Volunteer Spotlight: Ian E
This month we are pleased to feature a long-standing volunteer, Ian Evison, as our Volunteer Spotlight. Bringing his experience from the renowned Literacy Minnesota Program, Ian joined Literacy Source in 2021 and since then has donated 660hrs as a tutor and as a Conversation Partner, and even appeared at the center with hammer in hand to help with some projects around our new office! We are so grateful to Ian for all his commitment both to the class and his student. He is always so willing to learn, improve himself, discuss, and give feedback, and usually has a good anecdote to share along the way. Thank you, Ian, you are an asset to our team!
1. Where are you originally from? If you’re not from Seattle what brought you here?
My family and I have lived many places. When we retired, we were living in St. Paul, Minnesota. This is where we were when I first began assisting in teaching English. It was the time of the Muslim ban (2017) which was accompanied by a series of nasty attacks on Muslim people in our community, including an attack on a Muslim neighbor of ours in the alley behind our house. These events had the effect of making Muslim people in our community feel terribly alone and isolated.
This led some of us to ask what we could do to visibly show support. We got yard signs printed that said, “Blessed Ramadan to our Muslim Neighbors.” Later I began volunteering at Literacy Minnesota, at their location in a largely Somali American area of North Minneapolis. This was a great organization to work with.
We moved to Seattle during the Covid lockdown to be close to our daughter and her family.
2. Please share something of your life so far and what you would like to do in the future.
I am a Unitarian Universalist minister and have had a variety of professional roles in congregations and in theological education, research and consulting. Here in Seattle, I look forward to the adventure of new roles and involvements as my connections here deepen. I have trained as a Master Gardener here in Washington State but have not done anything with that yet. And I look forward to being part of the lives of our two grandchildren as they grow. The six-year-old granddaughter is learning to read which gives me yet another opportunity to teach language skills. She is having trouble with vowel combinations—just like many of our students!
3. Why did you choose to volunteer at LS?
I explain above how I came to volunteering at Literacy Minnesota to help immigrants learn English. That was and is an excellent organization, deeply connected to the communities it serves, great staff, and wonderful support for volunteers. When we got to Seattle, I heard that Literacy Source was a closely parallel organization.
4. What do you like about volunteering at LS?
My wife and I choose to focus our efforts as volunteers and as donors on a few community organizations where we feel we can make the most difference. Each time I help with teaching and each time I tutor someone, I know that at least I have shown a sense of warmth and welcome to those who are too often excluded and marginalized. In addition to this I find at Literacy Source wonderfully supportive fellow volunteers, students, and staff. And Literacy Source provides great training and support.
5. Any stories or highlights from volunteering at LS?
I find that volunteering to help with literacy is to make myself part of an ongoing drama at two different levels. First is the individual level where the smallest bit of learning can make one of our students feel a little less alienated and a little more at home here. Today, for example, we talked about Fall traditions in conversation class. At the end of class one student said that last year her grandchild talked about “trick-or-treat” and she had no idea what that meant. After today’s class she now understands. In addition to this in volunteering at Literacy Source find that I am part of an ongoing drama at another level—as, for example, how we need to respond to the Trump administration initiatives
6. What might people not know about you?
Another passion of mine is bringing back to life old tools. They have so much soul! I also volunteer at the Shoreline Tool Library. One very satisfying part of this at the Tool Library, as at Literacy Source, is the individual connection. I recall one evening that a man was at the library who was struggling with loss of sight. I showed him how to sharpen tools using only his sense of touch. No, he didn’t cut himself!
Here is what our instructors and her colleagues have to say about working with Ian:
It has been a delight to work with Ian in our morning conversation class for the last 1 ½ years. Ian brings a positive attitude, openness, and curiosity as well as well-honed leadership skills and teaching experience to our team. He has proven to be an unflappable volunteer who is always ready to jump in - whether it’s to create an innovative lesson plan, substitute at the last minute, conduct a classroom evaluation, provide insights and suggestions with candor, hang a coat-rack or straighten a white board with aplomb. Ian exemplifies wisdom, thoughtfulness, camaraderie, and a can-do team spirit in everything he does.
~Sally
Ian’s a valued member of the morning Conversation class team. He’s helped us improve in many ways, most notably in team building and how we evaluate our work. At his suggestion, we adopted a valuable term-end practice where we have a conversation with students about aspects of class they find most valuable, and topics of interest they want to explore in the future. We learned that vocabulary review is highly valued by students, as is learning about everyday American life. This feedback gives us a starting point for building out lessons in future terms. Finally, Ian is extremely generous with his time, whether stepping up to tutor students one-on-one or jumping in when a sub is needed. I can count on him to cover our backs.
~ Cynthia