Crowder book drive benefits AEL families
March 27, 2019
Vinnie Roberts
Crowder College’s Adult Education and Literacy recently wrapped up their “Love of Literacy” book drive, an event in which members of the community were invited to donate books at Crowder locations all over the state.
The Adult Education and Literacy Program (AEL) is a program that strives to help educate adults in the community, degree seeking or otherwise, in the art of reading and writing. The AEL program offers assistance with high school equivalency test preparations, basic skill review and college and career transition assistance for testing systems like Compass, NCRC-Workkeys and the ASVAB.
The AEL program also offer English as a Second Language (ESL) services for non-native English speakers to either learn or perfect their English.
Crowder offers the AEL program at the following locations: Aurora, Cassville, Crowder McDonald County Campus (Jane), Monett, Mount Vernon, Neosho, Noel, and Seligman. Crowder offers the ESL program at Monett Job Center and the Monett Tyson facility, as well as on the Neosho and Noel campuses.
“Back in November, we were thinking of some ideas of how to engage the community with the program and how the program could be a blessing to the students,” said Daniel Bayes, AEL/ESL instructor for Crowder.
Bayes and the rest of the AEL department at Crowder came up with the idea to do a book drive. When February was chosen to host the drive, “Love of Literacy” was chosen as the theme.
Participating Crowder facilities from all over the surrounding area accepted books for the drive across the month of February. Bayes and the rest of the AEL department at Crowder were able to obtain 434 books. The initial goal of the drive was to acquire books for at least ten percent of their student body in the AEL department, which would have been roughly 50 books.
“We’ve got about 500 to 600 students enrolled in our classes every year,” said Bayes. “We thought if we could get two books for about ten percent of our students that would be a good goal but, the community went above and beyond.”
In addition to books from the community, the book drive also received several donations from private businesses looking to aid the AEL program. These included: Scholastic, Federal One Credit Union of Neosho, Always Buying Books of Joplin and many more.
For the distribution component of the book drive, Crowder has elected to forgo traditional means and instead make an event of it.
“We’re looking at doing some family nights at some of our sites,” said Bayes. “We’ve got several locations across Neosho, Jane, Seligman, Monett, Noel and Aurora that we could do it.”
According to Bayes, these family night events involve Crowder AEL students coming to Crowder with their children to listen as an orator reads them passages from one of the donated books.
“We spend a couple of hours reading the donated books with the students and their kids,” said Bayes. “When the students and their kids get ready to leave, the kids get to pick out a book and take it home to be theirs.”
The first of these family nights was on Wednesday, March 6. While attendance to the event wasn’t up to the expectations of the AEL program’s leaders, Bayes remains optimistic about the future of the program.
“We’ve got a lot on our hands now, but we’re looking forward to getting these books in to the hands of the students.”
Bayes explained that there isn’t currently a timeline in place for future book-drive related events, but that AEL department does have some idea of what the future of this new program will look like.
“We’re talking about doing this book drive once a year, and we’re talking about doing the family nights three or four times a year at each location. Hopefully, it will be something that continues.”
For more information on the Love of Literacy Book Drive, AEL Family Nights, to get involved with either the AEL or ESL programs, or any future Crowder events, contact Crowder College at (417) 451-3223.
Vinnie Roberts
Crowder College’s Adult Education and Literacy recently wrapped up their “Love of Literacy” book drive, an event in which members of the community were invited to donate books at Crowder locations all over the state.
The Adult Education and Literacy Program (AEL) is a program that strives to help educate adults in the community, degree seeking or otherwise, in the art of reading and writing. The AEL program offers assistance with high school equivalency test preparations, basic skill review and college and career transition assistance for testing systems like Compass, NCRC-Workkeys and the ASVAB.
The AEL program also offer English as a Second Language (ESL) services for non-native English speakers to either learn or perfect their English.
Crowder offers the AEL program at the following locations: Aurora, Cassville, Crowder McDonald County Campus (Jane), Monett, Mount Vernon, Neosho, Noel, and Seligman. Crowder offers the ESL program at Monett Job Center and the Monett Tyson facility, as well as on the Neosho and Noel campuses.
“Back in November, we were thinking of some ideas of how to engage the community with the program and how the program could be a blessing to the students,” said Daniel Bayes, AEL/ESL instructor for Crowder.
Bayes and the rest of the AEL department at Crowder came up with the idea to do a book drive. When February was chosen to host the drive, “Love of Literacy” was chosen as the theme.
Participating Crowder facilities from all over the surrounding area accepted books for the drive across the month of February. Bayes and the rest of the AEL department at Crowder were able to obtain 434 books. The initial goal of the drive was to acquire books for at least ten percent of their student body in the AEL department, which would have been roughly 50 books.
“We’ve got about 500 to 600 students enrolled in our classes every year,” said Bayes. “We thought if we could get two books for about ten percent of our students that would be a good goal but, the community went above and beyond.”
In addition to books from the community, the book drive also received several donations from private businesses looking to aid the AEL program. These included: Scholastic, Federal One Credit Union of Neosho, Always Buying Books of Joplin and many more.
For the distribution component of the book drive, Crowder has elected to forgo traditional means and instead make an event of it.
“We’re looking at doing some family nights at some of our sites,” said Bayes. “We’ve got several locations across Neosho, Jane, Seligman, Monett, Noel and Aurora that we could do it.”
According to Bayes, these family night events involve Crowder AEL students coming to Crowder with their children to listen as an orator reads them passages from one of the donated books.
“We spend a couple of hours reading the donated books with the students and their kids,” said Bayes. “When the students and their kids get ready to leave, the kids get to pick out a book and take it home to be theirs.”
The first of these family nights was on Wednesday, March 6. While attendance to the event wasn’t up to the expectations of the AEL program’s leaders, Bayes remains optimistic about the future of the program.
“We’ve got a lot on our hands now, but we’re looking forward to getting these books in to the hands of the students.”
Bayes explained that there isn’t currently a timeline in place for future book-drive related events, but that AEL department does have some idea of what the future of this new program will look like.
“We’re talking about doing this book drive once a year, and we’re talking about doing the family nights three or four times a year at each location. Hopefully, it will be something that continues.”
For more information on the Love of Literacy Book Drive, AEL Family Nights, to get involved with either the AEL or ESL programs, or any future Crowder events, contact Crowder College at (417) 451-3223.
