Maggie Nelson

The Literacy Council of Union County's tutoring program was not Maggie Nelson's first exposure to teaching adults to read. Indeed, she has tutored American adults in a library program in Virginia as well as in her native state of Washington. In speaking of her experiences with adult new readers, Nelson says she finds them to be tough, gritty people--real survivors. According to Nelson, all the adults she's taught were "impressive" people. When asked why she tutors, sometimes as many as four days per week, Nelson speaks of her interest in meeting new people as well as the benefit from being "useful" while having fun at the same time. Having spent the last 30 years without a TV, Nelson claims there is a lot of entertainment value in tutoring. She is convinced the tutoring experience is much more enjoyable than anything found on TV.

Since beginning her tutoring with Literacy Union over two years ago, Nelson has worked with students whose native languages were Vietnamese and Spanish. Although she knows a little Spanish, Nelson had no experience with it and further agrees that to teach someone to speak English, the only requirement is that the tutor be able to speak English. Nelson, familiar to many in Union County from her work as a lead animal control officer for Union County Animal Control, says she loves her job working with animals. She also loves tutoring even though this volunteer experience is about as far away from her work experiences as one could get. She wouldn't want to give up either "job" but wished she had some additional free time so she could tutor even more students. We wish so, too!