The first ELS Activity And Teacher’s Guides arrived today.

The Bishop Gibbons English Department asked for help getting ELS (English As A Second Language) workbooks for teachers and activity books for the students.

This would be of great and urgent assistance for the refugee students arriving at the school from Bishop Maginn.

I found six or seven highly recommended books for teachers and some ESL games and exercises for the children.

The first of them arrived at the school this morning Tricia White, the head of the English Department, wrote to thank me and said the books will allow the teachers to better help the new arrivals with their English learning.

Trish, like Sue Silverstein, is an incredibly dedicated teacher.

I asked our angel book friend Alys Culhane in Alaska (isn’t life full of crisis and mystery?) if she could help, and it so happens, she had three boxes of ESL activity guides for students sitting right at her feet in her Palmer, Alaska office, headquarters of the Bright Lights Book Project, a non-profit group Alys started that recycles used and discarded books and sends them out to school and people who need them.

Alys is heroic; she never fails to deliver.

The boxes will soon be on their way from Alaska, and the guides I purchased are arriving today and tomorrow.

If you have your hands on any used ESL activity books for high school children, please drop them in the mail: Tricia White, English Department, Bishop Gibbons High School, 2600 Albany Street, Schenectady, N.Y. 12304. I think we’re in good shape.

Broken and forgotten jewelry is on the way, and so are sheets and canvas and beads.

This is what I love to do.