St. George’s Episcopal Church has been growing their Light on Literacy (LOL) Missional Community over the past three years to partner with Buena Vista Elementary School (BVES) in tutoring, student enrichment, and family engagement. LOL has been playing an active role at the school this semester. Weekly, they have reading partners visit the school to connect with a student and read with them.  

In mid-October, St George’s Priest, Reverend Martin Odidi, of Nigeria, did an hour long enrichment program for the third and fourth grade classes. Father Martin told one of his favorite Nigerian childhood stories with a short local song and some simple dance steps. In early November, LOL hosted the BVES Fall Festival. St. George’s provided pizza for the families and LOL volunteers staffed fun learning game stations. Also in October, a volunteer from LOL attended United4Hope’s Cultural Humility and Adverse Childhood Experiences Workshop and shared the information with the group. 

St. George’s LOL members have been collecting donations of gently used and new items that will be contributed to the school store and to the annual holiday gift event in December. The holiday gift event is held just before the winter break. The students are allowed to visit the store and pick out a gift and wrap it for their family. This is St. George’s second year to support this event. Last year, they found that picture frames, jewelry and holiday decor were very popular. St. George’s LOL has also collected funds to buy new uniforms, socks, underwear and belts to contribute to the school to give to students. They plan to deliver these items to the school before year-end.

We are thrilled to see St. George’s Light on Literacy Missional Community growing in their support and partnership with Buena Vista Elementary. Thank you to our volunteers and school staff who are making this partnership a success!

Email Janelle with questions and to share your events and stories so we can continue to share resources across our United4Hope network.