Literacy Night at Alachua Learning Center

ALACHUA - The Alachua Learning Center, located at 11100 State Road 235, kicked off its annual Literacy Night on Wednesday, Oct. 9.

Parents and students from kindergarten to eighth grade were invited to join the Alachua Learning Center in games and stories.

Every year, the school hosts Literacy Night to encourage children to develop strong reading habits. The event also sells books for a discounted price so that children can afford to read more. The funds from the books sold are used to help teachers grow their in-class libraries.

Literacy Night was deemed to be a success, selling out several series of books. One of the most popular books was the novel “Spirit Animals,” a series about children that are guided to make morally right decisions by their spirit animals.

Alachua Learning Center teacher Goura Perey was the host of the event. It was her first year hosting, and she said that she loved seeing how excited the students were about getting new books and reading them.

“They want to experience the books,” she said. “They’re flipping through pages and also making recommendations to each other.”

In addition to Perey, parents and students volunteered to help the event run smoothly. Theresa Vaicys was one of two parents that helped out. Vaicys was in charge of handling money earned from the books sold.

Vaicys said she went to the event once and really enjoyed it. Since then, Vaicys has volunteered for Literacy Night three more times.

“I really appreciate all the planning that goes into it,” she said. “We rely so much on parent support and student volunteers as well. We had an outstanding group of students this year.”

Vaicys’ two children go to school at the Alachua Learning Center. Her oldest, a middle-school student, also volunteered this year.

“He volunteered to set up during the school preview, so he was there all day with me on that Monday,” she said. “He helped the kindergarten through second-graders. They need somebody to write down the books that they liked.”

After 14 years of hosting Literacy Night, the event has become a staple for the Alachua Learning Center students. And while the students are the biggest buyers for the event, it’s also open to the public.

“I look forward to being a part of this project again next year, and I think I’ll be looking for ways to get more community involvement,” Vaicys said.

While Literacy Night is finished for this year, students and parents can still go to the Scholastic website and purchase books that will help Alachua Learning Center teachers pay for more books and supplies in their classroom.

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