler
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“I am a tutor for the AACLC and have experienced first hand the difference in individual lives when access to free tutoring and opportunities to learn to read and write are provided. One of my students, now 60, has returned to tutoring after having been aided by AACLC tutoring when he was in his 40s. Now, after raising his children and meeting his responsibilities, he is giving himself the gifts of reading to his grandchildren and writing personal notes to his infirm father.
My other student is a bright, hardworking man whose dyslexia now interferes with his career. He has been promoted to a managerial position and knows that improving his writing and reading skills is essential to retaining his position and moving forward with promotions.It is a privilege to work with these students and reminds me that literacy is a priceless gift, which we too often take for granted.”
– AACLC Literacy tutor Jan Booth
