Faith Network wants to say...

During the 2014-2015 school year, more than 248 volunteers provided support and practical assistance to the East Bay area and its children through Faith Network.

• 121 Reading Tutors at 20 Excel Reading Clinics enabled over 260 primary grade students to improve their reading levels.
• 38 Food Baggers put together nutritious weekend lunch bags for 1550 families in 18 Alameda County public schools.
• 23 Event Volunteers donated their time and talents working our 5K Walk and Gala fundraisers.
• 21 Library Volunteers and 2 community groups supported and staffed 8 under-resourced school libraries. They provided over 4,000 books to eager students every week.
• 17 Newsletter Team Volunteers throughout the year assembled our monthly printed newsletter, which reaches over 1,200 supporters.
• 13 Mentors guided 12 high school students as they navigated their internships. Through our community partners, Faith Network placed a total of 19 high school students in internships.
• 12 Lab Assistants and 12 Math Tutors helped provide over 450 elementary school students with hands-on learning experiences focusing on Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math.

What a year! Thank you for generously giving your time, talents, and resources!

All Aboard the Train to Reading

“Do your best work, follow directions, and show respect.”

Each Excel Reading Clinic student knows this by heart. These three rules keep them from straying off the train tracks on their way to reading. With one-to-one instruction, it’s truly amazing how far struggling readers travel in just one year.

Their train conductors, Excel Reading Clinic Tutors, are people JUST LIKE YOU. All volunteers, whether new or experienced at teaching, receive training so that they are familiar with the learning process and effective methods of teaching remedial reading. Site coordinators like me are here to support tutors. We pre-test students under their teachers’ guidance, set up the materials, and oversee tutors during each two-hour clinic.

Budding readers meet with a dedicated tutor for one hour every week throughout the school year to learn sight words and phonics. Each achievement is another mile marker closer to being able to drive the train themselves. Not only is the student blessed but the tutor also comes away enriched. There’s no greater thrill than when your excited student beats you at Sight Word Bingo!

We need more tutors! If you or someone you know would like to help a student, climb aboard. If you’re retired, but tired of the “same old, same old” every day, a learning journey with a child might be just the thing. If you’re someone who enjoys kids and loves to see them excel, we’re looking for you!


Please contact our program director Rebecca Buckley (rebecca@faith-network.com) for further details and to sign up to start in the fall. You’ll be so glad you did!

Sincerely,
Jan Zovickian
Excel Reading Clinic Coordinator

Upcoming Training Dates

Wednesday, September 2, 3:30-6:00 pm

Saturday, September 26, 9:00-11:30 am

Contact Rebecca for more dates!

Project Peace: Day of Service

August 22, 2015, 9:00 am - 12:00 pm

A Day of Service is a volunteer service opportunity coordinated by Project Peace East Bay to bring together local faith-based groups, non-profit organizations, and East Bay social service providers. It is an opportunity for people from very different backgrounds to come together simply to love and serve our shared community.


Project Peace’s hope is that through these partnerships our local East Bay communities will become more environmentally, economically and socially sustainable.

For more information and to sign up,
visit www.projectpeaceeastbay.org/Day-Of-Service
or email DayofService@ProjectPeaceEastBay.org

Volunteer Shoutouts

A thank you letter from Ms. Washington’s second-grade class to FN volunteer Pete Gohler who shared about his experiences as a pilot during a trip to the library.

Oakland Students Win Award at UC Davis

On May 30, Oakland’s Roosevelt Middle School (RMS) sent a team of blossoming robotics experts to the 2015 C-STEM Day RoboPlay Challenge Competition at University of California, Davis (UC Davis). The Roosevelt Bulldog Robotics Team, students from a newly created robotics course at RMS, were mentored by retired scientists and Faith Network volunteers Mark and Joanne Perra. The team won third place out of thirty-six teams in their division, which is composed of Northern California middle schools.

The RoboPlay Challenge is one of three competitions that take place during C-STEM Day, an annual event organized by the UC Davis Center for Integrated Computing and STEM Education. C-STEM is an acronym for “Computing, Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math.” The event encourages middle-school and high-school students to demonstrate real-world problem-solving skills in a competitive environment.

Professor Harry Cheng, director of the C-STEM Center at UC Davis, publicly recognized the RMS team for a strong showing and for the fact that this team was the first ever from Oakland to participate in the competition. Sporting bronze medals around their necks, the students and their classroom teacher Zelda Allison proudly received a trophy in the concluding awards ceremony. When he heard about the win, former OUSD Superintendent Gary Yee said, “Can you believe how far we’ve come since Mark and Joanne Perra brought the UC Davis C-STEM program to the attention of district leaders in 2013? Can’t be more excited.”

Faith Network is a major supporter of the C-STEM launch at RMS, supplying volunteers and funding.

In the Land of Reading

by Merle Miller, Excel Reading Clinic coordinator

Every Friday afternoon at Martin Luther King, Jr. Elementary, seven excited second-graders enlivened Pod B classroom with their eagerness to read. The team of experienced tutors was always up for the challenge, making sure to wrap learning with fun. We progressed through boxes of sight words and learned the difference between the short “e” sound and the short “i” sounds. We discovered that The Funny Baby wasn’t actually funny-looking after all, just different. With every book, we built up our confidence in reading. I can truly say that there is no greater picture than that of a child’s face lit up with a triumphant smile! Thank you, tutors. You have taken former non-readers on a wonderful journey into the land of reading.

Gala Wrap-up

Click here to visit the gala photo gallery.

Thank you to all sponsors, guests, program participants, and volunteers! We loved seeing all of you. Your freely-given prayers, participation, and generosity have overwhelmed us. Thank you. Make sure to check out the photo gallery.

Platinum Sponsors
Branagh Construction
Kathy Drake
Paul and Courtney Ebner
Terry and Mary MacRae
Ken and Stacy Mattson
Mark and Joanne Perra
Union Bank

Gold Sponsors
Pricewaterhouse Coopers, LLC

Silver Sponsors
Alta Vista Solutions
Doug and Lauren Bockmiller
California Bank of Commerce
City National Bank
Kaiser Permanente
Don and Karyn Kintzer
Jonathan and Varetta Mayes
Mick and Lauren Morlan
Randy and Diane Roth

Champion Sponsors
Vicky and Paul Cohune
Convergence Church
Aliza and Noel Gallo
Ken and Eileen Jones
Don and Karyn Kintzer
Manny and Paula Martinez
Mission Springs Conference Center
Oakland Worship Center
Mark and Joanne Perra
Randy and Diane Roth
David Silver and Angela Aquino-Silver