Tuesday, May 12, 2015

2015 Literacy Leadership Awards : : National Coalition for Literacy

2015 Literacy Leadership Awards
The National Coalition for Literacy
May 14, 2015
5:30 PM to 7:30 PM
Washington, DC

The National Coalition for Literacy (NCL) Literacy Leadership Awards Event recognizes individuals and/or organizations that have made extraordinary national contributions to improving adult literacy and English language learning in the United States. Past awardees have included corporations, foundations, members of Congress, and adult literacy professionals. Light h'ors douerves and drinks will be served.

This year, the NCL will recognize the following outstanding individuals and organizations:

Representative Phil Roe (TN). Dr. Phil Roe is the U.S. Representative for Tennessee's 1st congressional district, serving since 2009. He has been a strong advocate for strengthening adult education and is the founding member and Republican co-chair of the House Adult Literacy Caucus.

Mayor Michael Nutter. In 2011, Mayor Nutter stated tackling the city’s adult literacy problem would be a priority for his administration. He made a $1 million investment in city adult literacy programs and reinstituted the Philadelphia Mayor’s Commission on Literacy, and tasked it with creating an online referral system that will allow real-time matching of adult learners to classes, tutors, testing and instruction, and to supplement face-to-face learning with opportunities for online learning and practice. That system, called myPLACE™, has served over 5000 adult learners to date.

Kavitha Cardoza. Ms. Cardoza is a Special Correspondent for WAMU and reports on D.C. area news, with a special focus on children, education and poverty. She has won numerous awards for her work including the regional Edward R. Murrow Award for Hard News in 2012. In 2013 she wrote and produced a four-part NPR series that highlighted the current adult literacy crisis facing communities across the country. This series provided some of the most in-depth coverage of this issue in the national media in recent memory.

Mary Jane Schmitt and Adult Numeracy Network (ANN). In 1994 Mary Jane Schmitt co-founded the Adult Numeracy Network which has been the leading voice advocating and providing PD for improved adult numeracy instruction. She also founded and directed the Adult Numeracy Center at TERC—a constellation of projects contributing to innovative research and development in adult mathematics education. Ms. Schmidt passed away earlier this year, and a representative from ANN will accept the award on her behalf.

The NCL Literacy Leadership Awards are made possible through the generous support of the Dollar General Literacy Foundation.

About the National Coalition for Literacy
The National Coalition for Literacy (NCL) is a coalition of the leading national and regional organizations dedicated to advancing adult education, family literacy, and English language acquisition in the U.S. NCL helps advocates, policymakers, and others who care about adult literacy make a positive difference advocating for adult education and family literacy.
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Sunday, May 10, 2015

Literacy – Spanning the US: Prescott, AZ :: New Jersey :: Pittsfield MA

Literacy: Spanning the U.S.

After 4 years with tutor, adult student has skills to take naturalization test
Prescott Valley Tribune: 4.22.2015 by Sue Tone

With no prior tutoring experience, Prescott Valley resident Daniel Van Haren has helped bring his student, Indelicacy Corona, from Level 1 to Level 5 in English reading, writing and speaking skills over the past four years. She now reads and writes in English at an upper high school grade level, and is ready to take the U.S. Naturalization test.

Van Haren is a tutor with the Prescott Valley Library Adult Literacy Group, which provides free tutoring to adults wanting to acquire reading skills and those wanting to improve their English language skills.

Corona has been in the U.S. since 2002, and moved to Chino Valley in 2007 with her husband, Mike Ayyad. For the past three years, she has worked full time as a housekeeper at an assisted living facility, paying into Social Security, state and Federal taxes.  READ MORE !

Volunteer now to help change a life at LiteracyNJ
South Jersey Central Record: 3.19.2015

When Bill first came to the LiteracyNJ office in Willingboro, he was 19 years old, had not completed high school and had few opportunities for work. He needed to earn his GED and was hoping he could find some assistance.

