[NLA] Archie's New Year Wishes

Tue Dec 11 14:56:31 EST 2001

Thank you, Archie, for your suggestion.  Both Laubach and Literacy
Volunteers of America have a history of commitment to student involvement.
We intend to preserve this as a part of our collective legacy  in
"NewLitOrg".  We have agreed, for example, that the new organization will
have at least one student on its governing Board, and that there will be
meaningful opportunities for student involvement in decision making
throughout the various divisions of the organization.

We have also formed a task force made up of student leaders from both
organizations that is going to make recommendations to us about a new
student advisory group that will advise the president and CEO of the new
organization on matters of interest to students.  This task force is being
chaired by John Zickefoose, whom many of you know.

These mechanisms have been designed to ensure that students have
opportunities to influence the decision-making of "NewLitOrg" on a variety
of matters, and so that students do not simply assume token roles.  We also
will be open to the possibility that a student may be the best candidate for
new employment positions that are created as a result of the merger.

> ******************************************************
> Nothing great was ever accomplished without enthusiasm.  ~~Ralph Waldo
Emerson
> ******************************************************
> Marsha L. Tait
> President, Literacy Volunteers of America, Inc.
> Chair, National Coalition For Literacy
>  635 James Street, Syracuse, NY 13203
> Tel: (315) 472-0001   Fax: (315) 472-0002
> mailto:mtait at literacyvolunteers.org
> http://www.literacyvolunteers.org
http://www.natcoalitionliteracy.org

-----Original Message-----
From: nla-admin at lists.literacytent.org
[mailto:nla-admin at lists.literacytent.org]On Behalf Of Archie Willard
Sent: Monday, December 10, 2001 9:05 AM
To: _NLA LISTSERV
Subject: [NLA] My New Year Wishes

To The adult learners and The literacy field

At the end of each year a few people on the listserv make their end of
the year comments. I have done so in the past. Most of the comments are
about making changes in literacy.  Changes are hard to make and
sometimes hard to accept. From time to time this past year I have
expressed on the listserv most of the changes I would like to see take
place. Changes that others wish for have also been expressed in the past
year.  Being an advocate for adult learners, I have two wishes for the
New Year that I have not expressed.

(Wish one)   I would like to see all 50 states have members in the VALUE
organization. VALUE has members in thirty-four states. If you know adult
learners from the 16 states that are not represented, please encourage
them to join VALUE. If you have been a member and did not rejoin please
take the time to come back and help us make society a better place for
non-readers. There are many different kinds of membership and anyone can
join. VALUE members are the only ones who will be able to use the VALUE
listserv so you need to join to keep communicating with other members on
the VALUE listserv. Listed below are the states that are not represented
as having a VALUE membership:

New Hampshire, South Carolina, Tennessee, Mississippi, Louisiana,
Arkansas, Missouri, Kansas, North Dakota, Nebraska, Colorado, Wyoming,
Montana, Idaho, Utah, and Nevada

VALUE can do a lot of little things that become big things in lives of
adult learners. It can develop leadership, give adult learners the
courage to work around their literacy problems, help adult learners find
out who they are, help them to find a place in life and to find
happiness. When we do the little things first, adult learners become
better student learners.

As I reflect on the history of VALUE I can remember in December 1996
making telephone calls to 5 other adult learners: Toni Cordell from the
state of New York at that time, Dale Chrisitianson from Illinois, Pat
Blackwell from Indiana, Senitila McKinley from Oregon, and John
Zickefoose from California. I asked each of them if they wanted to be a
part of forming a national adult learner group and they all agreed to
take part. We had many conference calls to plan our first meeting. This
first meeting was a leadership academy at Illinois State University in
Bloomington, Illinois, August 1997. We came away feeling that this
leadership academy was more successful than we could have dreamed. Other
people encouraged us to keep going. Ed Castor, an adult learner from
Indiana and other professionals joined our group in the fall of 1997 and
helped us plan the founding meeting of VALUE. This meeting was held at
the Highlander retreat outside of Knoxville, Tennessee in March 1998.
Forty adult learners attended this meeting to help with the formation of
this new organization, temporary by-laws were put in place, and the
organization was given the name Voice For Adult Literacy United For
Education (VALUE). In June 1999 the first National VALUE Conference was
held in Indianapolis, Indiana and we were growing. The National VALUE
Conference held in Columbus, Ohio, last summer was a very successful
conference. VALUE is an organization that is on the move. This is an
amazing story of how 6 adult learners from 6 different states got
together and started a national adult learner organization using
computers and conference calls to communicate.

(Wish 2)  In the past Toni Cordell and Ed Castor were two adult learners
who became professionals in the literacy field.  Toni worked for Laubach
Literacy and Ed worked for General Motors. They traveled around the
country bringing awareness about illiteracy and encouraged other adult
learners to make reading improvements. Adults with reading problems
looked up to them and found hope. Today we don’t have adult learners
with their kind of exposure as role models. With the upcoming merger of
Laubach and LVA I suggest the new organization hire a full time adult
learner who has gone through an adult literacy program to work in a
student affairs position. This would show how serious the new
organization is about involving and helping adult learners. I feel now
would be the ideal time to do this.

Happy Holidays,
Archie Willard
President Emeritus of VALUE

--
Archie Willard
millard at goldfieldaccess.net
FAX - 515-448-3213
URL - http://www.readiowa.org/archiew.html

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LiteracyTent: web hosting, news, community and goodies for literacy
http://literacytent.org