Above: Student Fatima and Tutor Mary
For this Volunteer Spotlight, we would like to highlight one of our astounding tutor volunteers, Mary Eure. Mary has lived in Loudoun County for about 10 years. She has recently retired but still helps out at her husband’s restaurant in downtown Leesburg. Mary came to Loudoun Literacy Council in Fall 2011 and she wanted to be a tutor. Although she had no experience working with ELL students, her heart and attitude were driven to learn how to help, and so far she has been quite successful in helping her student learn English.
In the Fall, Mary was matched to work with Fatima. Fatima comes from Morocco and has been in the USA for about 6 years. Conversationally, Fatima has a good grasp on English, but just a week into their tutor sessions, Mary found that Fatima needed to work more specifically on her reading and writing. Fatima could not read and write any English, and throughout their weekly meetings, Fatima has learned to better her reading and writing. She is now able to read through her workbook and also through various children’s stories.
Throughout their sessions, they have developed a great relationship, and Mary works with Fatima on her reading and writing during a part of each session and then they move on to computer skills and emailing. Every session, Mary sends Fatima an email and Fatima in response has to reply to each email. This encourages computer literacy, a vital component of literacy in this country and in the world.
We are thankful for all of the time our volunteers dedicate to teaching English, and we are especially thankful for Mary and her time she has committed to working with Fatima. The success is very rewarding for both our students and volunteers; I watched Mary beam with joy as Fatima went through a book, word by word, and read through the story.
-Janna Starr
AmeriCorps Member, Adult Literacy Program Assistant
Loudoun Literacy Council
LoudounLiteracy 