Elected Board Members 2006:
Elections were held on March 11, 2006 during the Membership Meeting during the 3rd Annual (Net)Working Conference on Women & Literacy.

Co-Chair Amelia Onorato, MA Coordinator, Peer Advising and Tutoring Program at College of Public and Community Service (CPCS), University of Massachusetts-Boston, Massachusetts	Co-Chair Anna Yangco, MA Pre-GED teacher, Project Hope in Dorchester, Massachusetts
Secretary Meghan Doran, BA ABE Instructor, Suffolk County House of Corrections, Boston, MA	Treasurer Lorna Rivera, PhD Assistant Professor, College of Public and Community Service (CPCS), University of Massachusetts-Boston, Massachusetts
Member Nancy Howard, MSW Coordinator Community Safety Initiative, LISC (Local Initiatives Support Corporation), Rhode Island	Member Cathy Kozlowicz, MA Family Literacy Specialist, Literacy Council of Greater Waukesha
Member Dana Huber, MA Procedure Specialist, Bottom Line Enhancement Services, Minnesota	Member (Ex Officio) Mev Miller, EdD WE LEARN Founder - Director / Educator/ Resources Coordinator / Consultant
WE LEARN is seeking new Board Members for 2007 term. You must be a current WE LEARN member to apply. If you are interested, please contact us.

Regional Advisory Boards

WE LEARN would like to establish regional advisory boards. These boards would include adult learners and practitioners interested in promoting the work of WE LEARN in their region. Each region could be flexible and creative in doing what best serves the participants in their region. Our broad vision acknowledges the ways in which regional boards would assist the work of national organization AND how the national organization could support regional work. We are still in the process of creating this network. If you are interested in developing a regional board in your area, please contact Mev Miller, welearn@litwomen.org or call 401-383-4374.

Committees

Committee Members do not need to be on the Board of Directors. However, they do need to be current members of WE LEARN. ABE Student Leadership Conference Planning Fundraising / Grantwriting Regional Advisory Boards Research / Policy Website / Technology Committee Women's Perspectives For more details on how to get involved in these committees, please contact us.

 

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Meghan Doran       (Secretary)
Term 2006-2009
Massachusetts

Newly elected in 2006. Meghan currently teaches Adult Basic Education at the Suffolk County House of Corrections in Boston, MA. She is a recent graduate from the College of Public and Community Service at UMass Boston, where she studied Adult Training and Development and where she currently works as a Peer Advisor/Tutor. She has also taght ESOL at Elm Hill Family Service Center in Roxbury, MA. and at the Latin American Workers Project  in Brooklyn, New York. She has a passion for community work and has recently volunteered with the Massachusetts Alliance to Reform CORI (for whom she has designed several trainings), the Washington Street Corridor Coalition and the Maurice J. Tobin Middle School.

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Nancy Howard               (Member)
Term 2006-2009
Rhode Island

Program Coordinator, Rhode Island LISC's Community Safety Initiative. She is a trained mediator and has close to 15 years experience in training and consulting. She has developed and presented trainings in mediation, conflict management, restorative justice, negotiation, communication, problem solving, community policing and diversity issues. Nancy has also done work in board development, organizational development, facilitation and program design. She has been a grant writer for non-profit organizations and a grant reviewer for city, state and federal agencies.

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Dana Huber              (Member)
Term 2006-2009
Minnesota

Dana worked as a facilitator  for Women Leading Through Reading Book Discussion Groups. She has always had a passion for education and serving others.  Dana has a Master's degree in Educational Leadership from the University of St. Thomas.

 

 

 

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Cathy Kozlowicz       (Member)
Term 2005-2008
Wisconsin

Cathy is a Basic Skills and Family Literacy Program Coordinator for the Literacy Council of Greater Waukesha where she works on student retention, volunteer recruitment, public relations and marketing, tutor development and event planning. Cathy was Secretary for the Greater Milwaukee Literacy Coalition, 2003-2004 and a member for a year where she worked on literacy issues in the Milwaukee area. Prior to working in Wisconsin Cathy was Executive Director of a YWCA (1999-2001) in Eugene, Oregon where she was dedicated to the mission of empowering women and girls and eliminating racism. She was responsible for rebuilding this organization from scratch and implemented marketing campaigns, volunteer and staff recruitment, fund-development and grant writing.

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Mev Miller              (Ex Officio / Founder / Director)
Rhode Island

Mev Miller co-founded Women Leading through Reading in 1995, an initiative in Minnesota that sponsored book discussion groups for women learners. She has an Ed.D. in Critical Pedagogy, with an emphasis on curriculum and instruction, popular education and participatory research, adult basic education and women's issues. She also works part-time for SABES Southeast (Massachusetts) as an Associate Coordinator.

Mev founded WE LEARN as a way to bridge discussions of women's rights and social justice issues with women's adult literacy, literature and basic education. With more than 20 years experience in the feminist book industry, she has a strong commitment for the development and distribution of women-centered adult literacy materials and curriculum resources. Her skills include networking -- people to people; people to resources; people and resources to organizations. She is also knowledgeable in the areas of grassroots non-profit organization, administration and bookkeeping, website design and database management, and grantwriting.

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Amelia Onorato       (CoChair)
Term 2005-2008
Massachusetts

Amelia has been teaching for the past 20 years in settings ranging from Adult Basic Education and Refugee Resettlement, to university level Intensive English Language Programs. She currently teaches writing and other subjects at the College of Public and Community Service (CPCS) at UMass/Boston. She also coordinates the college's Peer Advising and Tutoring Program. She has developed this program into a source of significant academic support for CPCS students, and the program has also become a wonderful means of developing student leadership and encouraging meaningful student participation in the College. Another facet of her job which Amelia particularly enjoys is working with students from the CIRCLE (Center for Immigrant and Refugee Community Leadership and Empowerment), WICD (Women Involved in Community Development) and ABE-College Transition cohorts.

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Lorna Rivera                  (Treasurer)
Term 2005-2008
Massachusetts

Lorna is an assistant professor in the College of Public and Community Service at the University of Massachusetts-Boston where she teaches courses in community planning, sociology, and women's studies. Lorna has a Ph.D. in Sociology (specialization in gender studies) and her work focuses on the impact of popular education, critical pedagogy, and adult literacy on low-income women of color. Lorna worked as an adult literacy teacher and administrator at Project HOPE in Boston and contributed to a number of curriculum projects related to welfare rights, health literacy, and civic participation. In 2003, she was awarded the National Academy of Education's Spencer Postdoctoral fellowship to write a book about her ethnographic research in a women's literacy program.

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Anna Yangco      (Co-Chair)
Term 2004-2007
Massachusetts

Anna has taught in the Project HOPE Adult Learner Program since 1999. She teaches reading and writing at the Pre-GED level and also developed a learning strategies class for the women in the program. Anna graduated with an M.A. from the Creative and Critical Thinking Program at UMASS-Boston. Inspired by her work with the wonderful women in the Women, Violence, and Adult Education project, she is writing her synthesis, Rising Above the Barrier: The Ways an Adult Learner Program Has Overcome the Impact of Violence on Low-Income Women's Learning. When she is not writing or teaching, Anna gives violin lessons and plays with the Quincy Symphony Orchestra.