Brandi Thornton – Kitimat Community Corner

Posted by Eleanor Kendell 
on Mar 26, 2011
 

Brandi Thornton, adult literacy coordinator, was our guest speaker at our March 20th meeting.  Now located across from the Bank of Montreal, the new home for the Kitimat Community Service Society’s literacy program is brightly painted and welcoming. Both the staff and the public are happy with the new location.  We were told how their programming is now much broader than reading, writing and arithmetic.  The organization has programs at Delta King Place, and the senior’s centre.  

Brandi shared a video done in Hazelton, BC, a literacy project that highlights the passing on of knowledge in many different forms.  The community works together to help one another.  An organization called Storytellers Foundation was started and it is proving to be effective.  It’s about ordinary people sharing stories and knowledge.  There is a small store The Learning Shop where young and old gather.  Youths are encouraged to share their interests and their desires.  They have a garden, do art works in many forms, and enjoy music.  One person talked about the Velcro effect.  We all know how Velcro knits together.  The positive has evolved.  I can do, I am ready to learn.  Organizers continue to work to get Velcro to the people.  Brandi says she and her colleagues have been inspired by this vision and are now incorporating the ideas from it into their program.  January’s family literacy night was a huge success.  One item on the society’s wish list is bins for books, where people could deposit books that are in good conditions that could be given to others who would value from having them.