My particular program was defunded, meaning, primarily, the group with whom those who were a part of my program worked are now left unserved.
I work for Ampact’s Language Corps. I moved across the country to work for this particular program within the larger umbrella of Ampact because the goal of Language Corps (LC) was so essential to enabling students who are English Language Learners of middle school age to have access to the same and equal opportunities as their peers whose first, primary and typically only language is English, that I sold even my most sentimental possession — an antique guitar given me by my cousin, Laura, many years ago — to pay for my travel to Minnesota to serve in this position. I have been so grateful to be able to be among those serving in this capacity that I’d have gladly returned to the same role for as many years as I’d have been allowed. I cannot even begin to adequately describe the impact this program has in a very rapid manner on the students who work with its tutors, an overwhelmingly positive experience that affects other students, as well — the confidence, the ability of these children to recognize their own strengths, their own abilities, their own agency within their own destines — in a short time, it was so exponentially increased that I, at times, would cry after leaving the school site for the day, because if Ampact was to strive for a goal, I couldn’t imagine one more more profound than this.
