Tony Dodero -- From the newsroom

Sarah Markel is hoping to get a call from you this week.

As the program director for the HOSTS reading program at Whittier

School in Costa Mesa, she’s hoping that you will decide to become a

mentor to a young elementary student eager to learn to read.

It just takes an hour a week.

In fact, starting today, volunteers are being sought to help children

read at Whittier, Pomona and Wilson schools and at the new Shalimar

Learning Center that is now sharing a roof with the Someone Cares Soup

Kitchen on 19th Street.

“We have 80 children in the program right now,” Markel said.

Because of a lack of volunteers, each mentor is assigned to two

children per hour, she said.

“I need about 60 more,” she said. “My goal is to be able to say to

every child, ‘yes you have a mentor.’ That’s what it boils down to.”

If you wind up calling Sarah or the literacy leaders at the other

schools, let me just tell you now, you won’t regret it.

How do I know that, you ask? Because of a young man named Rogelio.

Rogelio hailed from Cuernevaca, Mexico. At 22, he and his young wife

were struggling to make ends meet, he making a touch over minimum wage in

a Huntington Beach factory and his wife making about the same at a

fast-food burger joint.

They toiled mostly to make a better life for their young daughter. And

one of their many goals was to learn to read English, so they in turn

could read books to their daughter, in English.

That’s where I came in.

I was a newly christened reading mentor with the Literacy Volunteers

of America. I got lucky, and for a year and a half, I was teamed up with

Rogelio. He and I met on a weekly basis at a city library, and I did my

best to help him learn English.

It was a long and sometimes painful process.

And I say I was lucky because as time went on it became one of the

most gratifying moments of my life to see Rogelio’s reading skills slowly

improve.

Rogelio became someone who I looked forward to seeing each week. We

would laugh together when I’d try to explain some of the complexities of

the English language that he struggled with and even I didn’t understand.

I regret that I was not able to help Rogelio very long. A change in my

job hours caused me to lose touch with him.

But the short time that I worked with him taught me probably much more

than I was able to teach Rogelio. That is, how much this journalist takes

for granted the power of the written word.

So think about it.

All you have to do is spare one hour a week, between the hours of 8:30

to 11:30 a.m. or 3 to 6 p.m. Monday through Friday, and you can help

provide the keys of knowledge to a young child.

“Many of our children come from various backgrounds and don’t have

role models who are successful,” Sarah Markel said. “We get students from

Newport Harbor High honor classes, people who work in the community at

Barnes & Noble, Starbucks and the Los Angeles Times. These children get

these fabulous role models from all walks of life.”

If you’re ready to pick up the phone now, let me help you out. Here’s

the contacts:

* Whittier School, Sarah Markel, HOSTS program director, (949)

515-6898;

* Pomona School, Jill McWhertor, literacy leader, (949) 515-6980;

* Wilson School, Pam Eastman, literacy leader, (949) 515-6995;

* Shalimar Learning Center, (949) 646-0396.

If you’re not sold yet that’s OK, maybe next time.

But just remember the words of Sarah Markel who told the story of how

her young charges react when they learn that a mentor has come to see

them.

“You see their faces light up.”

And believe me, once you see that, it makes it all worth it.

* TONY DODERO is the editor. His column appears on Mondays. If you

have story ideas or concerns about news coverage, please send messages

either via e-mail to o7 [email protected] or by phone at

949-574-4258.