Paul Szmal: Welcome back to FLX Morning on Finger Lakes News Radio. Coming up on 8-17, I have a trio of guests joining me from Literacy Volunteers of Yates County, starting out with Liz Searle. Liz, good morning. How are you this morning?
Liz Surrell, Chrissy Talba, Karen Ramirez: I'm good, Paul. How are you doing?
Paul Szmal: Excellent, excellent. Also joining us, one of the tutors, her name is Chrissy Talbot. Chrissy, good morning.
Liz Surrell, Chrissy Talba, Karen Ramirez: Good morning. Good to be here, Paul.
Paul Szmal: And finally, we have a learner who has been part of the Literacy Volunteers of Yates program for a while, and that is Karen Ramirez. Good morning, Karen.
Liz Surrell, Chrissy Talba, Karen Ramirez: Good morning.
Paul Szmal: Karen, I'd like to start with you. You originally came here from El Salvador. What brought you here to the U.S.?
Liz Surrell, Chrissy Talba, Karen Ramirez: Yes, my name is Karen Ramirez. I'm from El Salvador. I live in Canandaigua.
Paul Szmal: Wonderful. How has the experience been so far?
Liz Surrell, Chrissy Talba, Karen Ramirez: Could you repeat, please?
Paul Szmal: How has your experience here in the United States been so far?
Liz Surrell, Chrissy Talba, Karen Ramirez: Oh, it's amazing. We moved here seven years ago because my husband received a job offer. We never imagined living in New York, and we love living here and can't imagine living anywhere else.
Paul Szmal: When did you decide to go to Literacy Volunteers, and what were you looking for when you went there?
Liz Surrell, Chrissy Talba, Karen Ramirez: I looked for this place around years ago because I couldn't speak English very well. My husband was who spoke for me everywhere, every time, and we looked for this place. They helped me a lot with my English. The impact of the one-on-one tutoring program has been great for me. I am now more confident in myself, and I can communicate more effectively and connect with people and have opportunities that were previously out of reach.
Paul Szmal: Wonderful. Chrissy, let me go over to you. You've been tutoring since April of last year. What brought you to Literacy Volunteers to become a tutor?
Liz Surrell, Chrissy Talba, Karen Ramirez: Well, 20 years or so ago, I was a Peace Corps volunteer, and I taught a little bit of English then. I really enjoyed it and found it really rewarding. My workplace in Rochester, they started offering me a half-day Friday. I said, I really need to give back to the community somehow during those hours that I've got back. I gave the person in Canada Guac Hall, and she said, come on in and let's do an interview. I've loved every minute of it since then.
Paul Szmal: What do you like best about working with people like Karen?
Liz Surrell, Chrissy Talba, Karen Ramirez: I just find it really rewarding. Karen is just a beautiful person to work with. She's just lovely inside and out. Every time we meet together, we just become better friends. We're laughing half the time that we're talking, and it's just really a lot of fun.
Paul Szmal: I'm curious as to whether or not there are certain techniques you use for tutoring. Is tutoring someone in the English language? Is there course material that you went through prior to starting? Was that part of the program?
Liz Surrell, Chrissy Talba, Karen Ramirez: Yeah, there is a training that the Literacy Center offers when we first start. Liz would know the name of it. I forget the name of it off the top of my head. There's an online training program that they take you through that does provide materials. Then at the office in Canada Guac, there's also a library of resources that I check out regularly.
Paul Szmal: Liz, can you tell me a little bit more about that tutoring program?
Liz Surrell, Chrissy Talba, Karen Ramirez: Sure. It's an online self-paced training program that's hosted by Literacy New York. It's called Intakes to Outcomes. They spend a lot of time creating these modules based on the science of adult learning and all of that. There's a basic course that our tutors take when they start working with us, but then there's a whole library of different modules so that as tutors work with their learner and the learner progresses or maybe faces different challenges, they can go back to this library and look at what resources are there. There's lesson plans and resources that tie with that lesson plan. That's a great resource for our tutors, but also the staff works really closely with our tutors and learners. When a learner comes in, they take an assessment that gives us some really good diagnostic information about where they are with various skill levels for their literacy, whether they're just learning English or they're a native speaker who's trying to improve their literacy. It gives us a starting point, and every time we do an assessment, which is usually at least annually, we get new information so we can revise the individual learning plan and help the students stay on track with reaching their goals.
Paul Szmal: Let me go back to Chrissy here for a second because I have to imagine that working with people who are learning or attempting to sharpen their skills in the English language, watching them progress and make success has got to be a tremendously rewarding experience.
Liz Surrell, Chrissy Talba, Karen Ramirez: Oh, it absolutely is. Yeah, it's just wonderful. Every week she comes in, Karen comes in, and there's something that will come out of her mouth and she'll, oh, you know what, we learned last week that she'll start to correct herself if she makes a mistake and she's just her pronunciation is getting better. And yeah, it's super rewarding. That's why I come back every week.
Paul Szmal: And every case is different, I imagine.
Liz Surrell, Chrissy Talba, Karen Ramirez: I've only ever worked with Karen, but yeah, I would love to work with other folks in the future, but I'm sure Liz can speak to that.
Paul Szmal: Yeah, I think that's one of the advantages that we can offer with literacy volunteers and the one-to-one tutoring is we can meet each individual learner where they are, address any particular learning struggles or challenges that they have and work with them to master those at their pace, at their schedule. I think we're fortunate in this region. We have some really quality adult education programs, but not every style of instruction works for every student, right? Some folks have never done really, really well in a classroom setting. And then other times for our adult learners, we have so many responsibilities. They're juggling jobs and family and all that. They might not be able to commit to being in a classroom a certain number of days a week at this specific time of day. So the flexibility of what the tutors can offer by meeting whenever and wherever the learner is able to, I think that can mean a lot to those learners who can't make it into a classroom.
Paul Szmal: Let me go back to Karen for a second here. Karen, what is your ultimate goal as part of this tutoring program? What are you looking to eventually fully accomplish?
Liz Surrell, Chrissy Talba, Karen Ramirez: My goals for learning English are speaking English fluently, feeling confident and comfortable communicating in English in any situation, for example, in my children's school or when I go to the doctor, connecting with other people in English, making friends, building relationships, and feel part of the community and working in something related like what I studied in El Salvador and helping my family in my country.
Paul Szmal: That is wonderful. I am so glad to hear that. Karen, thank you so much for being here with us this morning. Chrissy and Liz as well, thanks to you for not only helping Karen along the way and so many others, but continuing on with the wonderful programs that Literacy Volunteers of Ontario Yates has to offer.
Liz Surrell, Chrissy Talba, Karen Ramirez: Thanks, Paul.
Paul Szmal: Thank you.
Liz Surrell, Chrissy Talba, Karen Ramirez: All right. I hope everybody has a wonderful day. Get out there and enjoy the sun before it disappears.
Paul Szmal: Will do. It is 8.25 on FLX Morning.
