Missouri
From LiteracyTentWiki
February 16, 2005
I sent the message below to all AEL directors in Missouri this weekend. It followed several initial alerts which I sent the first couple of days last week. I also included th e-mail which was sent to all COABE members by our policy analyst, Noreen Lopez. COABE is cooperating fully with NCSDAE and NCL in this effort.
I have also sent e-mails to both Senators and one representative where most of my students live. Representative Carnahan (who represents the area where I live) had a town hall meeting on the 7th. I attended and submitted a question about the proposed cuts at that time. I will follow up with an e-mail as soon as his web site is up. His local office will open next week. I will also call next week. My advisory board and our local literacy councils and Literacy USA affiliate are also involved.
I have had several follow-up e-mails and phone calls about the effort from AEL directors in Missouri. We are just gearing up, but I think we will have an effective campaign.
Bob Weng
Missouri
February 25, 2005
We in Missouri are working in a variety of ways to ratchet up our advocacy work. During a state meeting of Even Start coordinators, we spent several hours discussing the techniques of advocacy based on David Rosen's advocacy workshop at a conference in St. Louis. The coordinators have been sharing their experiences with me. Here are some of their reports:
In Independence:
Yesterday, the United Way representative brought a staffer from Jim Talent's office to our site. Talent's staff person was quite impressed with the comprehensive program of family literacy / Even Start. I gave her an Annual Report and before she left she ask for me to write down the federal funding source on paper so that she could take it back to the office.
In Lemay:
Russ Carnahan came through the other day. One of our board members added our center on his tour of south county without him really knowing. However, this meant that he was here for literally less than 5 minutes. He did mostly see our Family lit program since he came after all the children were down for naps. The young ladies in our program were working on writing official letters already and decided to write him letters of thanks for coming and telling him how the program has impacted their lives. His aide for this area was with him and is supposed to be calling to set up a time to come back to learn more about us.
In St. Joseph:
I met with Congressman Graves' educational aide, Chad Higdon, on January 24. He was very interested in what St. Joseph Even Start was doing and how Bush's cuts would affect our program. Chad was unaware that there was an Even Start in St. Joseph, and said that he would pass the information along to the Congressman. I invited them to visit our program, and Chad said that he would keep that in mind, as it would provide a perfect location for the Congressman to be seen with children and adults in a federal program. I have sent a follow up letter thanking Chad for his time and explaining how the budget cuts would affect our community. He also requested that I keep him updated on new developments as they became available to me.
Sarah Beaman-Jones, MAT
Literacy Program Developer
LIFT-Missouri
