Page 6 - TR What Women Want August 2016

6SS • What Women Want • An Advertising Supplement to the Three Rivers Edition • Sunday, August 14, 2016
EILISH PALMER/CONTRIBUTING PHOTOGRAPHER Armida Stokes of Batesville grew up in California, where she spoke Spanish at home. When she moved to Arkansas, she did not have many occasions to speak Spanish, so she began teaching English
to the Hispanic community.
Sharing THE GIFT Bilingual tutor uses linguistic skills to teach those needing help communicating
BY SARAH DECLERK
SPECIAL SECTIONS WRITER
Many people imagine what life would be like if they had super- powers, and although such day-
dreams are inspired by fiction, most ev- eryone has a skill or talent. When people use their abilities to make the world a better place, they may become heroes to the people around them.
Armida Stokes speaks both English and Spanish, and she uses her ability to help Batesville’s Hispanic community by teaching English to Spanish-speaking residents.
“I have a strong passion for tutoring Hispanics and helping them better themselves for our community,” she said. “They want to be able to speak our language. A lot of them have kids in school who were born here, and [the parents] want to be able to communicate with teachers, doctors, banks, at the grocery store.”
Stokes is no stranger to immigrant life. Her par- ents moved from Mexico to California before she was born. For the first years of her life, Stokes spoke only Spanish in her home. She began learning English when she went to kindergarten.
Her bilingual abilities came in handy during her
freshman year of high school, which she spent with her relatives in Mexico. While she was there, her school’s English teacher asked her to teach English to the class, so Stokes did.
Stokes said her mother taught her the importance of helping others.
“My mom taught us to always help other people, not to always just think of ourselves. She was always helping, whether it was family or friends. If someone needed a place to stay, she opened her doors to them. If people needed a ride to the grocery store or a doc- tor appointment or a job interview, my mom took the time to help others,” she said. “She told us not to be selfish because that’s not what God wanted from us. She set the example.”
Stokes eventually moved to Arkansas and settled in Batesville. Although she said she feels at home in The Natural State, Stokes said she was disappointed when she found that she barely had a need to speak Spanish.
“I really felt like I was missing out because, to me, it was a gift from God to have this second language. I was praying and asking God to show me how I can use my second language that he had blessed me with,” she said.
Her prayers were soon answered, she said. While Stokes was working as a phone sales representative at Lifeplus International, a co-worker who was a mem-
ber of the Literacy Council of Independence County asked Stokes if she would be interested in tutoring.
“I got excited because the day before, my sister and I had been talking about me tutoring Hispanics in our community,” she said. “So when he approached me, I was like, ‘I would love to.’”
That co-worker put Stokes in touch with Nicole Stroud, executive director of the Ozark Foothills Lit- eracy Project. When Stroud learned that Stokes was fluent in Spanish, she asked if Stokes would like to tutor with AmeriCorps. AmeriCorps is a program of the Corporation for National and Community Service that uses volunteerism and service to help individuals and communities.
“It interested me very much, so I became an AmeriCorps member, which was in 2012,” Stokes said. She worked one on one with about 11 adult stu- dents at a time, she said. Because she was still working at Lifeplus, she tutored students during evenings and
weekends.
“I enjoyed it,” she said. “That was my passion — to
be able to use my second language.”
AmeriCorps provided training sessions and a cur-
riculum for Stokes’ tutoring, and she often used other teaching methods as well. Many times, she went over local menus with her students, she said.
In one instance, a student wanted a certain drink from McDonald’s, but because she and the staff could