Duke Employee Giving funds awarded to a new DLC initiative!

“When you take an age group like that, 18 to 24 years old, that’s a point in life when they’re ready to launch,” said Joan Zec Nelson, ESOL program coordinator for the Durham Literacy Center. “They’re in a new country. It’s an opportunity.”

We are very happy to share that we can better support young adults/older youth in our Youth English Language and Job Readiness Initiative thanks to support from Duke's Doing Good in the Neighborhood employee giving campaign! The campaign's website described our initiative in a recent article focusing on several participating students:

Martin Cuello is a 24-year-old information technology specialist whose dream is to study strategic planning at Duke University.

He arrived in the U.S. two years ago from the Dominican Republic, and he is a native Spanish speaker. To eventually apply to Duke and begin his strategic planning career track, he is first strengthening his English language skills.

He is currently taking English for Speakers of Other Languages (ESOL) classes at the Durham Literacy Center, located off Chapel Hill Road. Durham Literacy Center students like Cuello are immigrants who are working to strengthen their English in order to find a well-paying job in the U.S. or pursue a dream career. They are also working to strengthen their job skills, such as participating in in-person interviews and writing resumes. The Durham Literacy Center helps students achieve these goals by providing its ESOL classes and one-on-one mentoring at no cost to students. [Click here to read the rest of this article.]

This initiative is made possible with support from the Community Care Fund grant-making program, which is funded by Duke’s Doing Good in the Neighborhood employee giving campaign and coordinated by Duke University’s Office of Durham and Regional Affairs.

Learn more about the campaign at doinggood.duke.edu.