The Doorway - Collierville Literacy Council

The Doorway
Vol. 5, No. 2
167 Washington St., Collierville, TN 38017
Fall/Winter 2009
Volunteer Appreciation Dinner
Tutors, students, staff, and the
CLC Board gather annually in the fall
to celebrate and appreciate the
spirit of volunteerism that allows
our programs to flourish.
The
Church of the Incarnation graciously
hosts this event, which our Board
organizes and presides over. The
Knights of Columbus supply the delicious dinner for all
who attend.
Council, but with many, many organizations both in Collierville and outside of Collierville.
Congratulations to Jane Dalton, pictured left, who was
presented with the 2009 Volunteer of the Year Award
by CLC Director, Karen Ray. Jane started tutoring with
CLC two years ago. She has donated 227 hours of time
to her students in these two years. Previously, Jane
had two ESL students; one of them received her Citizenship while Jane was her tutor. At the time of our
dinner, Jane was tutoring 3 students, an ELL student, a
Many tutors invite their students and it is an opportu- Literacy student and a GED student!
nity to visit, enjoy a wonderful meal and salute our ef- Karen also recognized tutors Clare Griggs and Emily
forts for one night. We thank Father Parham for his Duke with their five year service awards. Both Clare
presence and gracious words of welcome.
and Emily have impacted many students with their warm
A highlight of the evening is the presentation of the personalities and dedication. We are so fortunate to
Outstanding Volunteer of the Year Award, which is have them and many others who are so generous with
named in honor of John Barrios. John is a wonderful their time.
community volunteer, not only with Collierville Literacy
Holiday Greetings from all of us to all of you!
Thoughts from Karen …
This has been an exciting year of growth for the Literacy Council. More than 175 tutors helped us serve over 500
students last year – both record numbers for CLC!
To our tutors – We’ve enjoyed every moment we’ve spent with you to help students achieve their goals. And a lot
of goals were achieved, from 87 GED graduates, to 3 new U.S. citizens, to individual achievements with driving and
employment manuals, to obtaining jobs.
To our students – You bring so many good things to the staff and your tutors. Your hard work and determination
inspire us, your achievements bring smiles to our faces, you teach us about your native countries
and things you are skilled at that we aren’t. You have each added something to our lives!
To friends of Collierville Literacy Council – We appreciate so much that you have continued to sup(Continued on page 8)
1
Mission Statement
The Collierville Literacy Council is a non-profit
organization dedicated to providing opportunities
for adults to attain educational goals that enhance individual growth and benefit families, the
workplace and the community.
Schnucks & Kroger Cards…
Donate to the Collierville
Literacy Council
Governing Board
While you shop!!
Sarah Walne, President
Our thanks to those of you who have and use
these reloadable gift cards from both Kroger*
and Schnucks grocery stores. .
Kim Keough, President Elect
Dave Parks, Immediate Past President
Trish Kerr, Treasurer
Susan Eads, Secretary
For those of you who would like to support CLC in this way:
Pat Albee, Carolton Anderson, John Barrios,
Steve Hoffman, Gerri Jernigan, Dan Lattimore,
Sissy Lofton, Henry Stokes and Joel Tracy
1. Pick up the card of your choice at the Collierville
Literacy Council.
Staff: Karen Ray, Director
2. Take it to the Kroger or Schnucks where you shop.
Carol Faller, GED Coordinator
3. Load your gift card at the register.
4. Use it to pay when you check out and a percent of the
amount loaded will be donated to CLC!
Julie Parks, Volunteer Coordinator
Kelly Thieme, Literacy Coordinator
Trish Kerr, Bookkeeper
Thank you, thank you for making this effort!
Volunteers: Mary Jane Randolph &
*Kroger cards are preloaded with $5.00
Elizabeth Wayne
Collierville Literacy Council:
Telephone & Fax # 901/854-0288
Opportunities to Help!
B
Website: www.colliervilleliteracy.org
arnes & Noble
ookfair
December 10th—16th, 2009
Barnes & Noble Carriage Crossing,
Make Christmas Shopping a Breeze in 2009!
Collierville
Simply make a donation ($10 per name), and we will mail a
holiday card in your name to a friend, family member or business
associate. They will be pleased to know that you have made a special donation to the CLC in their honor.
A percentage of the net sale will be donated to
Collierville Literacy Council!
Please present our Bookfair I.D. # 578518
at
Email address: [email protected]
Stop into our office to fill out a form, or call us to mail
one to you! Deadline is Friday, December 18. 854-0288.
Thanks for shopping
Barnes & Noble! :)
2
Tutor Support Gatherings …
The volunteer tutors at CLC are certified through a 10-hour free Tutor Training they attend
before they begin tutoring. Periodic Tutor Support Gatherings (TSG) are held at the Council to facilitate ongoing tutor education, to foster tutor camaraderie and to share new information with one another. Days, times and FOOD vary as we try to accommodate our tutors’
different schedules and interests.
