Literacy Volunteers of America, Essex & Passaic Counties, NJ Inc.

February 2017

Volume 5, Issue 2

The Insider

The Insider, the monthly newsletter of LVA, Essex & Passaic Counties, will keep you in the loop on all of the organization’s upcoming events.

Tutors became poets for a day as they took words clipped from newspaper headlines and created poetry during Margaret Valentine’s “Using Poetry to Build Language Skills and Vocabulary,” a hands-on, tutor support workshop this month.

Literacy Volunteers of America Essex & Passaic Counties

90 Broad Street, 2nd Floor, Bloomfield, NJ 07003
(973) 566-6200, ext. 217 or 225

195 Gregory Avenue, 2nd Floor, Passaic, NJ 07055
(973) 470-0039

Cristhian Barcelos      -Executive Director
                                           cbarcelos@lvaep.org
Russell Ben Ali         -Recruitment & Training Coordinator
                         rbenali@lvaep.org
Jorge Chavez               -Data Processing Coordinator
                                           jchavez@lvaep.org
Debbie Graham           -Education Coordinator
                                           dgraham@lvaep.org
Mary O’Connor          -Trainer & Tutor Support Specialist
                                           moconnor@lvaep.org
Marisol Ramirez          -Student Coordinator
                                           mramirez@lvaep.org

The Insider

Greetings LVA Family,

In the aftermath of the contentious presidential election and a recent executive order that seeks to ban entrance to the U.S. for refugees and others from seven predominantly Muslim countries, non-profit organizations around the country have sought to ease the anxieties of immigrants they are charged with helping. Many of their clients have reported fears of deportation, bias attacks and intimidation.

New Jersey Association for Lifelong Learning (NJALL), which quickly issued a “Statement Against Bigotry and Violence” following reports of post-election violence, will team with two non-profits, New Jersey Alliance for Immigrant Justice and Make the Road New Jersey, to offer a free webinar on Friday, February 24, that focuses on strategies to protect the rights of immigrants and implications for adult education. Details on Page 2.

Earlier this month, ProLiteracy President Kevin Morgan wrote of growing concern and anxiety that immigration policy changes are causing students, instructors, and staff. Full statement at: https://goo.gl/YOvOuO

Our own website can be a huge resource to students, with information on everything from immigration legal services to free and low cost health clinics. See our “Resources” page at: http://www.lvaep.org/students.html

While many of us teach English as a Second Language to adults, UNESCO reminds us that mother languages are equally important, and some are disappearing. The UN agency celebrates “International Mother Language Day 2017” on February 21. https://goo.gl/xyM20D

In the News

To view the following stories, copy and paste the highlighted website into an internet search bar.

‘South Orange Synagogues welcome refugee family,’ New Jersey Jewish News   https://goo.gl/vobjcy

‘Fascinating world map reveals each nation’s second language,’ Daily Mail. https://goo.gl/nQR30Z

‘N.J. sued over 'shocking' lack of special education for inmates,’   nj.com https://goo.gl/DmdH2Q

“For more firms, teaching English is in business plan,’ Boston Globe    https://goo.gl/IK796s

Esteban, a Peruvian native, has worked his way to become our most advanced ESL student. A computer programmer for years, he’s now planning a very different career.

Tutor Support Workshops

Tutor Support Workshops

“Teaching Vocabulary With Pictures,”
with Mary Kao
Bloomfield Public Library
90 Broad Street, 2nd Floor Boardroom
Bloomfield, NJ 07003
Tuesday, March 21, 2017; 1:00-2:30 pm
Please bring a pair of paper-cutting scissors

Tutor Training Workshops

Belleville Public Library
221 Washington Avenue, Teen Center
Belleville, NJ 07109
Tuesdays and Thursdays
March 7-23, 2017; 12:00-3:00 pm

Hilton Branch, Maplewood Memorial Library
1688 Springfield Avenue
Maplewood, NJ 07040
Mondays and Thursdays
April 3-20, 2017; 1:00-4:00 pm

NJALL Webinar

“Immigration Now: An Update on New Immigration Policies and How Communities Are Responding”
Friday, February 24, 2017, 1:00-2:00 pm.
https://goo.gl/LV4ZfQ

Getting to Know Us
Esteban, LVA student

In his native Peru, Esteban was absorbed by a career in the computer industry. Later, his ambitions would change dramatically, leading him down a very different career path, one he plans to tell the world about it in a book.

Esteban left Peru with his wife and two young daughters and settled in Essex County a year-and-a-half ago. He joined LVA and, with lots of hard work and extreme dedication, has become our most advanced ESL student. “We are proud of Esteban and he is ready for greater and better things,” said Cristhian Barcelos, Executive Director of LVA, Essex & Passaic.

