AACLC’s Executive Director Lisa Vernon and volunteer tutor Maggie Cullman were guests for an interview by WNAV radio on September 4, 2012. We’re always glad to have a chance to spread the work about the work of our dedicated volunteers and lives they are changing through literacy tutoring.
You can listen to the six-minute interview now with this link:
Click Here to read article online
Deborah Ryan Johnson of Millersville has been a high school teacher, an elementary school principal and trained other teachers. Yet, she describes the student she tutors through the Anne Arundel County Literacy Council, as the “single most highly motivated and hardest working person I’ve ever worked with in a teacher-student capacity.”
Her student’s enthusiasm showed when he was asked how he felt about his tutoring sessions.“I don’t like it, I love it!” he said. Johnson’s student is a man in his mid-30s who recently moved to the United States from Jamaica. His wife, the local library, and a community center helped him connect with the literacy council. He spoke with Capital Gazette on the condition that he not be identified by name because of his illiteracy.
“I can tell you, it’s beautiful!” the man said. “My tutor, she’s good, very good. I want to get a high school diploma, a proper education for a good job. With education you can go where you want to go. I’ve got the chance to do it. I’m grabbing it with both hands and I’m never letting it go!”
Johnson and her student are a bit unusual in that she travels from Millersville to Annapolis for their sessions. Most of the council tutors live in south county, so students in that area are usually able to be matched with a local tutor.
“We have 25 tutor/student pairs currently meeting at North County library,” Lisa Vernon, the literacy council program director wrote in an email. “Many of those tutors travel from Annapolis to meet their student. The majority of our students live in the northern part of our county, and many of them are willing to meet at the North County library. We always have a shortage of tutors for the Glen Burnie area.”
Ellie Morton of Point Pleasant recently contacted the Capital Gazette to ask for coverage of the council’s services. Morton is currently tutoring four students, three at the North County Area library and one at the Provinces library in Severn. “It really brings to light the fact that many people, even if they graduated from high school, don’t have the basic foundation, they’ve just been passed through,” she said.
Two of Morton’s students are working toward taking their GED exam. Another would like to be able to read the TV Guide and other magazines. “We need to target north county,” Morton said.
According to Vernon, the group currently has five students who would like to meet at the North County Area Library, but haven’t yet been matched with tutors. So far, only two of the volunteers who have signed up for the next tutor training are from north county. “The need is great,” Vernon said.
The two-day tutor training seminar will be held from 10:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Sept. 29 and Oct. 13 at Woods Memorial Presbyterian Church, 611 Baltimore Annapolis Blvd. in Severna Park.
The literacy council is a volunteer nonprofit organization that provides free, one-on-one tutoring to adults in Anne Arundel County who have low-level reading skills or are English language learners. It also provides free training for the volunteer tutors and skill assessors.
To register for the tutor training session, email programdirector@aaclc.org or call 410-798-0408.
For more details about the organization, visit www.icanread.org.
The council needs funds to pay for training and instructional materials for tutors and students.
The new Anne Arundel Cares website has selected the organization as its nonprofit of the week in the education category. Donations can be made to the literacy council through Thursday at www.aacares.org/literacy. The three organizations with the most donations will also receive a $2,500 grant sponsored by Capital One Bank and an anonymous donor.
A book fair benefiting the group will be held from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Saturday at Barnes & Noble, 2516 Solomons Island Road in Annapolis. Patrons who mention AACLC when they check out during those hours will have up to 15 percent of their proceeds donated to the council.
Barnes & Noble online purchasers, who use the book fair identification number 10823003 from Saturday through Sept. 19, will have 10 percent of their proceeds donated to the council. The fair will also feature five local authors hosting book signings and prizes from local merchants given away every hour.
Simply mention AACLC at the checkout counter on September 15th and our organization will receive up to 15% of the proceeds from all sales of books, Nooks, magazines, music, toys, and café items. Last year, purchases totaling $4,000 resulted in a generous contribution of $650 from Barnes & Noble, and this year we’re aiming even higher.
With 30 new tutor-student matches being launched this fall, our needs are growing: Let’s see if we can spur more than $5,000 in sales! We’ll also receive 10% of any online purchases made during the week of Sept. 15-19, so all you armchair shoppers have to do is type in Book Fair ID# 10823003 before you make that final mouse click!
Flyers are now available to post in your workplace, neighborhood or on your community bulletin board highlighting the event and scheduled activities. Please send me an email if you are willing to print and post a flyer or two! I will send it to you in an email attachment.
Look for updates about the Book Fair on our Facebook page! Event will be at Barnes & Noble, Annapolis (2516 Solomon’s Island Rd., Annapolis, MD 21401)
We are looking forward to a great turn out!
Stevie Donahue,
Plan to attend – and bring a friend!
