Toolkits: Creating a Newsletter

By Jose Armendariz
Serving at the Boys & Girls Club of Santa Monica

Here, at the Boys and Girls Club of Mar Vista Gardens, we encounter so much creativity from every member. Members are able to apply and further develop their creativity with the different activities and resources available throughout the rooms inside the club. Also, the club incubates different groups such as Torch Club, Key Stone, Smart Girls, and Passport to Manhood, which interact within the club or the local community with their service or by organizing different events for the members to participate. So, there are always plenty of projects always going on, but photographs posted in the window’s office would be the only documentation of the happenings at the club. A newspaper emerged as an idea to engage members with creative writing, and as a source to document everything that was occurring at the club. A meeting was scheduled in order to designate roles for the members interested in participating as correspondents or editors. During that meeting members also voted for the newspaper’s name, “The Mar Vista Gardens BGC Bugle.”

The newspaper is a tool that will become sustainable after our service is completed because the content of it is brainstormed and elaborated by the members, and there is an official template that is only a click away from being updated each month.

The newspaper has been successful due to its flexible content, which changes every month according to the member’s topic of interest. The stories published in the newspaper depict the different likes, concerns, or queries of the writers involved in creating an article; and, each story is entertaining to read since it really portrays the character and spirit of the member in charge of it. Also, it is important to add that members rejoice being part of the newspaper crew since they discover new aspects of the club or the people inside of it. Members enjoy developing each story or article because they have to interact with other members or staff to get the information needed to finish their work. For example, members who are young and cannot explore the teen’s room; they can do so while writing a story regarding the teen’s perspective about a situation or an event. Members in charge of a story usually perform interviews in order to compile information to add to their story.

Overall, the newspaper has been well received by the members of the club, and the members in charge of it are truly excited to work on it.

Helping Students and Parents Learn to Love Reading

By Madeline S. Collazo, AmeriCorps VISTA Program Associate, Jewish Coalition for Literacy

Bio: Being an avid volunteer, Madeline has served in the East Coast, West Coast, Puerto Rico, and even American Samoa.

When I was a little girl, my favorite time of day was story-time. After I got ready for bed, I would pick out one of my favorite books. My mother would then read aloud as I listened and drifted off to sleep, cocooned in stories of dragons and princesses and children who would not eat their vegetables. I remember my excitement the day I looked down at the page and discovered I could read the words along with my mother, the stories I loved leaping off of the page.

For many children, there is no story-time. The only exposure they get to reading is in the classroom, and for many, this simply isn’t enough. Boosting reading skills at a young age is crucial for future success and, in order for students to get the most out of school, they should also have reading support at home. My current position as an AmeriCorps VISTA at the Jewish Coalition for Literacy (JCL) is focused on Parent and Community Engagement; my top priority is organizing and facilitating workshops for parents who want to practice basic English vocabulary, pronunciation, and structure so that they can read books at home along with their children. Since September 2013 alone, JCL conducted more than 100 parent workshops in public schools across the Bay Area, helping communities that are often marginalized and underserved.

Phyllis Harrison, principal of North Shoreview Montessori School in San Mateo and long-time JCL partner, believes that JCL’s parent workshops have a multi-generational effect on families, benefiting the parents who come to the workshop, their children who now benefit from a reading-friendly home, and consequently, future generations in the family. “By coming to their child’s school every week, parents need and want to know that North Shoreview is their child’s home away for home,” Harrison told me.

Parents love the workshops as well, which provide them with the skills they need to help their children excel. Mothers, fathers, and guardians are their children’s first teachers, and the most trusted person in their sons’ and daughters’ lives. Sara L. Gomez, who faithfully goes to JCL’s “Reading Together in English” workshop every Tuesday morning at an elementary school in San Francisco, said: “I love to learn English so that I can help my daughter.” Dina Estevez, another regular at the Tuesday session, added that “it is very fun and we practice a lot of English.”

It is thanks to this enthusiasm and growing interest that JCL’s workshops are developing a new cadre of parents committed to their children’s reading success, and to creating supportive home reading experiences. Together, we are making story-time the new favorite time of day.

Interested in inspiring a young reader? Check out JCL’s website at www.jclread.org.

 
Read the Original Article

 

National Service VISTA* Video!

Neighborhood Advocate

by Anna Gettles
serving at Hands On Asheville-Buncombe in North Carolina

 

When I think of a community member that has made a significant impact to our Enka Middle Community School program, Terry School comes immediately to mind. She is passionate about Enka Middle School as it is the only public middle school option for youth in her neighborhood. The school is currently overcrowded with over 1000 students and 60% of these students qualify for free and reduced lunch. She sees the need for more community involvement and believes that it can make a difference in the lives of the students and families of Enka Middle.

(Terry using a hedge trimmer on an overgrown bush

 for our Make a Difference Day event.)

She lives just 5 minutes away from the school in Biltmore Lake, a neighborhood with over 500 families. Terry is such an asset to this program, and has emerged as a compassionate and devoted volunteer leader. She serves as a vital link between Enka Middle Community School and the Biltmore Lake neighborhood.



Here are a few ways she has served this year:

·          Member of Community School Advisory Committee (which meets monthly)

·          Volunteered for Make a Difference Day school beautification project

·          Organized a neighborhood meeting about Enka Middle Community School in order to recruit more volunteers  and spread the word about our program

·         Recruited over 15 volunteers  from her neighborhood so far

·         Volunteered for Enka Family Fun Night, helping to serve food to over 90 attendees

·         Provided outreach by emailing her entire neighborhood volunteer opportunities

·         Coordinated a clothing drive in her neighborhood for the Enka Middle School Clothing Closet (which provides clothing for students in need)

·         Assisted us in securing over $500 in donations to go towards student and family programming

·         Organized a volunteer event to assist Enka Middle’s AIG teacher in a class mosaic project

·         Committed to volunteering for our Healthy Cooking on a Budget classes this spring AND to becoming a volunteer Literacy Tutor, giving 1-2 hours of her time each week to work with a student in need of assistance in literacy skills

 Terry is an invaluable resource to the Enka Middle Community School. I believe that Terry is very important to the sustainability of our program and through her volunteer efforts she is helping to promote a positive image of the school within the Enka-Candler community. It is our hope to continue developing our relationship with Terry and her neighborhood to ensure many more years of community involvement for the Enka Middle Community School program.