Literacy Specialists positions are open

The Write to Read adult literacy program has two Literacy Specialists positions immediately available. These are provisional positions.

 

The two Literacy Specialist positions open are:

 

Tutor Coordinator 0.5 FTE - Coordinate, train, and recruit tutors for one-on-one tutoring and Reading Clubs for second language learners. Match tutors with learners and support the integration of learners into small group in-depth learning.

 

Literacy Teacher 1.0 FTE - Teach ABE classes for adult learners at County library branches and community sites. Develop curriculum, learning materials, train peer tutors and work as a team with contract teachers providing reading and writing small group learning to a diverse urban population of adult learners.

 

Candidates must still apply with the County. The Alameda County job announcement, on-line application and supplemental questionnaire are available at www.acgov.org. To go directly to the job announcement, click here. Last date for filing is June 6, 2008 at 4:30 PM.

 

All candidates must apply for the Literacy Specialist position no matter what the specific working job description they are interested in or have been hired as a provisional employee. The top five finalists in the Civil Service Oral Exam. Finalists will be interviewed by the Alameda County Library and adult literacy staff for the positions below. When applying state both full time and part-time preference and County location. The positions below are locatd in Fremont at the Extension Services in the AC Library administration building. Those candidates who have been hired as provisional employees must re-apply and be on the top five selected.

 

For more information, please call Dr. Luis Kong, Write to Read program director.

(501) 745-1484

lkong@aclibrary.org

Literacy Specialist position open

The Write to Read adult literacy program has a Literacy Specialist position open to coordinate volunteer tutors in our expanding program. Please see the description below or click here Literacy Specialist to print the announcement and here for the Application. Please post or distribute to interested persons. If you have any questions, please contact Luis Kong, program director, at (510) 745-1484

 Alameda County Library

Literacy Specialist 

Part-time Position Minimum 18.75 hours per week

$24.63-29.25 approx. Hourly Rate + Pro-Rated Benefits Alameda County Library is currently recruiting for a Provisional Literacy Specialist.  This is a permanent part-time position.  The current vacant position works directly with adult basic education and immigrant populations, and the tutors and instructors who provide literacy services. 

 

POSITION:  Under general supervision of the Program Manager and in coordination with staff, coordinates small groups, volunteer adult literacy tutors and student pairs in Alameda County Library service areas including library branches in Newark, Fremont, Union City, San Lorenzo, Castro Valley and Dublin.  Positions in this series perform functions in direct support of Literacy Project Managers at the Alameda County Library’s Extension Services located in Fremont, CA. 

 

This position is responsible for assisting in the training of small group reading club tutors, volunteers and individual tutors; referring tutors to appropriate reading materials; assisting in the scheduling and convening of workshops for tutors and students.  Other duties include screening prospective volunteer tutors and learners; assisting in the selection of books for the literacy collection; matching students with tutors.  Knowledge of life skills and pre-GED instruction is helpful. 

 

MINIMUM QUALIFICATIONS:  Possession of a bachelor’s degree from an accredited college or university and the equivalent of two (2) years full-time experience providing instruction in both reading and writing to adults in a professional or public setting.   

 

DESIRED QUALIFICATION:  The equivalent of two (2) years full-time experience providing administrative support in an agency whose primary purpose is to (1) teach adults and children and/or (2) manage, coordinate or administer a volunteer service is highly desirable. 

 

Salary:  $24.63 with step progression to $29.25 hourly and pro-rated benefits. 

 

APPLY:  The County application form may be obtained directly on the Alameda County website:  www.acgov.org.  Click on any posting and find “Apply.” Please send completed County application and current resume to:  Luis Kong, Ed.D., Alameda County Library, 2450 Stevenson Blvd., Fremont, CA  94538.  Send questions via e-mail to:  lkong@aclibrary.org.  APPLY IMMEDIATELY may close at any time.  EEO 

POLICIES AND PROCEDURE FOR USING LIBRARY BOOKS

·        If the tutor has selected a library book, the coordinator reserves and collects as many books as there are students signed up for the reading club, plus two extras – one for the tutor, and one extra to be used for in class use only (for students who might join the reading club later on.) 

 ·        The coordinator checks these books out to the tutor’s library card.  

·        On the first day of the reading club class, the tutor distributes books to the students, and makes time at the end of class to take students up to the check-out counter and have them re-check the book out to the student’s library card.  There is no need to use the book sign out sheet to keep track of who has what library book now.  ·        Students and tutor are responsible for renewing their books when necessary.   

·        If a student joins a class mid-session, the tutor lends them the in-class copy of the book for that class meeting.  For “homework,” the new student is responsible for checking out a copy of the book from the library, or requesting a book from another library if necessary.  The tutor can help students with this if necessary at the end of the class. (*If a tutor is not sure how to do this, a librarian will be happy to show them and the student.) 

·        If a tutor has any extra copies of the book after the first day, the tutor should simply return them to the library. That way the books will be in the system for anyone who needs one later on.  

·        The Book Sign-out sheets will only be needed for books that are NOT library books—books that are “Program Copies.” The sign out sheet is a way for tutors and staff to keep track of who has these books and who returns them. At the end of a session, staff will collect those forms in order to contact any students who are still holding on to program copies of books. 

Welcome New Tutors

During our February tutor trainings, eight new tutors joined Write to Read. Three will be tutoring in our Reading Clubs and five in our short term one-to-one tutoring. Thank you very much for your time and commitment. Welcome to  Write to Read!

