Literacy Volunteers of Illinois - 2008OTRAwardWinners

From left, LVI Board President John McLeod,
Executive Director Dorothy Miaso, and accepting
the award on behalf of Borders are, Sarah Harkins,
District Marketing Manager, Kristen Lee Sohacki,
District Marketing Manager (who was our contact
during the drive), and Wanda Fisher, Regional
Marketing Manager

Company of the Year

"The end result of the book drive was that through the Borders stores and their customers donations over 17,000 books were donated to local literacy programs throughout the Chicago area and several downstate locations." - Dorothy Miaso, Executive Director

2008 On The Road To Literacy Awards Presentation

From left, Board member Maria Thiel, Donald Bartok, Board President
John McLeod and Dora Ivory

Donald Bartok, Prairie State College, Chicago Heights

After semi-retirement and double hip replacements Donald became interested in the tutor training offered at PSC through his wife who was already taking the classes. He has been tutoring math every since ! According to his nominator Dora Ivory, he is often referred to as The Amazing Math-A-Don ! Since November of 2001 he has volunteered from six to seven hours a day, three to four days a week for a total of 4,968 hours. During this time, he taught over 100 students.

Juliette takes an active interest in the lives of her students, according to her nominator Amy Rhoades, and encourages them towards their goals that are both personal and academic. She has a faithful following among her ESL students and has increased the retention rate in our intermediate class tremendously, with the students showing great progress under her leadership. During the most recent testing period, all of her students increased their BEST scores with two of her students increasing two MELT levels in three months.

From left, Board member Maria Thiel, Deborah Fandrei, Lesley Goldberg, and Board President
John McLeod

Deborah Fandrei, Read to Learn Program, Township H.S. District 214,

What makes Debbie an exceptional tutor, according to her nominator Lesley Goldberg, is her infectious enthusiasm, sincere warmth, infinite patience and knowledge and ability to work with any level student. She greets her students with enthusiasm, always cheerful and eager as though she is the one who will be learning new skills. She has tutored for six years and has worked with six students, celebrating every success they have with encouragement and praise.

Robert Graham, Jump Start Program at IYC-St. Charles, Literacy Volunteers of Illinois

Bob teaches basic math through the SAT, with the majority of his students being GED candidates. He is successful with his students and strikes a balance between their interest and math needs. He has been a tutor with us for ten year and taught 35 to 40 students along the way. In addition to his work with Jump Start, he is also a tutor at the county jail, and at Fellowship House where he tutors in ESL. According to his nominator, Dot Read, he is an exceptional tutor who contributes a lot to the community and troubled youth.

From left, Board member Maria Thiel, Amanda
Cross, Sister Helen Joseph Leffner, and Board
President John McLeod

Sister Helen has many years of experience teaching math, English, and Spanish to students. She received her B.A. in English from Mount Mary College and her M.A. in Counseling from DePaul University. Now in her 80’s Sister Helen has been actively tutoring ESL for several hours a day for two to four days per week since 2004. According to nominator Amanda Kross, her students continue with her for years, which is a testament to the quality of her teaching.

From left, Board member Maria Thiel, AmeriCorps member Maria Mata, AmeriCorps member Anthony Workman and Board President John McLeod

Maria Mata, Adult Education Department, Instituto del Progreso Latino,

Maria’s work is exceptional because of her outstanding and admirable level of involvement in student activities and her extraordinary willingness to assist others, wrote her nominator Anthony Workman. She attends and helps set up events such as Immigrant and Refugee Day as well as training sessions. Beyond this, she has supported nearly 40 students and shows her interest in them by attending Student Council meetings. All of this is in addition to her work with English literacy mini-lessons and Spanish-language reading circle students.

Angela Newberry, Jump Start Program at IYC Harrisburg, Literacy Volunteers of Illinois

Angela has an excellent work record, wrote her nominator, Leslie Logeman, and though she was a little intimidated at first working within the prison system, the students' enthusiasm, appreciation, dedication, and hard work made her feel more comfortable. She teaches GED math and several of her students have gone on to get their GED. One student in particular was struggling very hard with plotting points on the graph; however, after many tutoring sessions, the student learned the technique and began teaching other students and soon passed the GED math test !

Bhagwanti Pardasani, Midwest Asian American Center

Bhagwanti has a great sense of humor and an adorable personality, especially when working with limited English speaking elderly, wrote her nominator, Vanda Dalal. She understands the difficulties the students have and gears the programs to their needs. Since July of 2007, Bhagwanti has assisted 80 students in successfully becoming proud citizens of America, which is a remarkable goal. For the past fours years she has tutored at the site and it has been a pleasure and an asset to have her.

