Your April News & Award Winners

April 2015

Greetings!

April is National Volunteer Month, and every year School on Wheels nominates volunteers to receive the President's Volunteer Service Award. In 2015, 124 of our volunteer tutors will receive the prestigious award for volunteering more than 100 hours in a year. Alexandra Victor, Amy Ezhaya, Andrea Aguinaldo, Ben McGarry, Bruce Ward, Catherine Meek, Denice Gonzalez-Kim, Diana Martinon, Ian Chan, Isabel Carrillo-Dono, Jimmy Dhanapanth, and Karen Castaneda will receive the Gold Medal for over 500 hours of volunteer service. Andy Wang, Bryant Rivera, Conway Gilbreth, Gladys Herrera, Ian Tindel, Jim Edmisten, Khodayar Goshtasbi, Liat Smener, Luis Gallardo, Shea Chuey, and Winifred Strohmeyer will receive the Silver Medal for over 200 hours of service (or over 75 hours for those under 15 years old). And 98 tutors will receive the Bronze Medal for over 100 hours of service. All our wonderful recipients and their tutoring locations are listed below.

Congratulations to our amazing Presidential Award Winners for 2015

East LA

Amarilis Bolanos, Douglas Gee, Evan Panas, Jacqueline Romo, Luis Gallardo, Prapti Gautam, Sarah Gonzalez, Wilton Mui

Skid Row Learning Center

Alex Goodman, Allison Maldonado, Arianne Neumark, Audrey Limon, Benito Polanco, Bruce Ward, Bryant Rivera, Damion Wagner, David Kagen, Denice Gonzalez-Kim, Diana Martinon, Emerson Puerto, Gladys Herrera, Ian Chan, Isabel Carrillo-Dono, Jessica Pacheco, Jim Edmisten, Kate McNeil, Kiran Goraya, Kelsey Ritzel, Kristina Kulkovit, Lionel Ong, Michelle Bennett, Milvia Ramires, Natalie Platon, Robert Finucane, Shea Chuey, Stacey Yakimowich, Victoria Johnson, Wayne Espinoza, Westview Services

South LA

Allen Vernik, Ann Dawidziak, Carlita Dorsey, Colleen Scribner, Daerique Jamison, Eileen McAndrews, Gaby Cardoza, Johnna Hotchkiss, Joseph Portillo, Lisa Guillemin, Lynn Deegan,Nancy Thomason, Rebecca Jones

Westside

Alexandra Victor, Alicia Markoe, Blue McDonnell, Brendan O' Donnell, Caroline Sexton, Ellie Lederman, Jeremy Blum, Joseph Lardner, Julie Clark-Hansen, Khodayar Goshtasbi, Kimberly Pemberton, Kristen Schulle-Griffin, Leigha Kemmett, Linda Arvanites, Lucas White, Nannette Callo, Ruth Blanco, Spenser May, Pepperdine Volunteer Center

Long Beach and South Bay

Abigail Shipley, Alan Su, Carolyn Shipley, Christopher Ehling, Ed Babtkis, Jeffrey Jacobs, Jessica Prosper Seymour, Jezz Quibal, Justin Foust, Keith Weber, Kiaira Knox, Peggy Sanders, Sonia Contreras

Hollywood and Mid-City

David Nguyen, Gillian Smith, Joseph Soulsby, Karen O'Keefe, Peter Lin

Inland Empire

Amber Christon, Kayli Brunelle, Michelle Wells, Willie Riley

San Fernando Valley

Charles Tsouvalas, Evan Green, Ian Tindel, Mackenzie Trujillo, Margaret MacCurdy, Theresa Fiddler, Wendy Trujillo, Zoe Cole

Ventura and Santa Barbara Counties

Al Earle, Amy Ezhaya, Andrea Aguinaldo, Andy Wang, Ben McGarry, Catherine Meek, Claudia Gack, Conway Gilbreth, Janice Smets, Karen Castaneda, Katherine Green, Katie Chilton, Ladan Sheikholeslam, Liat Smener, Marcia Rothman, Naomi Sanchez, Winifred Strohmeyer, Xinyu Wang

Orange County

Franklin Rutherford, Jimmy Dhanapanth, Linda Gottlieb, Margie Johnson, Maria De Souza, Mark Vanderpool

Catherine Meek
Executive Director

In This Issue

Donor of the Month

Events

Star Tutors

Star Students

In The News

Donor of the Month

Gesner-Johnson Family Foundation

The Gesner-Johnson Family Foundation recently awarded School on Wheels a grant to turn part of our Skid Row Learning Center into a new, state-of-the-art Digital Learning Room. Because of this grant, our students now have access to the latest laptops, chromebooks and tablets as well as many online learning resources to help them develop and enhance their technical skills, and to keep them learning at the same rate as their peers. Thank you to the Gesner-Johnson Family Foundation for making this possible! Paul Johnson, president and director of Gesner-Johnson was on hand to join in the celebration along with Josh Fein, President of the School on Wheels Board of Directors (pictured above). Thank you both for your contribution to this wonderful day and for helping to bring much-needed technology to our students.

Events

Volunteer Appreciation Month

April is Volunteer Appreciation Month at School on Wheels! Regional Coordinators will be taking the time to honor you, our amazing volunteers, for all of your hard work and dedication to your students and our program. We will also be honoring our Presidential Service Award winners at these events. This award is given to volunteers who have given over 100 hours to our organization and, this year, there are over 124 of you! Amazing! Be on the lookout for your invitation to come and celebrate with us!

Ventura St. Patrick's Day Parade

We had a great time at the Ventura St. Patrick's Day Parade on March 14! About 40 people came out to support School on Wheels, to advocate for homeless youth, and to have fun. We even had our very own Bussy with festive St. Patrick's Day decorations!
Thank you to everyone who supported us at the parade.

Star Tutor

Folu Oyefeso, online tutor

"Overall, online tutoring works well for me because I can adjust sessions to easily work within my schedule. The location doesn't matter too. Since starting online tutoring in January, my experience has been very eye-opening and inspiring! The look on students' faces when they understand a new concept is invaluable.

One of my greatest successes was when I received an email from a student after our final session. In the email, he said how much my tutoring meant to him. He even referred to me as an older brother, which meant so much to me. Fortunately, the student was able to move forward from the program to a better environment. I hope to continue tutoring as long as I can with School On Wheels!"

-Folu

Click here to read more about our Star Tutors.

Star Student

Dillon, 2nd Grade

"I had the privilege of meeting Dillon this winter. Dillon is a great student who is full of energy, intelligence, and a rather contagious optimistic attitude that made our tutoring sessions a blast. Each week he was ready to tackle his next homework assignment and was motivated to finish his weekly assignments days in advance. When we weren't working hard on homework, we had interesting conversations that expressed his imaginativeness and genuine curiosity for all things math and science. This included conversations about the subtle wonders of Newton's Laws of Motion and the physics of Newton's Cradle! I have no doubt that Dillon has the potential to do great things in his future and to achieve his dream of becoming a scientist. I wish him all the best!"

- Ruben Maldonado, Tutor