Greetings:

It's hard to believe graduation is upon us already.  This coming Friday, May 28th, 2010 at 6:30 p.m. the GNRM will be hosting its annual graduation ceremoney for those women and men who have successfully completed their Recovery Programs. 

Part of the graduation ceremony acknowledges the achievements these programmers have made while attending classes in the Academic Center.  Programmers can attempt and successfully achieve more than 1 certificate.  Friday evening this year's graduates will be able to take pride in the following achievements"

• 1 Woman and 5 Men will have taken and passed their GED exams (which is the equivalent of a high school diploma).
• 8 Men will have received ACC (Academic Center Certificates).  These certificates recognize significant improvement in the areas of Reading and Math; as well as the completion of an essay, resume, or possessing the ability to type up to 40 wpm.
• 7 Women and10 Men will have received ACLSC (Academic Center Life Skills Certificate).  One of the women will be the FIRST IN-STEP graduate to obtain this certificate!!  In order to earn this certificate our programmers must show significant improvement (an average of 80%  or better on all lessons attempted) in the areas of Math, Reading, and Writing, completion of a resume and cover letter, learning how to write and maintain a budget, learning how to type up to 40 WPM with 95% accuracy, and 50 hours of electives in a minimum of 5 different subjects ranging from Vocabulary, Math, Religion, Logic, Science (either physical or life), Astronomy, History etc.
• For the first time ever 4 men will be recognized for obtaining an AACLSC (Advanced Academic Center Life Skills Certificate).  I enjoy this part of the program because our students are provided with the opportunity to choose any subject they are interested in.  They then spend 60 hours researching their subject, write a ten page paper, and teach what they've learned to the rest of their classmates and me (the teacher).  For once I am able to sit back and learn from our students!  What a treat!
• 2 Women and 3 Men will be recognized for attending and successfully completing and passing (with a GPA of B or better) classes at Shasta College or the Institute of Technology.

Congrats to all of you!!  I'm going to miss you!

Do you have an interest in helping these men and women change their lives around?  You can,  by volunteering, a morning or afternoon a week  - classes run Monday and Wednesday mornings ( In-Step and Women) and Tuesday and Thursday monrnings and afternoons (for the Men).  Please give me a  call or email me.

Looking forward to having you become a part of the Academic Center Staff.

Lynn Swanson

Academic Director

242-5920

242-5924 Fax.

lswanson@gnrm.org

"Love is a friendship set to music." E. Joseph Cossman