Brittney is an effective and versatile tutor providing lessons at various levels of math and reading, as well as computer skills, wrote her nominator, Leslie Logeman. She has an excellent work record with outstanding attendance and promptness. She continues to show commitment, reliability and patience while working as a volunteer tutor. In the one short year that she has been there she has worked with over 30 students.

Joshua Smith, Christopher House

Despite having an extremely busy schedule, his nominator Maria Hetman states that Josh reliably comes to the site every Monday evening to teach ESL In his time at Christopher House Josh has worked with three students, earning their trust and boosting their confidence. Exceedingly patient, he has been known to help mothers with their babies in addition to tutoring. He is an invaluable asset to Christopher House.

Paul Strauss, Blue Gargoyle Adult Learning Center, Chicago

Paul Strauss came to the Blue Gargoyle as a volunteer tutor two years ago. According to his nominator Tom Barbie ”I can’t think of any individual more deserving of recognition for giving so generously of his time and compassion as Paul.” He is devoted to his student Michael and has become his friend and champion, encouraging his optimism in the face of his adversities. Each has developed a respect that is reciprocated by the other.

Tom Swiss, Chinese American Service League,

Tom has been very consistent in volunteering his time for the past five years to teaching students at the CASL and helping them to achieve their goals which are to obtain proper skills in English, acquire better jobs, and obtain citizenship. According to his nominator Jack Magardician, Tom has worked with over 2,000 students during the past five years and, during the last year, contributed 144 hours of his time.

Teresa has time and time again shown her commitment to our lowest-level literacy learners, wrote her nominators Kristin Pomykala and Megan Wells. Since becoming involved with the program two years ago she has tutored four students and offered home visits to her students who are from countries with different writing systems and who might otherwise feel isolated in the classroom. She has also encouraged her student’s children, family, and friends to become involved in the process of learning too! She has done her own research on how adult low-level literacy students learn best, and one of her current tutoring activities is an alphabet book, which facilitates a hands-on language learning experience.

Anthony Leo Workman, Instituto del Progreso Latino

Anthony has the initiative and reliability to help others as all tutors and educators should have, wrote his nominator Maria Mata. He is an exceptional tutor because he worries about his students, motivates them to study, and looks for the best ways to individually help them learn. He is constantly looking for creative ways to teach his students and incorporates popular novels and tapes in his curriculum. His encouragement to his students to regularly attend school and do their best gives them the confidence to actually come to school and really learn.

From left, Jump Start coordinator Dot Read,
Charles Young and Board President John
McLeod

Charles is an exceptionally diverse volunteer who is equally comfortable with tutoring as he is with training tutors, especially in math, wrote his nominator, Dot Read. He has been involved with Jump Start for the past six years and in the last year volunteered over 150 hours. Out of the fifteen students with whom he has worked while tutoring at the site, Charles has had five students succeed in obtaining their GED. He has also mentored students who desired a career in the armed forces, assisted two students in enrolling in NIU’s “Chance” Program and assisted another in enrolling in culinary school.

From left, Board member Maria Thiel, Jean Zwick, Board President John McLeod, and
AmeriCorps member Brandi Williams

Jean Zwick, Anixter Center, Chicago

Jean is a kind and soft-spoken woman who is passionate about her role as a volunteer tutor, wrote her nominator Brandi Williams. Rather than acting as a manager of a client’s literacy program, she analyzes the student’s needs and together they develop goals and a plan of action for achieving those goals. Jean continually seeks the students input and praises not only their successes but their failures – because, to her, more important than the right answer is the attempt to answer. In December of 2007 she was the volunteer highlight for the January 2008 program newsletter

Tutor of the Year

Albert Guevara, The Literacy Connection in Elgin, Illinois

From left, Board member Maria Thiel, nominator
Anna Orozco accepting award and Board President John McLeod

CeCe M. Tilsley New Reader Leadership Award

Ben Bickerstaff, Carl Sandburg College

Ben is a student in the Adult Literacy Program at Carl Sandburg College and a member and officer of the New Readers for New Life organization at Sandburg College. He is also the Treasurer of the New Readers Readers for New Life of Illinois organization and an active participant in the undertakings of both organizations. His program tells us that he is a constant source of support to them and the other adult learners in the program, and is forever the optimist when helping others in making their dreams come true.

From left, Board member Maria Thiel, Ben
Bickerstaff, and New Reader President Robert
Dowling, with a member of the CeCe Tilsley
family

Members of the CeCe M. Tilsley family