Lou Potter was exactly what he needed. Potter, a Medford Lakes resident and volunteer literacy tutor, helped Bill create a plan to prepare for his GED test. The LiteracyNJ office provided them with GED study materials and they set to work, meeting at the local library to prepare for the exam.

With Lou’s help, Bill earned his GED and got a job with an area before/after school program. He now hopes to further his education and ultimately, earn a Bachelor’s Degree.

Another tutor, Steve Rakoczy, also from Medford Lakes, has worked with his student for over a year, helping him learn to read, write and speak English more proficiently. His student, a local resident, has since obtained a driver’s license and received a job promotion and a raise.

Locally, about 20 tutors provide one on one or small group instruction to adult students. Some of these tutors include Eileen Marcy, Peg Cunningham, Betsy Allen, Tom King and Suzanne Berroa.  READ MORE !

Literacy Volunteers provide the gift of communication
Pittsfield Gazette: 3.12.2015 by Susan Guerrero

Hundreds of local residents have been assisted in reading, writing and learning English by a non-profit organization since its humble beginnings more than 50 years ago.

The seeds of Literacy Volunteers of Berkshire County, incorporated in 1980, were planted by a group of local women in the 1960s, said Karen Wallace, executive director. That original group of women attended a training session of the Literacy Volunteers of America in Syracuse, N.Y.

When they returned, they did informal tutoring in various settings in the area including local churches, Wallace explained.

The women, from their encounters with people in the community, became aware that there were people who were struggling with reading and writing, she said.

The desire to help others to read, write and sometimes learn English continues with the 50 or so volunteers who tutor in the organization today.

Last year, a total of 80 adult learners from 30 countries met faithfully at the Berkshire Athenaeum with trained men and women tutors from Literacy Volunteers of Berkshire County.

In addition to the United States, the adult learners came from places all over the globe such as Brazil, Bulgaria, Chile, China, El Salvador, Ghana, Korea, Indonesia, Pakistan, Tajikistan, Romania and many others.  READ MORE !

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Wednesday, May 6, 2015

Future of the Stacks : : John Palfrey |:| Library as Third Place

Biblio
TECH
The Future of the Stacks
How closing libraries means losing more than just good memories
Medium: 5.05.2015 by John Palfrey

When asked what they like best about libraries, people often recall browsing in dimly lit stacks for a book. The browsing experience is one of the most magical childhood memories for many people. They have positive associations with the experience of tracking down a book by call number, wending their way through the aisles, and running their finger along the spines of books in musty library stacks.

The joy of unexpected discovery has enormous appeal to people of all ages and all walks of life. The library browsing experience is strongly associated with the concept of serendipity.

There is something powerful about the idea that patrons will find on the shelves books that they didn’t expect to find. To date, this experience has come about thanks to the physical proximity of other books to the book they are initially seeking. For some people, it is impossible to come out of the stacks without armfuls of books, even if they went into the stacks seeking just one. This serendipity has broader social implications too. New ideas and new connections between fields can be created as a result of these unexpected findings. This serendipity, this sense of discovery, relies on a long and complex chain of activities, many of them carried out by librarians.

There is reason to fear that this type of positive experience will be lost if library stacks, and the people who staff them, disappear. If libraries shed their physical collections and materials are rendered to patrons through electronic delivery only, the experience of serendipity could be lost forever. The same fear goes for the decline of the physical, printed newspaper.

When a reader searches only for a narrow topic and ends up with a single story, she may miss the surrounding stories that offer a broader snapshot of what’s happening in the world. (Even the prospect of moving previously inaccessible stacks can lead to public outcry, as occurred with the New York Public Library in 2012.)

If libraries were to disappear, cities and towns would lose essential “third places” that are open to the public. In a 2013 survey, 90 percent of Americans age sixteen and older said that the closing of their local public library would have a negative impact on their community. There are many sound reasons for this concern.

Outside of home and work, third places in many communities are shifting away from library spaces and toward commercial spaces, whether Starbucks in the physical world or Facebook in the virtual world.  READ MORE !



