During the past few months, Jose Arriaga has been asked to run horses at various tracks because of his English skills. He said that during these trips he was asked to help translate.

Thirteen students made level gains in the last two rounds of CASAS testing. Bernabe Flores, Maria Guardado, Martina Medina, Brayan Morales, Cesar Morales, Jose Roberto Oliva, Angel Perez, Elias Perez, Maria Raquel Portillo, and Guadalupe Rivera made one-level gains. Arturo Correa, Jose Rivas, and Jose Sanchez made two-level gains. Jose Rivas recently moved to the intermediate English class from the beginning section and Arturo Correa moved to the advanced class.

A reading time has been established from 1-2 p.m., Monday through Friday. During this time, students may come to the Center and have volunteers read with them. We have had a good response from the students to this new program and need volunteers to help.

If you have any questions about volunteer opportunities, please contact Stephanie Beaver at 636-4400 ext. 1231.

Chef Gil Logan, the executive chef of Levy Restaurants at Churchill Downs, will offer a cooking class on September 30 at 6 p.m., and 40-50% of the proceeds of this class will be donated to the Center and to an organization providing aid to Hurricane Katrina victims. The class will feature foods and wines from Kentucky, but Chef Logan will prepare the dishes with a distinct international flair. The cost to attend this class is $49.95, which includes the cooking demo and dinner. If you would like to attend please contact, the Service Center at 636-4400. Come and have a great time learning some new recipes and raise money for KFLC too!

We accomplished a lot this spring – thanks to our volunteer support, teachers, staff and our students!! We introduced several new classes; the Groom Elite being a great success! I hope to make the Groom Elite program a regular class offering during live meets. The close of the spring meet has not taken away our steam and enthusiasm. The ESL classes continue to be busy, and an afternoon reading time with volunteers was recently started. It has brought in familiar faces to practice and some new faces to begin learning English. In addition, our first volunteer-led citizenship class has formed and had nine students attend the first class! Great work, everyone.

Though Samantha Wagoner's VISTA service ended in September, two new AmeriCorps VISTAs have joined the staff at KFLC.

Anne Kaiser, a native of the Chicago area, recently graduated from the University of Illinois in Champaign-Urbana with a Bachelor's degree in Spanish. She has previously volunteered in the nonprofit arena working with immigrants and chose to serve at Klein because of the opportunity to continue to work with this population. As Program Manager, Anne will work to recruit and retain students, to support current classes, and to develop new programming.

Originally from the Dallas area, Stephanie Beaver graduated from Centenary College of Louisiana in Shreveport with a BA in English. Wanting to give back to the community, Stephanie chose to serve at Klein because of the unique environment in which it is located. Stephanie will work with the current volunteers as well as recruit new volunteers.

The Outriders Society has a quarterly meeting scheduled on Saturday, September 10 at 10 A.M. The meeting will feature a guest speaker from the Henry Clay Foundation. Not only a great statesman, Henry Clay was a great leader in the Thoroughbred Industry of his time.

The Outriders Society is the volunteer organization of the Kentucky Derby Museum, whose purpose is to enhance the image of the Museum throughout the community. Volunteers for Klein Family Learning Center are eligible to join The Outriders Society. Benefits of joining include: Museum membership, backstretch tours, annual horse farm tour, and a personalized Outriders jacket. If you are interested in joining, please contact Julie Henry at 637-1111 ext. 336.