Reading Club tutors (Krist Shaffer, teacher/trainer): 

Patrice Miller–Dublin

Patricia Cordeira–Fremont

Lisa Lee–San Lorenzo

One-on One Tutors (Kiran Malavade, teacher/trainer):

Joan Lewis–Castro Valley/SLZ

Linda Samaniego–UCY/Newark

Poh Ngau–Newark/Fremont

Kristin Speck–Dublin

Book Review for “Life Is So Good”

I like the memoir because George Dawson never gave up his dream to read and write. George was born in the late 1800’s. His parents were not slaves, but his grandparents were once slaves. George was raised in Texas. His family was poor, and he never attended school. Georges started working at a very young age, drawing water from the well each morning for the house. George worked alongside his father in the fields. The work was hard, so was their life. They had to watch what they said and went in fear of the K.K.K. Twelve year old George went to work, and stayed with a white family to help out at home. His cousins came to live with his family because their parents died, so George was needed at home. George left home at twenty-one and worked in Tennessee building levees. It was two years before he returned back home.Life is So Good is a story about George Dawson’s dreams of receiving mail, learning to read and write at the age of ninety-eight, and his work ethic. I can relate to George’s hard work and his work ethic. I beleive in hard work and doing it right the first time.

This book is sad and tells of struggles he had to go through. It is not easy reading at first because the chapters jumped around. But overall, it is a good book to read.

Book Review for “The Pact “

The Pact is about three young men who lived in the projects around drugs and peer pressure from old friends who did not want anything out of life. So George and Sam and Rameck made a pact to go to college. The young men had positive people in their lives, like a teacher, a friend’s father, and a dentist. I would recommend this book to other people because the book tells how three young men made a pact with one another not to let peer presure rule their lives. They went to college and gave back to the neighborhood. They are all doctors and a dentist. They had some disappointments in their lives, but they made it. This is a true story.

Book Review for “Dragonwings:Golden Mountain”

Dragonwings is a good book to read because you have a good feeling to know someone’s dream came true, like Moonshadow’s father’s dream. Moonshadow is a young man. When he was just [...], he had a chance to join his father who he had never seen before in the United States. He went through a difficult time passing immigration. This book talks about how Chinese people settled down in Chinatown and the experience in 1906 with the big earthquake in San Francisco, and then how Moonshadow and his father relocated to Oakland. Moonshadow’s father is a good kite maker, and he has a fabulous dream to make a flying machine. Moon Shadow writes a letter to the Wrights telling them how his father likes to fly too, and wishes they can help him. The father’s dream came true when he made a flying machine in 1909. Lawrence Yep’s historical novels shows rich traditions and the culture of the Chinese community. I will recommend this book to people who are American born Chinese because they can learn from this book about how difficult it was for their ancesters to get into this country, and how they worked so hard and how they survived in white society, so they will appreciate them. Overall it is a good book to read, I just have some words that were hard to understand for me, maybe because they are too old fashioned.

Welcome New Tutors

We want to welcome seven new volunteer tutors to the Write to Read Adult Literacy Program who will be working at several Alameda County library branches. They attended a Saturday, November 3rd training in the morning (Reading Clubs) and afternoon (one-on-one) facilitated by our Write to Read teachers and tutor coordinators, Krista Shaffer and Kiran Malavade. Thank you very much for your participation, especially to June Coffeen and Helen Flaherty who will be starting the first Reading Clubs in Castro Valley and Dublin branch libraries.

 If you are interested in becoming a tutor, call Write to Read at (510) 745-1480

New Reading Club tutors June Coffeen-Castro Valley

Helen Flaherty–Dublin

Linda Alpers–Newark

New 1-1 tutors

Brian Goodman

Candy Montalvo

June Coffeen

Hanna Szoke

Some activities from Sanju

reading-clubs-what-if-questions.doc  reading-clubs-idioms-quiz-2-1.doc  reading-clubs-idioms-quiz-1-1.doc  reading-clubs-flash-cards-word-exercise-2.doc  activity1.doc  Here are some of Sanju’s activities that she used in her reading club, both as conversation starters and as ways to build her students’ vocabulary. 

Book Review for “The Secret School”

 I think that this is a good book to read. This book tells about several children that go to a school in the early 1900’s in the Colorado Mountains.There is one teacher that teaches several grades. There are two students who are ready to graduate, but the teacher has some bad news, that she has to go back home to take care of her mother that is very ill. So she cannot continue teaching class even though the semester is almost over. There is a man that is called Mr. Jordan. He owns a store and is also the head of the local school board. He decides that the school will be closed for the rest of the semester since there is no time to find a substitute teacher, which upsets the students because they’re supposed to take the school exit test. This way they will know if they will go to high school. One of the students is very smart when it comes to electronic things, and his name is Tom. And then there is Ida. Ida wants to be a teacher so she really wants to take her exit test. So one day Tom and Ida start talking about how to keep the school open so they can all attend school. They come up with a plan that Ida will be the teacher. So they can take the exit test, and everybody will be able to learn. So Ida becomes the teacher and continues teaching where Miss Fletcher left off. She thought that being a teacher would be an easy thing to do. She had to make the class assignments and also check them as well. Plas she also needed to make sure she taught herself as well. This went went for some time. Then Mr. Jordan finds out and calls a board meeting to let the parents know what Ida was doing.If you enjoy reading what I wrote, you may want to check out this book. It’s a good book to read. It shows how if you set your mind to something that you want, and if you do not give up trying, then one day you can say, “I did it.”