A tall young man ambled over to our WCC table at the
Berkeley City College Service Fair this afternoon and broke into a broad grin.
“I had a writer coach when I was at Willard,” he said, pointing to our blue and
white banner. “It definitely helped me.” Although it has been nine years, Byron
McGovern, who is now working as a lacrosse coach at Bishop O’Dowd and as a sports
coach with Coaching Corps, still recalls the impact of his WCC coach and still recalls
her name: Virginia Jardim.
“She gave me a lot of tricks and tips,” he said,
including how to remember the spelling of the the word "government." More importantly, “She
helped me understand the writing process.” He remembered working on essays,
starting with a draft, going over them together, and making revisions, before
writing a final draft.
“In 7th and 8th grade, writing even a three-page essay is a daunting thing,” says Byron. “Having someone there to say, ‘it’s not that bad’ is helpful. For a lot of kids, I’m sure that support helped them get over their fear of writing.” A recent graduate of UC Santa Cruz, with a double major in English and politics, Byron put his writing skills to good use in college.
We don’t often get a chance to hear from our students after they move on, so it was a delight meeting Byron and hearing his writer coach remembrances. And maybe his coach had other positive influences. Like our own writer coaches, Byron has already found a way to give back to the community, with his service in the Coaching Corps program, which brings after-school sports to children in low-income communities--and whose motto could be our own: coach a kid, save a life.
Lynn Mueller, Associate Director