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Our Literacy Council will be featured as the “Nonprofit of the Week” in the Education category for Anne Arundel Cares Week! Anne Arundel Cares www.aacares.org has created a state-of-the-art website with compelling stories about the excellent work of non-profits who provide direct services to residents of Anne Arundel County.
As a result of very generous sponsorships by Capital One Bank and an anonymous donor, they will be offering three $2,500 challenge grants to the nonprofits which use the Anne Arundel Cares site to raise the most money during Anne Arundel Cares Week (Sept. 7-13). The contests will be among nonprofits of similar sizes. As of today, these are the nonprofits which will be competing with us for a $2500.00 grant in the organizations with annual revenues less than $100,000:
Please ask your friends and family to support us at www.aacares.org from Septem
The next Assessor Training event will take place on September 4, 2012, at the Edgewater Library from 2-4pm. CLICK HERE for a map and further details.
Assessors have a very important job at our literacy Council.
They are trained to give the Laubach Way to Reading (LWR)Diagnostic Inventory test to each new student. The purpose of the LWR Diagnostic Inventory is both to place students in the appropriate LWR skill book and to give the tutor a fairly detailed record of a student’s present reading skills. By profiling a student’s strengths and weaknesses in reading, the Diagnostic Inventory alerts a teacher to the skills that probably ought to receive special emphasis during lessons and to the skills that may only require relatively short periods of time for learning.
Once a volunteer completes our 12 hour tutor training, they are eligible, and encouraged, to take our Assessor training.
Photo Credit: “Adult Ed Students in Young” by Lisa F. Young via BigStockPhoto
Tony Ocasio has recently been elected to AACLC’s board as its Student Representative
Tony is in the literacy program so he can improve his reading skills and improve his chances to advance at work. He has been married for 22 years and has two sons, Nicholas and Daniel. Nicholas is in his second year at Mt. Saint Marys, and Daniel is entering his senior year at Bishop Spalding. Tony has been employed at UMUC (University of Maryland University College) for the past eleven years as a utility mechanic working on boilers, pumps, electrical matters and plumbing problems. He just returned from an annual vacation with his family at Deep Creek.
Welcome, Tony, and thank you for your interest and support of AACLC.
Volunteers, our Tutor Resources Page is the place to start when you’re looking for help.
Our website is a work in progress, but we’ve just added some great new resources for you. You’ll find links to them on the Tutor Resources page (See left sidebar of the website). Be sure to visit the Literacy Library, a list of links to sites and documents that will be terrific resources for you as you work with your student. As you find your own resources, please email the Program Director, who will whether to add it to the list.
As we add new items, we’ll put them on this page, so check back often.
To celebrate National Literacy Week, we have partnered with Barnes & Noble in Annapolis (2516 Solomon’s Island Rd., Annapolis, MD 21401) for a day of fun and fundraising on Saturday, September 15th. Mention AACLC at the checkout counter, and our Literacy Council will keep up to 15% of the profits from your purchase, including, books, music, toys and Cafe purchases. We will also have special events and prize drawings scheduled throughout the day. Barnes & Noble has been a big supporter of our Literacy Council through the years and has recently donated books for our tutors as thanks for the good work we are doing in our community.
If you would like to help with this event, please contact Stevie Donahue at Sd@wisedonahue.com
Hello Tutors,
Our lending library of books for tutors is up and running!
We hope you will stop by the AACLC office, browse the selections for teaching reading, and check out materials appropriate to use with your
student. Each book has a checkout card so we can track the books in use.
The office is located in Annapolis, at 80 West St., on the northwest corner of West and Calvert St. There is on street parking, as well
as a garage nearby.
The AACLC’s small office, which contains the book shelves, is located on the first floor. The Dept. of Social Services receptionist can point you to the corner office.
Please feel free to use those, as needed, and return them later.
Much of our materials are from New Readers Press, and you can peruse some of the materials at http://www.newreaderspress.
The success story (“How Being a Student Changed My Life”) in AACLC’s blog about my student Dwede was actually her own story, scribed by me. She was willing for the Literacy Council to share her story with people in order to encourage more volunteers to be tutors.
We have been studying how to write an essay in preparation for the CASAS test at AACC (Anne Arundel Community College) The guidance is to have:
I wrote those headings on a blank sheet of paper, and we discussed what might be in each paragraph, but at a very high level. Usually, Dwede wrote out her essay by hand, but for this assignment, she dictated it to me as I typed it into my laptop. She read what I typed, then added in the part about her job because she felt that was an important part of the story.
This technique is very much like using a graphic organizer with “fill in the boxes” format to guide the writer. Even students who cannot spell well will write a good story with the help of their tutor scribing for them, word for word, (could be either typing or hand writing) and it is encouraging for students when they can read their story back.
Dixie Catlett – AACLC Tutor
