Evelyn Goodell received the CBAL Literacy Award this year, in recognition of all the work she has done in the area promoting literacy.
The award criteria state that “nominees should be a strong advocate or champion for literacy, and an inspiration to others,” something that CBAL Family Literacy Coordinator Rhonda Palmer said Evelyn has always been seen as being. When the time came to put forward nominees, Goodell, who recently retired as the Nakusp Library’s head librarian, was mentioned right away. It didn’t take much prompting for the Community Literacy Advisory Committee to see she was the person to celebrate this year.
“Evelyn not only spent many years as the Public Librarian in Nakusp she also did a lot of work for the Columbia Basin Alliance for Literacy (CBAL),” Palmer told The Arrow Lakes News.
Goodell was also the Family Literacy Coordinator for CBAL in New Denver for three years, and coordinated a Parent/Child Mother Goose program that took place in the Lucerne school library.
“During this time, Evelyn brought One-To-One Reading to Lucerne School,” Palmer said. Goodell trained with Deb Schiller, who developed the program, in Vernon and had 100 volunteers (including High School students) the first year the program started at the school. During her time as coordinator, she also provided a Homework Club in the school.
The scope of Goodell’s work went beyond just book literacy. She also travelled to Cranbrook with Rhonda Palmer to do the week-long training for Mary Gordon’s Roots of Empathy program, and began offering the program that saw a baby visit a classroom each month at LESS for the next two years.
In addition to programming in the community and school, Goodell set up a reading tent at the original Hill Garlic Festival in Hills where children could come and listen to stories and sing songs while visiting the festival.
After she left her position as Coordinator for the New Denver area, she continued to work for CBAL doing “For the Love of Reading” at Lucerne Elementary School and attended the Community Literacy Advisory Committee (CLAC) meetings representing the Public Library.
Evelyn Goodell has fostered a caring and literate environment, and her contribution to the surrounding communities will be felt for a long time to come, and were celebrated by this award.
The award, made by Keith Berens from Live Metal Works in Nelson, features two readers, and the inscription on it reads: “You built a reader one person at a time…thank you for your passion and dedication to literacy.”