Literacy Rochester Announces
Partnership with LiteracyCNY to
Relaunch Programming in Syracuse, NY.
Rochester, N.Y. – Literacy Rochester (LR) announced on Saturday, June 26, 2021, that it has formalized a managed service agreement between LR and LiteracyCNY (LCNY) in Syracuse, NY to provide adult literacy programming to adults to Onondaga County. Through this agreement, LR will restart services that were previously run by LCNY before it suspended services and started the process of dissolving the organization back in November of 2020.
LCNY was founding in the early 1960’s and was the launching organization for Literacy Volunteers of America that has since become the international organization ProLiteracy. For almost 60 years LCNY has been providing reading, math, and English language education to adults who mainly have reading and English comprehension levels below a 5-grade level.
“LiteracyCNY offered teaching and training to 100s of students over the last several years. Unfortunately, cash flow became impossible due to funding cuts and a limited reserve. Literacy Rochester reached out to see how they could help, continuing the mission of a more literate community in Upstate New York. I cannot possibly express how much the efforts of Literacy Rochester are appreciated, with their ability to step in and restart services in CNY due to their obvious superior organization and ability to help transform lives.” – William Kriesel, LCNY President
With the leadership and Boards of the two organizations working together and with the help, support, and advice from the United Way of Greater Rochester, the two organizations were able to navigate the process of setting up the agreement and providing the needed tools that if in the future the two organizations merger into one, the groundwork has been soundly laid.
“United Way was honored to be a trusted partner in this process and to provide Synergy funding to support this important project,” said Jennifer Cathy, Chief Impact Officer at United Way of Greater Rochester. “This collaboration ensures that critical literacy services can continue to be provided in Central New York and demonstrates that the nonprofit sector can work across New York State to support and strengthen our communities.”
The importance of keeping programming provided by organizations like LR and LCNY is that many of the people that are served by them fall between other education institutions. They might be too old for traditional high school, they do not have the reading or math levels for entrance into a high school equivalency or vocational training programs, or they are an immigrant or refugee that wants to improve their English language and/or reading skills so that they are able to participate fully in their community as workers, partners, consumers, and citizens. No matter what their goal is organizations like LR and LCNY are there to provide tutoring and classes tailored to the needs of the community to help them reach their goals and to be success in what they want to do.
“We provide services that people need based on their needs. Our one-to-one tutoring is done where and when the student and tutor can meet, and they cover topics and work that is specific to the goal that that student is working on. Our digital literacy program is in locations around the city of Rochester where computer help is needed the most based on feedback from the public library system. Out volunteers help the community complete their computer-based task that they need help with. We are the Community helping to improve the Community.” – Joshua Stapf, LR Executive Director
This partnership will provide opportunity and innovation that will benefit both the Rochester and Syracuse communities that we serve. This is all made possible through the hard work of staff, volunteers, and the community supporting these vital services.
