County
Volunteer Coordinator Motivates Volunteers, Residents to LEARN
Live Well San Diego: 10.01.2015
Over 440,000 adults (20%) in San Diego County cannot read at
the third-grade level, lacking the literacy skills needed to sign a form, fill
out a bank deposit slip, or enjoy a novel. Many have learning disabilities;
others received insufficient individual instruction in school or at home; and
still others are immigrants seeking to learn English as a second language. To help adults improve their literacy skills
and empower them to achieve their goals, the County created the LEARN Adult Literacy program in 2005. Volunteer Coordinator Kevin Vigil
has been inspired by the program’s success since the beginning.
“I moved here from Denver just as the program
was getting started,” said Vigil. “I was
a school teacher and needed to update my credential to work here in California,
so this job was only meant to be temporary, but I ended up loving what I was
doing! I get to see the impact this
program has on people’s lives and coming to work is something I look forward to
every day.”
LEARN (Libraries Empower All to Read Now) is a
volunteer-based tutoring program that helps adults improve their literacy
skills through one-on-one and small group tutoring and computer-aided
instruction. Services are free and
confidential. There are literacy centers
at the El Cajon and Vista branch libraries, but services are available at all
San Diego County Library branches.
“We have such an international county,” said
Vigil. “About 60% of our learners are
non-native speakers – from Spanish and Arabic to Korean and Chinese. We have 33 branch libraries and all of their
demographics are different.” READ MORE !
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