The Great
Good Place
The Library as Third Place
Library Journal: 2.17.2014 by Annoyed Librarian

Inspired by this article in the Chicago Tribune hailing libraries as “havens on earth,” I wanted to write about libraries as Third Places.

A Third Place is somewhere other than home or work, the first two places. From the Wikipedia article summing up Ray Oldenburg’s The Great Good Place, we find the following characteristic of third places:
◾Free or inexpensive
◾Food and drink, while not essential, are important
◾Highly accessible: proximate for many (walking distance)
◾Involve regulars – those who habitually congregate there
◾Welcoming and comfortable
◾Both new friends and old should be found there

Depending on the community, lots of public libraries could count as third places, especially those with cafes and open spaces outside the normally quiet stacks areas. People generally don’t sit around the reference section merrily conversing, but there’s often space for that sort of thing.

This is even perhaps what a lot of public librarians want libraries to become, even if they don’t put it in those terms. It might make a lot more sense of some of the activities now happening in libraries if the official goal was to make the public library into a Third Place.  READ MORE [comments] !

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Sunday, May 3, 2015

Literacy – Spanning the US: Wicomico Co MD :: Columbia MO :: Tulare Co CA

Literacy: Spanning the U.S.

Literacy: Key to solving many of society's ills
Delmarva Now: 4.10.2015 by Susan Parker

On Thursday morning, the Friends of Wicomico Public Libraries organization hosted its third annual Light of Literacy Awards Breakfast.

You might think of a "friends of the library group" as something like a PTA group, some retired women who are looking for some nice charity work to occupy their time, holding meetings and bake sales, or maybe book sales, to raise money.

You would be severely underestimating this group. Members do hold meetings and sell books to raise money, but they are passionate about literacy, books, reading and making our community a better place, and they understand better than most of us just how important a role literacy plays in every aspect of our society. And so they established the Light of Literacy Awards program.

Light of Literacy awards are given to recognize and honor the work of people in our community who promote literacy. The people nominated for these awards do some of the expected things — they teach, tutor and give away books to children. But they accomplish these things — and more — in some very creative and unexpected ways.

One award is made in each of six categories annually: business, adult, educator, higher education, youth and nonprofit organization. This year, 37 nominations were submitted. Anyone can submit a nomination. All nominees were recognized individually at the breakfast.

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Education is key, he said. Readers are more likely to vote, volunteer in the community, live independently and otherwise function as citizens.  READ MORE !

Literacy Action Corps helps volunteers share love of reading
Columbia Tribune: 4.12.2015 by Linda Breedlove

 “The last 21 sessions we have worked on sounding out words. Mary (not her real name) reads every week for a longer period of time. She is doing better, paying attention to the words that make a difference in meaning of sentences….I’m so happy she makes time every week to meet and work on improving her reading skills. We enjoy one another’s company; we go to the library, to lunch and even volunteer at the Food Bank once in a while.”
—notes from sandy

These are progress notes from Sandy, who tutors through Literacy Action Corps of Columbia. She has been involved with LAC for over a year. Originally Sandy decided to take the tutor training because she loves to read and wanted to share her enthusiasm for reading with others; like many tutors, she couldn’t imagine not being able to read proficiently. She and her student start off many sessions with a funny poem to set a light, fun tone for the hour they spend together. To Sandy, the wonderful thing about tutoring is the joy of exposing her student to new ways of discovering things for the first time — like finding new places on a map or reading a recipe all the way through. Building a rapport with her student is “icing on the cake” to Sandy.

LAC is an all-volunteer, non-profit organization that trains tutors and connects them with adult students who have low literacy skills or internationals who want to improve their English, providing them with opportunities to become more self-reliant, productive members of society. Tutors help their adult students achieve their life goals, complete job applications, pass a driver’s test, become a US citizen, write a letter or read to their children.  READ MORE !

Library Literacy Day part of National Library Week
Porterville Record: 4.15.2015

“I am proud to have our Library Literacy Day during National Library Week and proud of our program,” Wegener said. “I’m amazed at the commitment and dedication of the tutors who provide their time, knowledge and skills in service to our learners.”

