FARMINGTON — Literacy Volunteers of Franklin and Somerset counties, and Franklin County Adult and Community Education have moved to portable classrooms on the Mt. Blue Campus, 129 Seamon Road.

Literacy Volunteers is devoted to helping adults with reading skills, language development and education for 35 years.

“The need is there,” Executive Director Becky Jasch said. “Eight percent of adults in Franklin County and 10 percent in Somerset County cannot read well enough to fill out a job application.”

People learn to cope without the skills, but probably do not fulfill their potential, she said.

With 100 volunteers and 51 active students, methods for working with adults are also changing, she said.

A recent ConnectME technology grant has provided Kindle readers for tutors to use with students, she said. There are free programs online that help with pronunciation, math and reading. Books can be downloaded.

Since Literacy Volunteers of Maine disbanded, the group has worked with the Department of Education. Currently, a potential new program, Literacy For ME, which involves the whole family, is under consideration, Jasch said.

“A reading parent makes a reading child,” she said.

Literacy means the ability to use printed and written information to function in society, to achieve one’s goals and develop one’s potential, Jasch said.

The fact that a large percentage of people in jail do not have high school diplomas shows the importance of education, she said.

It is difficult to measure all the group has done to promote literacy over the years but “the changed lives of the individuals we serve are a testimony to all the good we have done,” she previously said.

The partnership with adult education provides office space, she said. The organization governed by a board of directors and led by Jasch with help from volunteer coordinators Donna Kenney in Franklin County and Deb Burnham in Somerset, continually strives to fund the program.

Grant applications and fundraising is a necessary part of the work.

All year, the group collects used books for their annual sale. It’s set for 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Saturday, May 3, and 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. Sunday, May 4, at the Farmington Elks Lodge, 120 School St., West Farmington.

“We have some really good books this year,” Jasch said. “Book donations are always accepted.”

Literacy Volunteers also is accepting donations of new or gently used items for its annual Huge Indoor Yard Sale on June 22. Individuals can rent tables.

For more information, call the LVFSC Office at 778-3460.

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Becky Jasch of Farmington, executive director of Literacy Volunteers of Franklin and Somerset counties, holds one of the used books for the group’s annual sale May 3 and 4 at the Elks Lodge in West Farmington.