Our THANKS to Kelley Seitz, who provided insight, helpful hints and activities to use
with our English Language Learners (ELL) at our Wednesday, August 19 Tutor Support
Gathering. Kelley is one of the tutors who works with our Wednesday Talk Time Program.
Thursday, October 29 found Tutors Gathering again to focus on sounds … hearing them
and pronouncing them. Led by Kelly Thieme, our newest staff member, we learned new
ways to work through the sounds of our English letters.
PLEASE give us feedback on these gatherings, and suggest topics we might explore together!
***See page 8 for Calendar of Upcoming CLC Events!***
Celebrating Citizenship!
Congratulations to Mai Tran and Hye Kim, pictured at the right, two of our ELL students who recently became U. S. citizens! Mai, a native of Viet Nam, and Hye, originally from South Korea, have been working on their English skills with me since last
fall. They both applied for citizenship this year and for the past few months have
been hard at work studying the one hundred possible questions that they might face
on the new exam. Each week we learned the answers to questions ranging from
―What is the supreme law of the land?‖ to ―Who is your U. S. representative?‖
After receiving an interview date from the immigration authorities, they each went
for an interview where they were asked general questions about their background and why they wanted to become citizens. They
were asked ten questions about U. S. government, history and geography and were given a simple dictation test. The interviewer
gave each of them the good news that they had passed. At a later date they attended a swearing in ceremony with other new citizens. After Hye’s exam, the three of us celebrated with real Memphis food – barbeque and ribs from Germantown Commissary!
Both Hye and Mai have worked so hard to become active in their adopted country. Mai works in her family’s business, Diana’s Nails,
in Collierville. This week she told me proudly that she just received her new U. S. passport, which she’ll be using to travel back to
Viet Nam in January. Hye and her husband are busy getting ready to open a new branch of their dry cleaning business, Elite Cleaners, in Germantown. She told me, ―Before I became a citizen, I didn’t belong to America. Now I’m more involved – watching, listening, voting…‖ It was a great experience for me to help them along this path.
Pam Guthrie, tutor
CLC STUDENTS !!
Remember to sign your name on a slip of paper and put it in the FISH BOWL
each time you come to the Literacy Council to work with your tutor!
Congratulations to all our $10 winners!!
August 2009: Terry’s student, Hyun Jung
September 2009: Donna’s student, Yolanda
Weather
Rule: If
schools are Closed—
No Talk Time or Coffee
& Conversation—
Check with your tutor
for individual classes!
October 2009: Carol’s student, Valerie
November 2009: Cathy’s student, Satyam
(Our thanks to Collierville Presbyterian Church who has made this incentive possible!)
3
CLC Celebrates our Newest Certified Tutors!
WELCOME
to our newest groups
of trained and certified volunteer tutors!
We are so glad to have your helping hands.
Most of you have already met with your
student/s and are getting acquainted and
working hard! Thank you for taking 10
hours out of your weekend to prepare for
this service.
Tutors pictured left to right, back row: Toni Archer,
Reba Johnson, Jim Zimmer, Richard French, Ed
Weaver. Front: Nancy Harness, Danielle Goodgion,
Tusa McNary, Pat Gonyea, Jimmy Tran and Cheryl Ruddy.
Tutors pictured left to right, back row: Don Price,
Steve Cantu, Nectar Cantu, Sheila O’Connell, Elvira Sylve,
Franke Rob, Sonjii Owens. Middle row: Terri Vice,
Ginny Hollis, Neeta Shah. Front row: Leeann Buttram and
Saumil Shah.
Cox Community Center was a hopping place
October 22, with many local residents visiting the assortment of booths at the Town of Collierville and Collierville
Chamber’s annual Business Expo.
Collierville Literacy
Council was well represented by its dedicated Board members! Thanks to all of you who shared CLC with the many
interested folk who stopped by to check us out. Congratulations to Kathy Scales and Sid Beach for winning travel
Scrabble games!
Pictured is CLC Board President, Sarah Walne, chatting with
an interested visitor at the Expo.
4
Fed Ex Cares Day
If you are receiving this newsletter, it is because you
shared your email address with us. You may have been
among the many people that our FedEx Cares group contacted!
In September, CLC welcomed eight FedEx employees as
they spent part of their day making our agency a little
better and a lot tidier!
Pictured above, back row, left to right:
Ken Watkins, Christina Moran, Teri Burks,
Cathy Scheuer. Front row: Rick Forsythe,
Carole
Sciore,
Robin
Borer.
