When the atmosphere encourages learning, the learning is inevitable.
~Elizabeth Foss
Happy summer, Literacy Council tutors. If you couldn’t tell, it has been a slow season for us, but happily, things are starting to pick up as we near the start of a new school year. I’ll be sending out another e-mail with some new students in need of tutors shortly, so look for that!
I believe it has become a bit of a LCCC tradition to gather your current summer reading suggestions and compile them into a shareable list. Let me know any titles and their authors that you’ve been enjoying, along with a brief description of the book(s), and I will send that list out in August. I enjoy learning more about you all through what you read and look forward to adding some new books to my own ever-growing “to read” list.
Speaking of reading, put the first annual Carroll Book Festival, sponsored by Carroll County Public Library, on your schedule if you haven’t yet. It will be held at the Farm Museum on Saturday, September 19 from 10-4. The Literacy Council will have a booth, so stop by and see us! We plan to have some giveaways and raffles, and we’re sponsoring three local authors: Bill Fortin (author of a series of books on the Cold War), Lois Szymanski (children’s author of over 20 books, mostly about Chincoteague ponies), and Joanne Sayre (co-author of the children’s book “The Magical Adventures of Charlotte and Fischer”, a tale of time travel and classical music).
We will also hopefully have the LCCC cookbook printed and available for sale at the book fair, and if not, we will be taking orders. Tutor Andy Preziosi and our Media Assistant Vicky Spitalniak worked very hard to make the cookbook happen, and tutors Deb and John Gill were indispensable to its production. We’re very excited to see the final product. Copies will be $20 with proceeds being a fundraiser for our organization.
As far as continuing education, the ProLiteracy website has been dry regarding new offerings over the summer, but there are still lots of free past webinars. Tutors Sarah Alouf and Denise Welsh told me recently that they’ve found the webinars to be very helpful, and they recommend that other tutors check them out. Here are some of the ones listed that stood out to me: “Where Do I Start? Planning the First Month of Lessons with a Low-level English Student”, “Building Conversation Skills: Strategies for Adult English Learners”, “Passing the Updated Citizenship Test”, and “High Impact Instruction for GED Test Success”. If you watch any of the past webinars and find them useful, please share which one and what you liked about it with me.
As always, thank you for all you do! Let’s make the most of the rest of 2026. The tutors ARE the Literacy Council of Carroll County, and without you, we’re nothing but an unmet need. Thanks for being a bright spot in our small corner of the world.