Supporting families and ensuring children are ready to succeed when they enter school, as well as beyond.
* 16% of children in Androscoggin County live in poverty.

A Dynamic Community:
Promoting, supporting, enhancing independence and self-sufficiency
* 49% of local residents cannot read higher than a sixth grade level.

Meeting Basic Needs:
Ensuring individuals and families have food, shelter, clothing and access to services that promote physical and mental well-being.
* 60 people in our community are homeless on any given night.

Life-Long Learning:
Promoting opportunities for job training, education, collaboration and volunteerism.
* In 2004, 200 high school students in our county dropped out of school.

Advocating that individuals and families are safe and protected at all times
* Over 3,000 crimes were committed in Androscoggin County last year.

United Way of Androscoggin County Helps Make a Match

Two years ago, 21 year old Adam Merrill was involved in a car accident that left him with a severe brain injury impairing his ability to read, write and carry on conversations.

With help from family, physicians and therapists, Adam regained his driver’s license and returned to his job. But without the ability to read work orders and other job related information accurately, Adam struggled to keep pace and quickly came to realize he needed more help and turned to Literacy Volunteers, an agency receiving United Way support.

For more than six months Sigrid, a volunteer tutor, met with Adam once a week at Literacy Volunteers. Together they read the newspaper, worked on pronouncing words common in the workplace and used scrabble tiles to help further build Adam’s vocabulary. Adam became so good at Scrabble that he sometimes caught Sigrid with a word she did not know.

Thanks to donations to United Way of Androscoggin County, Literacy Volunteers received funding necessary to support their Tutoring Program, which matched Adam with Sigrid.

“The program is good for me,” remarked Adam. “Without Literacy Volunteers and Sigrid I would still be struggling, frustrated and unable to do my job well.”

Today Adam’s reading, writing and spelling skills have greatly improved. He enjoys reading comics and the menu at his favorite restaurant, the Ninety-Nine.

Literacy Volunteers Tutoring Program is one of the over 50 local programs funded by United Way of Androscoggin County. United Way funding reaches more than 30,000 people in Androscoggin County each year, helping to ensure support for children and families, people with disabilities our elderly citizens and providing emergency assistance during crisis situations.