Janice M. Sapp

From LiteracyTentWiki

I teach ESL; MA in English and ESL George Mason University; M. Div. Wesley Theo. Seminary at AU in DC; have been interested in languages for a long time having spoken Italian before learning English at age 4.5. I feel that Literacy is a Peace and Justice issue, which is a study I would like to undertake as my next long term project. I have just closed a school where we taught ESL to adult learners, had a Homework Haven for children, 1st to 8th grade, taught sewing and art. Six faithful volunteers came to teach beginner classes in the evenings and on Saturdays. Training them was delightful; we learned a lot together and found new and interesting ways to teach important concepts. Our students paid $3 per hour for instruction and worked hard both in and out of class. Most of our students worked for 3 to 5 months in the area and then moved on to a different location for another 3 to 5 months. We did see several of them again as they returned to their previous jobs on their routes. Accordingly, most of our population were men who sent money home to their families in Mexico. The connections that I made in the community were able to help many of our students with occassional food, clothes, and other needs. A physician who had heard what we were doing in the community offered our students office visits for less than half the cost of a regular fee. We closed our school because of increasing violence in the bazaar where we rented our school rooms. However, we had a great experience.