Miami Valley Literacy Council Records

The Miami Valley Literacy Council Records document the progress of an important business and community organization. Through these records, researchers may gain insight into the literacy problems that were an ongoing issue in 20th and 21st century Dayton, Ohio.

Series I, Administration, is divided into three subseries.

Subseries IA, Board Minutes, documents the MVLC's monthly meetings and 6 months of monthly Project READ meetings. The minutes within the current collection start in 1986 and end in 2001. However, there are years within that range which are missing. The MVLC minutes are organized chronologically by month and year. The Project READ minutes are organized behind the MVLC minutes. This is the largest subseries in the MVLC records. It contains information vital to any researcher looking for financial records of the council.

Subseries IB, Annual Meetings, documents the MVLC's annual meetings which were held in April. The annual meetings were used to track the progress of the MVLC. These records will be useful to researchers looking to gain a quick insight into the MVLC goals and achievements.

Subseries IC, Correspondence, documents the MVLC's correspondence with volunteers, board members, and the community. This subseries is rather small. MVLC discussed its most important correspondence at their monthly meetings, so some correspondence is within the board minutes.

Series II, Accreditation & Training, is divided into two subseries.

Subseries IIA, Accreditation Standards, documents the accreditation standards put out by Literacy Volunteers of America and how the Miami Valley Literacy Council fulfilled those standards. The accreditation standards are split into 18 qualifying standards and 14 scoring standards. The first folder in this subseries contains a synopsis of the standards. Three items of note are: MVLC employee handbook/policies (box 5 file 20), student orientation packet (box 6 file 5), and a student progress tracker (box 6 file 10).

Subseries IIB, Training Standards, contain three different training manuals: two board member training manuals and one tutor training manual. The tutor training manual might be the most important document in these records. The tutor training manual is the essence of what the MVLC was about.

Series III, Publicity, is divided into three subseries.

Subseries IIIA, Literature and Events, contains all the literature, except newsletters, produced by the MVLC. That literature includes promotional literature, such as flyers and bookmarks, and also hand written student work (box 7 file 8,10). The student work is primarily from the summer of 2010, just before the council closed.

Subseries IIIB, Newsletters, contains the newsletters produced by the MVLC to communicate with its students, volunteers, and the community. The number of newsletters published is unknown, but these records seem to be missing some.

Subseries IIIC, News clippings, is one of the larger subseries. There are three concentrations within the news clippings: MVLC related, general literacy, and general issues affecting education. The MVLC stayed informed on literacy issues and discoveries around the nation and the world. The Dexter Manley illiterate scandal could be of interest (box 7 file 18).

Series IV, Photographs and Scrapbook, contains one scrapbook and two archive binder photo boxes. The scrapbook documents the history of the MVLC up until the 1990s. There was a sticky page photo album included in the original records. The first archive binder photo box contains the photographs from that album. The original order was respected as much as possible. Loose photos found throughout the records were placed in the second archive binder photo box. Very few of the photos were labeled.

Series V, Memorabilia, contains certificates, plaques, a trophy, and two banners. The awards come from various sources across the Miami Valley and the nation.