Sue Gillison, program manager, spoke about the great results the program has achieved. Sue and Kim Torrez, Tulare City literacy specialists, each introduced a learner to the audience. Edward Villarreal from Visalia and Yvette Armenta from Tulare were chosen for this honor due to their accomplishments as adult literacy clients.

Villarreal improved his skills in reading, writing and mathematics, and Armenta earned her GED and recently started a career with the State Farm Insurance Company.

Board Chairman Steven Worthley read the proclamation, which stated that “The County of Tulare is pleased with the success of the library’s literacy programs for adults within Tulare County, and commends and publicly acknowledges the efforts of the program staff, volunteer tutors and learners in their future endeavors.”  READ MORE !

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Thursday, April 30, 2015

Do We Need Libraries? : : Forbes

Do We Need Libraries?
Forbes: 4.28.2015 by Steve Denning

Libraries everywhere are under threat. After all, who needs a library today, when it is possible, without even getting out of bed, to find and read almost any book or article that has ever been published? One is tempted to recall the reaction by some to the recent news that Radio Shack had gone bankrupt: “Radio Shack bankrupt? I didn’t know Radio Shack still existed!”

I was asked to give the opening keynote at a combined meeting of the Library Leaders Summit and the Computers in Libraries conference this week in Washington, D.C. In discussing the future of libraries, the conference continues a long tradition of forward-looking libraries exploring emerging technologies, hearing from bleeding edge practitioners and sharing case studies of innovative libraries. My thoughts on the future of libraries are equally applicable to many other sectors that are facing the threat of extinction from massive disruption to their businesses.

The Scale of Disruption Today
The scale and pervasiveness of the disruption that sectors like libraries face is amazing.

The disruption begins with products. The smartphone, as Larry Downes and Paul Nunes explain in their book, Big Bang Disruption, is resulting in a huge array of products becoming obsolete:

Address books, video cameras, pagers, wristwatches, maps, books, travel games, flashlights, home telephones, dictation recorders, cash registers, Walkmen, Day-Timers, alarm clocks, answering machines, yellow pages, wallets, keys, phrase books, transistor radios, personal digital assistants, dashboard navigation systems, remote controls, airline ticket counters, newspapers and magazines, directory assistance, travel and insurance agents, restaurant guides and pocket calculators.

But the disruption isn’t limited to products. Whole sectors of commerce are under threat.

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Against this background, what is the future of libraries? There is no reason to think that libraries are necessarily immune from the Grim Reaper of disruption. Do libraries have a future at all?

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Five “Right” Approaches For Libraries
The future of libraries is a story that has yet to be written. I don’t pretend to have “the answer” to that story. The only thing we know for sure is that the story will be different from the story of libraries in the past. But here are five questions that could lead to the right answer. In fact, the key to unlocking the mystery requires asking the right questions.

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Using the right metrics to track customer delight will be important here. A informal poll at this week’s conference suggested that relatively few libraries are using the Net Promoter Score (NPS) methodology. Instead, the metrics in use seem to focus outputs, like numbers of users or circulation figures. Although we all love librarians because they are instinctively helpful, getting feedback from users about the overall utility of the library as a whole, using the NPS methodology, would give libraries a handle on whether their efforts to delight users are paying off—or not.  READ MORE !

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Sunday, April 26, 2015

Literacy – Spanning the US: Santa Clara CA :: Asheville, NC :: Provo UT

Literacy: Spanning the U.S.

Read Santa Clara Shapes Lives Through Literacy Development
Santa Clara Weekly: 3.25-31.2015 by Cynthia Cheng

For the last six years, ReJoyce Ross has been a learner at Read Santa Clara, the city library's free literacy program.

"What made me come here was that I was cleaning a lady's house and her husband was there," Ross says. "I was supposed to pull out a special cleaner from under the cabinet, and I didn't know how to find it because I didn’t know how to spell it or read it...The husband asked me if I had trouble reading. I said I did, and he said it was nothing to be ashamed of, that there was a place that can help me, and that was the library. That was the beginning of my journey. When I started, I was at the second-grade level of reading."

