Literacy Volunteers of the Montachusett Area (LVMont) is pleased to announce the hiring of Zwanieke Visser as the organization’s new Executive Director.
Zwanieke has extensive international background, ESOL teaching experience and significant leadership and management experience in a variety of challenging settings. A former Navy Officer and military spouse who lived and worked in more than 8 countries, she has managed teams of up to 40 people in nonprofit organizations and managed larger budgets for different governmental entities.
Zwanieke has a deep commitment to community, literacy and English language learners. She has taught ESOL for 7 years, has a TEFL (Teaching English as a Foreign Language) certificate and fluently speaks 3 languages with basic conversational knowledge of 3 others.
Zwanieke has a Master of Arts in Global Studies with a specialization in in the Study of Cultures and Intercultural Communication from Misjonshøgskolen Stavanger in Norway. She has done post-graduate work in public health and operational and financial management and has a Bachelor’s Degree in Business Administration and Logistics from the Royal Netherlands Naval Academy.
Zwanieke and her family are newly settled in Lunenberg and look forward to becoming more involved in the community.
In starting her new position, Zwanieke said, “The mission of this organization is very close to my heart. LVMont does incredibly meaningful work by empowering those for whom English is not a primary language as well as by promoting and fostering adult literacy. I look forward to managing the program activities, increasing LVMont’s visibility and fundraising. But most importantly, I look forward to celebrating the incredible achievements that our students accomplish with the support of our tutors.”
Literacy Volunteers of the Montachusett Area is a private, nonprofit organization whose mission is to promote literacy in the Montachusett Area by providing free, confidential, and individualized tutoring to adults in basic literacy and English for Speakers of Other Languages (ESOL).