Kneeling: Larry Chandler
They contacted our newsletter recipients to confirm email
addresses, took the bars off of our door
(did you notice?), painted the side of our
building to cover the peeling brown
paint and cleaned windows inside
and out.
Hats off to ya’ll for helping us
out!
For our English Language Learners...
At the Collierville Library, several Friends of
the Library visited with students … in English!
Our ELL (English Language Learner)
students, who are waiting for a tutor, are invited to
attend one of two ―Talk Time‖ classes. These small
classes offer a time to practice conversation in English! They start again Jan. 6 & 7.
Collierville Presbyterian Church (CPC) hosted the December, 2009
C&C. What a nice turnout of ladies from the church, tutors and
students of English. Conversation revolved around holiday customs.
Wednesday Talk Time, 10-11:30 a.m. with Kelley Seitz
and Pam Rubenstein on January 6, 2010.
Thanks, Donna Lenocker, for coordinating this each month!
Thursday Talk Time, 10-11:30 a.m. with Pat Faudree
and Alice Hurley on January 7, 2010.
Questions?? Call us at 854-0288
5
We’re so PROUD of our GED
Graduates!
September 10, 2009 Grads:
Megan C., April D.,
Haywood M., William O.,
Joshua P., Ryan R., Timothy R.,
Daniel T., Mario V., Daniel W.,
Kevin C., William M.,
Veronika Q., Jacob S.,
Deanna T., Kaitlynn S., Neal D.
November 12, 2009
Grads:
GED = General Educational Development
About the GED Tests
The GED Tests provide adults who did not complete a formal high school program the
opportunity to certify their attainment of high school-level academic knowledge and skills
The tests are field-tested and normed on graduating high school seniors before becoming
final test forms
Only 60% of graduating high school seniors would pass the GED Tests on their first
attempt
History of the GED Tests
There have been four GED Tests Series
* 1942 Series
*1978 Series
* 1988 Series
* 2002 Series
Kyle A., Michelle A., Nicholas A.,
Joshua C., McKenzie D.,
The fifth test series will launch in 2012
Who Accepts the GED Credential
Kenneth E., Melissa H., Drew J.,
Sarah K., Felipe L., Wesley L.,
98% of colleges and universities that require a high school diploma accept the GED
credential (Annual Survey of Colleges 2007.)
Kendric P., Randall R.,
96% of companies accept applicants with a GED credential for jobs requiring a high
school degree (Society for Human Resource Management, 2002)
Dominic E., Jeremy M., Jaime R.
Sharing the Good ~ We commend ALL our tutors and students for their hard work!!
There is not room for all that we hear about, but we share a few...
Coleen & Kyung use various magazines in their lessons; Claire & Kay finished Vocabulary Basics; Jane & Kazuko completed ―Easy Stories;‖ Jan, Jhoythi & Kaori have an additional goal of increased interaction with English speaking people
and situations; Carol & Liz were reading ―Anne of Green Gables;‖ Javier got a job at La Prensa Latina translating articles
from English to Spanish — he and Clint are learning each other’s first language!
Congratulations to Yan Fen, who passed her Citizenship on August 12 —thank you, Lee for your part. Murray and
Taekang have worked on resume presentation; Linda leads Moung, Hong and Doris in field trips … shopping and the
library are two we know of! Congrats to Hai Lin for passing her driver’s test and getting her license —thanks for your
help, Donna. Conrad and Pedro continue to make good advancement. Jim and Cho were using email to keep in touch;
Javier and Marco have been working hard on Math and Writing for the GED; Donna’s student, Archana got her driver’s
permit...stay tuned! Karen & Bobbie have worked hard on Bobbie’s commercial driver’s license endorsement, and she
PASSED! Many of our students are requesting transcripts for college applications—it’s very exciting! We love the story
of one of our evening tutors, her student and another tutor/student pair who helped with a dead car battery one night.
Pretty much, everyone is working together...to move forward. This is good!
6
CLC’s 2009 Scrabble FUNdraiser was held on a beautiful Sunday afternoon, November 8, at St. George’s Independent
School in Collierville. 38 teams of 3 members each competed
with one another for the honors of 1st, 2nd and 3rd place as
well as the ―best team name‖ as determined by our ―Scrabble
Experts.‖
And the winners are:
1st Place: Lex-icon’s, total score of 1045
2nd Place: Letter Ladies, total score of 1027
3rd Place: The Annihiletters, total score of 1008
Best Team Name: The Vowel Movements
Lex-icon’s: Murali Balasubramanyam, Siddharth Murali &
Santosh Iyer
Best News to Report: Our 2009 SCRABBLE Tournament
raised $ 14,983 in sponsorships and team registrations.
The REAL winners are, of course, those adults who seek
the help of the Collierville Literacy Council to become literate, to prepare for and pass their GED or to learn English as a Learned Language.