Esteban grew up in Lima, Peru’s capital city. A self- described “homebody,” he was fascinated by computers at a young age. “Someone brought a computer from the U.S. in the early 1980s,” he said. “It was a very big, sophisticated computer and that is when I became interested.”

As a teen, he worked with a friend during school vacations as a computer game salesman. “We didn’t sell any games but we did meet a lot of top people in the video game industry,” he remembered.

It was these connections that moved him toward his future career. Esteban studied computer programming at TECSUP, a Lima technical college, and later became the head of the computer department for a nutritional research institute.

Later, Esteban began programming something entirely different: the human mind. To prepare himself, he studied hypnosis and Neuro Linguistic Programming (NLP).

NLP, according to online sources, describes the fundamental dynamics between mind (neuro) and language (linguistic), and how their interplay affects our body and behavior (programming). “Every thought is an interpretation of an experience,” Esteban explained. “We can go back and change that experience by changing the thoughts we have about it.”

Esteban is writing a book about his experiences in this field. If he shows the same determination we’ve seen in his pursuit to master English, look for his name on the best-seller list.

Literacy opens a wide door to life. Help us keep that door open with your donation!

Thanks in large part to you, we are able to aid hundreds of students each year. Please continue your efforts to improve the lives of others by giving the gift of literacy. You can contribute by mailing us a check or through our website @:

http://www.lvaep.org/donate.html

Trump’s Promises of Deportations Create Uncertainty for N.J. Family
National Public Radio

This story is part of Kitchen Table Conversations, a series from NPR's National Desk that examines how Americans from all walks of life are moving forward from the presidential election.

In some ways, Desiree Armas is your typical high school senior. She's getting ready to take the test for her driver's license. And she's applying to colleges.

"Only my best friend knows. No one else in school, besides my counselors," Armas says. "That's something I don't tell anyone. Because you never know."

President-elect Donald Trump has pledged to deport millions of immigrants living in the country illegally. And that's creating even more uncertainty for thousands of families. Many of those families — including the Armases — will travel to Washington, D.C., this weekend for a rally focusing on the rights of immigrants.

Desiree Armas left Peru with her parents when she was 3. Today the family lives in a small, tidy apartment in working-class Elizabeth, N.J. Desiree's mother, Olga Armas, says the family first arrived in the U.S. in 2002 and stayed to seek a better future for their daughter. "The beginning was very hard," Olga Armas says through a translator. "It was difficult to come. We arrived here with nothing to a lot of uncertainty. No pans or pots or even a spoon."

In Peru, Olga's college-educated husband, Carlos, had a white-collar job with an airline. In New Jersey, he gets up at 4 a.m. to load pallets at a paper warehouse. When his parents died, Carlos Armas couldn't go back for their funerals.

Reprinted from National Public Radio. For full story, paste the following link into an Internet search: https://goo.gl/2ckScx

Student Resources

Learning a new culture is more than studying a language. Tutoring is more than learning techniques. Our ‘Resources’ page covers everything from legal matters, health care, & scholarships for immigrants, to professional development for tutors. Give us a look @:

http://www.lvaep.org/students.html

Getting to Know Us (cont.)
Margaret Valentine, LVA tutor

There’s a secret to Margaret Valentine’s long, successful career as a teacher, one she’s quick to employ as a volunteer literacy tutor. And it’s all about staying positive.

“Tell them how great they are,” said Margaret, a former university and 12th grade English teacher and school administrator for 30 years, and an LVA tutor who’s big on positive reinforcement.

“Be honest and be specific,” she explained. “They need to understand exactly what it is they are doing well. Where they start and where they finish is not as important as their enthusiasm and dedication in between.”
And it’s working. Margaret asks that her student read for a half-hour every day and write about what she’s read. “You are a teacher’s dream, you don’t get discouraged,” she tells her student who has shown a dramatic improvement in language skills, according to her recent test.

Margaret uses modeled reading and other techniques to help develop her student’s reading skills, and the Bananagrams word game to encourage vocabulary and spelling.

A grandmother of four, Margaret’s an avid reader who, in her own words, “lives in books.” She’s also a poet who has run poetry workshops for teachers. Earlier this month, she presented a support workshop for our tutors, “Using Poetry to Build Language Skills and Vocabulary,” which was a very hands-on and well-received demonstration.

“It was good and it was fun and useful information for using with either ESL or basic literacy students,” said LVA tutor Jalaire Craver, who attended Margaret’s workshop. “I can imagine myself doing that in a class with my students.”

Margaret has taught English to nearly two thousand students over the years and enjoys corresponding with some of them. One former student, now a highly-ranked lawyer, sent Margaret a link to a New York Times story, which showed the former student descending a flight of stairs. The building was the U.S. Supreme Court. “I love hearing about my former students’ lives,” Margaret said.