Learners Running for VALUE Board
(Posted January, 2001)

Five members are running for those three positions:  Darlene Garcia, Harold Lockwood, Nancy Shields, Donna Swain, and Jennie Winnix.  These candidates were nominated by fellow members this past fall.

The winners will join eight members who are remaining with the board: Gloria Ashford (California), Pat Blackwell (Indiana), Ed Castor (Indiana), Kitty Gilane (Wisconsin), Calvin Miles (New York), Annette Sessions (Connecticut), Dale Sherman (Ohio), and Emma Torrez (California). Three members of last year’s board (Archie Willard, Marty Finsterbusch, and Ed Tomasso) have stepped down from the board. (Marty has moved over to become VALUE’s Executive Director. Archie will remain active as Chairman Emeritus.)

VALUE’s board members play important, active leadership roles. They decide policies and carry out the day-to-day work of running a national organization. Members head the committees which are in charge of conference planning, fundraising, our web site, membership recruitment, advocacy, board elections, overseeing our budget, and getting a nonprofit status for VALUE.

Learner members are being asked to complete the ballot and get it in the mail to our Nominating Committee by January 26th.  The Committee will announce the results by early February.

Members will receive the statements from the candidates shown below.  This will help members make an informed choice.

If you have questions about this election, please contact VALUE's Executive Director, Marty Finsterbusch, at 610/876-4811.

Statements of the Five Candidates for the VALUE Board
January 2001

Darlene Garcia (Fremont, California)

What I have done as a learner/student leader:
   
I'm very active in my community and bring awareness to others of the importance of literacy. I have shared with tutors the perspective of being a learner/student in a literacy program. I have set up library and literacy booths for community events for outreach. I have designed student orientations to introduce new students to our program to explain our student-centered participatory philosophy. I do follow-up with new and old students to question them on their progress in their classes after they have been in class for 6 weeks. This is also a way to assess tutors and the program, and to find out more on what more students want from their classes and the program.

The reason I want to be a VALUE Board Member:
       
I have been in the literacy program since 1993 as a student advocate. In this time I have helped form a national literacy organization, spoken numbers of times to the public about literacy, and shared my learning experience with others. I helped design and distribute the Easy Reader Voter Guide to local communities. I learned interviewing skills for Bay Area Breast Cancer Survivors as part of the Breast Cancer Oral History Project to bring awareness to public. Through all this experience I have shown and proven my leadership skills as a literacy student, and if I'm part of VALUE’s board I feel I will also learn new leadership skills and be able to share what I already know.

Thank you

Harold Lockwood (Belmont, New York)

Some of the things I've done:

-- GED Diploma
-- Providing leadership and direction
-- Student of the year at LVA-AC.
-- Basic Reading Tutor Training from LVA - AC.
-- Student Leadership Institute and Student Ambassador
-- Past member, National Student Advisory Board
-- Member, Board of Directors LVA- AC Affiliate
-- I'm a Tutor Trainer
-- I've done workshops at LVA National Conferences; also State Student Conference.
-- Yesterday I received word that I had been chosen for the NYACCE (New York Association for Continuing and Community Education's) student of the year.

Reasons I want to be part of VALUE:

-- LVA helped me to improve my self worth.
-- LVA & VALUE are striving to help Adult Literacy throughout  the USA.
-- Being a former student of LVA and now a tutor and tutor trainer, and a member of a board of directors and chair of Resource and Development Committee, I feel I can contribute a lot as a VALUE Board member.

Nancy Shields (Delaware City, Delaware)

I am VALUE member Nancy Shields from Delaware.  I was in a literacy program starting in 1989 for 3 years.  For the last 12 years I have been promoting student involvement and leadership: National, State & Local levels.  Worked on the planning committee for the National Adult Literacy Congresses. Worked with Laubach Literacy Action and Literacy Volunteers of America (LVA), and many other groups. I have been a full time paid staff person for literacy and adult education statewide in Delaware for 6 years. I am one of the founders for OAASIS, the statewide adult learner student organization.  You can read all about OAASIS on the VALUE web site at literacynet.org/value under News from the States. I want to and do help other learners to be successful, and to promote literacy throughout the U.S. I am a spokesperson for those who are not yet able to speak for themselves. A role model for others.

I believe I would make a strong board candidate for VALUE. I am on the VALUE program/conference committee, and in 1999 I was at VALUE's Adult Learner Leadership Institute in Indiana.  I did 2 workshops. I have worked hard to get where I am and will continue to work hard for adult learners and VALUE. My 12 years' experience as an adult learner leader will help VALUE 's goals and mission. I am here to help and support students any way I can. We can and do make a difference. Thanks for your support.

Donna Swain (Orange, Massachusetts)

I'm a life-long learner studying at the North Quabbin Adult Education Center, which is part of the Literacy Project, Inc., based in Greenfield, Massachusetts.  I'm on the H.E.A.L.T.H. (Helping Educate and Lead Through Health) Team.  We just finished an eight-month leadership training course.  I have developed and presented several workshops for teachers and learners, and I helped plan a three-day women's health conference.  I'm a founding member and current president of the first adult learner
organization in the state, the Massachusetts Alliance for Adult Literacy.  The group gives adult learners support and advice to help keep them involved in their education.  The pilot project has developed to the point that it is state-funded and a model for the nation.  I facilitated some classes for my fellow learners at my school in the past.  I'm also a T.V. producer at our local access T.V. station, where I helped put a video together on the need for transportation in our area.  In addition I was chosen as the first learner to sit on the board of the Literacy Volunteers of Orange-Athol. Also, I am a member of the Steering Committee of the North Quabbin Community Coalition, consisting of 41 health and human service agencies in nine towns.

I would really be honored to be on the board of VALUE.  I believe I have a lot to give, and I would like to learn new things from other learners.  I feel I would be a good advocate for other learners because of my own experiences coping as a learning disabled person.

Jennie Winnix (Greensboro, North Carolina)

I'm a good speaker and a good listener.  I did a commercial for the Literacy Volunteers of America for Business Marketing Associates and they received $10,000.  It will be shown widely.

I have made over a thousand speeches.  I'm on the Governor's list in North Carolina and I do volunteer work for United Way.  I go to churches and other meetings to speak.

Revised 1/4/01