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Here to help: ESOL learner and Community Champion

When Sahra first started on her ESOL course at WAES, she never would have guessed that just two years down the line she’d be confidently speaking English that it would help her make a real difference in her community.

Sahra volunteers with Community Champions in Queen’s Park, a charity that brings local people and services closer together to improve health and well-being in the community and helps them get the most out of the services available to them. She attends training sessions on a range of subjects, from healthy eating to how to register for a dentist, and spreads what she’s learned through her community.

“She’s an excellent role model to family and the community - inspiring her family and members of the community to lead a healthy lifestyle.”

Sahra’s been involved in some truly amazing projects and has even volunteered ideas of her own. Their recent outreach campaign for elderly people was something she suggested! She saw that many older members of her community were struggling in the winter so with the help of Community Champions, she ran a food drive for them. They leafleted her children’s school and collected many boxes of food which they personally brought around to elderly people’s houses. It helped people when they really needed it and made a massive difference to the lives of elderly people living in the local community.

The volunteer work really complements her ESOL classes and gives her a chance to speak English more often. “I’m very happy with it because I get more practice,” she told us. “Before I started Community Champions I wasn’t that confident.” But once she puts on her Community Champions jumper she has no problem approaching people.

She knows she has something important to offer them and can really help.

Her project manager agrees, “Her English has improved so much since working with people who speak English as their mother tongue.” Talking to other people has always been something Sahra has enjoyed, and not only does this help her communicate with others but it gives her a great reason to get out there and meet new people.

It’s a cause that she’s very passionate about and she would have never been able to promote it like she has done if not for the English skills she learnt at WAES. She says she is very happy with her classes at WAES, especially the one on one support that her teacher, Amy, gives her.

Sahra plans to continue studying at WAES and feels that she still has a lot to learn, but she’s proud of how far she has come since she first started and everything she has managed to do since then.

Find out more what ESOL courses can do for you

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