Today, Ross, 62, is still a housekeeper, but also employed at a hospital. She enjoys reading her mail, the Bible and other books. Immensely grateful for the Read Santa Clara program, Ross pays it forward by volunteering in her community and speaking to schools and community groups about her reading development.  READ MORE !

Volunteers impact hundreds of lives – including their own
Citizen Times: 4.10.2015 – Opinion

National Volunteer Week is April 12-18. According to Points of Light (www.pointsoflight.org), this observance encourages individuals and communities “to be at the center of social change — discovering and actively demonstrating their collective power to make a difference.”

This National Volunteer Week, the staff of the Literacy Council of Buncombe County would like to honor those volunteers who so often tell us that they get as much out of their experience as do the people they serve. Literacy Council volunteer tutors often humbly imply that they volunteer because:

“Volunteering is exciting. It’s the best two hours of my week.”
“I have made new friends ... and learned some Spanish. It feels good to help folks improve their abilities, too.”
“This is a good fit for me personally — I really am enjoying this.”
“I find it enjoyable, challenging and rewarding. What more could a volunteer ask for?”
“It’s been an enriching experience for me and gratifying to see (my student’s) improvement.” 
“I would be cutting myself off if I decided suddenly not to tutor anymore.”  READ MORE !

Project Read building bridges of literacy and hope
Herald Extra: 4.11.2015 by Debbie Balzotti

Zobeida Escobar, 43, tentatively sits down for the first time with a group of five other adults who have gathered at the Project Read offices in the Provo City Library for their weekly lesson. She is here after being referred to the only literacy program serving adults in Utah County by her former ESL teacher.

“I can speak English really well but I can’t write it well and I want to go to UVU to study business management,” Escobar said. “My testing level is too high for ESL but I need more help for my English writing. I need to study the grammar and which words are best to use. It can be very confusing.”

Members of the group welcomed her and together they read aloud a descriptive passage to identify adjectives and adverbs and their value in descriptive writing. Escobar took a deep breath and began reading an excerpt with words like specificity, mediocre, and generic.  READ MORE !

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Friday, April 24, 2015

On World Book Day, UN hails reading and writing as pillars of sustainable societies

On World Book Day, UN hails reading and writing as pillars of sustainable societies
UN News Centre: 4.23.2015

As global symbols of social progress, books have always been targets for those who reject freedom and tolerance, the United Nations agency mandated with promoting education said today on World Book and Copyright Day, calling the occasion an opportunity to recognize the power of books to change lives for the better.

“In recent months, we have seen attacks on children at school and the public burning of books,” Irina Bokova, Director-General of UN Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), said today.

“In this context, our duty is clear – we must redouble efforts to promote the book, the pen, the computer, along with all forms of reading and writing, in order to fight illiteracy and poverty, to build sustainable societies, to strengthen the foundations of peace,” she added.

Literacy is the door to knowledge, essential to individual self-esteem and empowerment. Books, in all forms, play an essential role here.

World Book and Copyright Day – marked around the world on 23 April – was proclaimed by UNESCO in 1995 and is observed by millions of people in over 100 countries by schools, public organizations and private businesses.

With 175 million adolescents in the world – mostly girls and young women – unable to read a single sentence, UNESCO said it is committed to leading the fight against illiteracy, and for it to be included as a crucial ingredient of the sustainable development goals (SDGs).

“Literacy is the door to knowledge, essential to individual self-esteem and empowerment. Books, in all forms, play an essential role here,” Ms. Bokova stated.

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The Day – 23 April – is a symbolic date for world literature. It is on this date in 1616 that Cervantes, Shakespeare and Inca Garcilaso de la Vega all died. It is also the date of birth or death of other prominent authors, such as Maurice Druon, Vladimir Nabokov and Manuel Mejía Vallejo.  READ MORE !

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