at her school and “Stacy is extremely program has earned the respect of valuable to our students, parents, and STAIR officials alike. organization. She exudes leadership For starters, Gullette got the in the most positive kids’ parents more involved manner. She is so than ever before. She also set up a free library in the Bay welcoming to all Ridge Gardens community the students and and began providing snack volunteers, as well bags for her students and kids from the neighborhood as their families.” when she found out some
Photography by Steve Buchanan
how widespread illiteracy was among young elementary school students, and it shocked her.
TOWNE SALUTE
Stacy Gullette
Start The Adventure In Reading (STAIR) Annapolis
S
By Tom Worgo
tacy Gullette served as a member of Annapolis Mayor Gavin Buckley’s Human Services Transition Committee to help address the city’s addiction problem. Gullette was devoted to that mission, spending five months doing exhaustive research and talking to community leaders and addiction recovery experts. Gullette and committee chair DaJuan Gay compiled a report on her findings.
“To be honest with you, I thought my main focus would be on the opioid crisis,” she says. “But then I made a 180-degree turn.” As part of her committee duties, she was tasked with identifying other critical social issues in the community. Gullette, an Eastport resident, in the process of her research, discovered 30
What’s Up? Annapolis | June 2020 | whatsupmag.com
“We were looking at some of the statistics of our local schools and saw some students were reading way below grade level,” she recalls. The problem was particularly acute at Georgetown East Elementary School in Annapolis. “It was one of the poorest performing schools in the county,” Gullette says. Gullette eventually connected with Start The Adventure In Reading (STAIR) of Annapolis and became the school’s site coordinator in 2018 for the nonprofit, which serves 13 elementary schools around the county. STAIR is an educator-approved literacy program designed to help second graders throughout Anne Arundel County improve basic reading skills and self-confidence in a fun, nurturing environment. She oversees a group of 18 volunteers that tutor second graders one-on-one two nights a week. She and her tutors work primarily with Hispanic and African American students. She’s done little short of galvanizing the
of them were going home hungry. She’s even learned Spanish through a phone app in order to better communicate with Hispanic parents.
STAIR appealed to Gullette because of her educational background, which includes a B.A. in English from George Mason University. She later earned a master’s degree in accounting from George Washington University and spent three years as a C.P.A. with Ernst & Young, in Washington, D.C., before starting her own tax preparation service in Herndon, Virginia. “Stacy is extremely valuable to our organization,” STAIR Executive Director Laura Iversen says. “She exudes leadership in the most positive manner. She is so welcoming to all the students and volunteers, as well as their families. She is really embracing family engagement this year and is very committed to leadership in the organization and at her specific site.” What has particularly impressed Iverson is how effectively she’s gotten parents and guardians to buy into the reading program. The parents used to pick the kids up in the main office after a tutor took