Our THANKS to all who contributed to this year’s event!
2009 Scrabble Sponsors — Thank you, Thank you!
Diamond ($5,000): St. Andrew’s Episcopal Church
Platinum ($2,000): Collierville Methodist Church
Gold ($1,000):
Letter Ladies: Kristen Hall, Debra Hicks & Alex Walter
First Tennessee Bank
Germanton & Collierville Appeal
Silver ($500):
Baptist Memorial Hospital
St. George’s Independent School
The Avenue Carriage Crossing
Bronze ($250):
Memphis Brooks Museum of Art
The Orpheum Theater
Embry-Riddle Aeronautical Univ.
Harrell Performing Arts Theater
Hampton Inn, Collierville
Bancorp South Bank
Kelsey Coffee
Barrios Financial Services
Kirk & Associates
Betty Owen, CPA
Pepsi Americas
City Center
M/M Mike Kerr
Collierville Chiropractic
Mrs. Estie Sheahan
Collierville Community Fund
The University of Memphis
Collierville Women’s Club
Twentieth Century Club
7
The Annihiletters: Cyndi Long, Shelley Kraemer &
Kelsey Kraemer
(Continued from page 1)
port our efforts with your gifts of money, time, skills, and
in-kind donations. I hope you are as proud of what’s been
accomplished with your help as we are!
Looking Ahead in 2010 ...
For 2010, there will continue to be changes and improvements. This e-newsletter (our first) is one change that
will save money while also helping the environment. Our
new reading specialist, Kelly, is improving literacy assessment and instruction so we can provide the very best to
our students. We had one of our biggest GED testing
groups ever, with over 38 full- and re-testers at the November test. We’ve added an additional Talk Time class so
more English Language students can begin studying weekly
at CLC while waiting for their one-on-one tutor. Additional GED, English-language and Literacy software programs will also be available on the workstations in each
tutoring room. Tutors, watch for information about what
is available and how it might help your student reach their
goal.
We have enjoyed this busy year and appreciate
all that each of you has contributed.
GED testing in Collierville:
February 18, Thursday
April 29, Thursday
June 29, Tuesday
Tutor Training at CLC:
January 22-23, Friday/Saturday
March 26-27, Friday/Saturday
June 11-12, Friday/Saturday
Tutor Support Gathering at CLC:
February 23, Tuesday, 10-11:30 am
April 8, Thursday, 1-2:30 pm
June 17, Thursday, 5:30-7 pm
Reminder! CLC staff will NOT be in the
office December 24—January 3. We
return on Monday, January 4, 2010.
Wishing you a wonderful 2010 ,
The CLC staff - Karen, Carol, Kelly, and Julie
To Our Faithful Contributors ~ THANK YOU!
August 1 through December 15, 2009
Donations in honor of Dave Parks, by Karen & Doug Ray; Carol Faller, by Linda Powell; Louis & Virginia Hiett, by Beverly Hooker
Donations of $500 and above : Joel Tracy; Collierville Rotary Foundation (partial match for CFGM Capacity Building -restricted grant/
software); Community Foundation of Greater Memphis for restricted grant; M/M George Lofton; M/M Mel Fitzharris
Individual Supporters: Barbara Fockler; Angie Vandenbergh; Kyoung An; M/M Sungeun Yang; Bettina Roberts; Cathy Hurdle; Chris Wilson;
Denise Magkotsou; Jan Boudreaux; Trish Kerr; Nancy Hsu; Becky Gafford; Edna Mae Rucker; Hong Lin; Kayoko Nakaya; Collierville Presbyterian Church (for our student incentive fish bowl!); New Neighbors; M/M Jim Williams; M/M Dave Parks; Cynthia Dunkin; M/M Da n Lattimore; Henry Stokes; M/M Hitoshi Abe; Pat Bell; M/M Sid Beach
Donations In-Kind: Pam Rubenstein; Yuli Ana; Betsy Sexton; Gerald Henson; Javier Ruiz Palafox; Sofia Delgado; Circe Zugno; David Noa;
Jim Williams; Carol Petschonek; and an anonymous donor of a bulletin board!
Special Thanks to the CLC Board and ALL those who helped make our 2009 Scrabble FUNdraiser so successful!!
Thank you to Barnes & Noble Carriage Crossing AND those who support our BOOK FAIR!
Thank you to the students who have reimbursed the Literacy Council for their books!
Thank you to all who supported our Christmas Card fundraiser!! What a great gift idea! :)
Thank you to Collierville Chamber of Commerce Office; Lucius L.Burch Collierville Library, Silver Caboose Restaurant and
Collierville Presbyterian Church who have graciously hosted Coffee & Conversation
A special thanks to those who support us through the United Way of the Mid-South Donor Choice Program and
the Designated Donor Match Programs.
8