By Kate Hill
Staff Writer
Cazenovia Public Library (CPL) Literacy Outreach has offered family literacy programs and individualized adult education programs to the community for more than a decade.
Literacy Coordinators Carla Zimmerman and Karen Kogut work with a network of trained volunteer tutors to provide literacy services on site and at two satellite locations — CazCares Food Pantry and New Woodstock Free library.
The CPL adult literacy program operates in conjunction with Madison County Reads Ahead (MCRA).
MCRA is a grant-funded, not-for-profit adult literacy service that works with public libraries across Madison County.
The service trains volunteer literacy tutors and recruits adult learners, 18 years of age and older, who are hoping to earn a New York State High School Equivalency Diploma, learn English as a Second Language (ESL), receive their United States citizenship, or improve their basic English language skills.
Students receive free, weekly one-on-one instruction from well-trained, dedicated tutors at their local libraries.
MCRA Director Tara Truett has been with the program for nearly a decade.
A retired educator, Truett spent 20 years as a special education teacher and administrator in Hamilton. She also taught GED through Madison-Oneida BOCES for 10 years and served as the education coordinator for Madison County Head Start.
In her role as MCRA director, Truett oversees and assists three local literacy coordinators: Zimmerman in Cazenovia and New Woodstock; Donna Bocketti in Chittenango, Bridgeport and Canastota; and Jody Szczech in Oneida.
According to Truett, MCRA services are also available in “the far reaches of the county” — in municipalities like Earlville and Brookfield.
The local coordinators are responsible for meeting with potential learners and matching them with the tutors and resources best suited for their specific needs and schedules.
“For a lot of the people that we see, it’s very hard for them to sit in a classroom, to show up every day, to do their homework and to be motivated,” Zimmerman said. “By working one-on-one, we are able to create individualized learning plans exactly for that person. We don’t waste any time. We say ‘what’s the shortest amount of time we can spend with you for [you to achieve your goal]?’”
Once a month, the local coordinators meet with Truett to discuss current issues, strategize and learn from each other and guest speakers.
Twice a year, the coordinators, director and tutors gather for a tutor training appreciation luncheon.
“We have a full program with different training components and then we have a luncheon together,” Zimmerman said. “Those are really great because of all the training, but also because of the way we learn from each other . . . The events are well attended and highly appreciated.”
According to Zimmerman, volunteer literacy tutors are currently needed in Oneida and Hamilton.
“In Cazenovia, I had 16 tutors this year,” she said. “Now I have 13. That’s a tremendous amount of tutors . . . For some reason, we have a harder time [in Oneida and Hamilton] finding tutors.”
Volunteers must commit two or three hours per week.
MCRA provides all necessary textbooks and informational workshops to the literacy programs it serves.
“There are so many materials that we need for people learning English as a Second Language or trying to earn their High School Equivalency Diploma,” Zimmerman said. “ . . . We saw a major shift in the high school equivalency exam in 2014, away from the GED to the TASC [(Test Assessing Secondary Completion)] . . . so we had to get new books . . . [We thought] how can you do this as a community organization? If you go with the big publishers, those books are pretty expensive.”
To acquire more affordable materials, MCRA has turned to several non-profit organizations — like Intercambio of Boulder, Colorado and ProLiteracy of Syracuse — that develop and distribute their own adult literacy learning resources.
MCRA grew out of literacy outreach efforts at the Oneida Public Library around 2000.
With grant funding, the tutoring services were expanded first to Canastota and eventually across the entire county.
A Hamilton area foundation has provided annual funding for MCRA for many years.
These funds cover the educational resources used by clients, the cost of training volunteer tutors, and the costs of celebrating the successes of both the clients and tutors.
A grant is written each year targeting the current needs of the MCRA program.
The CNY Community Foundation provides funding for the director position.
Through a variety of sources, the following libraries pay a stipend to their local literacy coordinator: Cazenovia, Chittenango, Canastota, Oneida and Hamilton.
Across the county, MCRA-trained ESL tutors are currently assisting speakers of nine different languages such as Chinese, French, Kurdish and Farsi.
Since last May, MCRA has also helped 13 adults to earn a New York State High School Equivalency (HSE) Diploma.
The CPL adult literacy program alone had eight graduates this year.
“When people don’t finish high school . . . there are real barriers,” Zimmerman said. “Employers want to see a high school diploma . . . A lot of times, when people drop out of high school and then come back to us as adults, they are ready . . . and we find enormous talent. It’s so amazing to sit there with someone who is so smart and so ready to work and get through the process.”
In 2018, New York State added a new pathway to a HSE Diploma by allowing individuals to use passing scores on certain Regents exams in place of passing scores on the corresponding TASC subtests.
“We keep trying to get the word out that if you have passed a regents, it will really help you,” Truett said. “We have even had a few people come in who have passed every single regents, but for whatever reason they didn’t graduate . . . In [such instances,] State Ed allows you to take any one test of the TASC. Hopefully they pick their best subject . . . Once they pass that one test . . . they get their High School Equivalency Diploma.”
According to Zimmerman, the state also has a rule that students who required an Individualized Education Program (IEP) — a plan developed to ensure that a student with an identified disability receives specialized instruction and related services — are permitted to use a “low pass” score (55-64) on a regents exam in place of the corresponding TASC subtest.
Each year, MCRA holds a ceremony for its graduates, complete with caps and gowns, a guest speaker and cake.
“In May, [the students] get a graduation party just like anybody else,” Zimmerman said.
MCRA also helps its students to explore their post graduation options by serving as a referral source for educational and career services programs in Madison County.
“We don’t just say ‘OK, you’ve got your diploma, now you’re gone,’” Truett said. “We have all these other programs in place [in the county.] We all go to meetings and try to stay informed about what’s out there.”
According to Zimmerman, Madison County Workforce Development has been a particularly beneficial resource for her students.
“They can take [our students] and give them other skills they might need and see what kind of employment is [out there] or what kind of education [or training] is available for them,” she said.
MCRA also works with ACCES-VR (Adult Career and Continuing Education Services-Vocational Rehabilitation) — which helps individuals with disabilities to achieve and maintain employment and to support independent living — and On Point for College Inc., a nonprofit college access and success program that helps students with every step of their college journey, from applications and financial aid to graduation and beyond.
To learn more about MCRA and becoming a tutor, contact Tara Truett at 315-345-1468.
For more information on the Cazenovia Public Library, call 315-655-9322 or visit cazenoviapubliclibrary.org.
