She received the David Ashworth Community Service Award from Central Market/HEB in 2022 and was interviewed on The Kelly Clarkson Show to share the story of her organization and its mission.
FORNEY, TX, January 22, 2024 /24-7PressRelease/ — Deidra C. Mayberry has been included in Marquis Who’s Who. As in all Marquis Who’s Who biographical volumes, individuals profiled are selected on the basis of current reference value. Factors such as position, noteworthy accomplishments, visibility, and prominence in a field are all taken into account during the selection process.
As both the co-founder and executive director of Reading to New Heights, a nonprofit organization that provides adult literacy learning opportunities, and the service department manager of Central Market, Ms. Mayberry demonstrates her leadership and passion for building community and improving the circumstances of individuals and communities alike. After earning a bachelor’s degree in communication, public relations, and business from The University of Texas at San Antonio in 2009, she joined Central Market, where she worked as an assistant service manager for several years before stepping into the role of service department manager in 2013. Since starting in this managerial role, Ms. Mayberry has continued to demonstrate her capacity to be a passionate, outgoing leader who possesses a strong expertise in customer service, relationship building, operation management, and business development.
Along with coaching, managing and leading more than 50 partners at Central Market, Ms. Mayberry oversees all department operations and provides professional development for her team, thus ensuring consistent product quality and exceptional customer service in order to maintain client relationships and generate new business. In progressing in her position at Central Market, she became aware of her desire to do more to help support adults outside of her managerial position at the grocery store. Driven by this aspiration, she collaborated with a friend in 2020 to establish Reading to New Heights, a nonprofit organization that helps adults improve their literacy skills in order to maximize their potential in society and gain the confidence that ensures a better quality of life.
Inspired by and drawing from her own experiences struggling with and mastering literacy, Ms. Mayberry thought outside the box to create a safe environment and program where adult learners could thrive and improve their literacy skills. Reading to New Heights offers discreet online training, led by certified educators who use a research-based curriculum to customize each adult learner’s experience, and deliver on the organization’s mission. Despite launching the nonprofit at the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, Ms. Mayberry and her fellow co-founder, Bobby Booker, persevered and were motivated by the belief that the services Reading to New Heights would provide would be life-changing and benefit not only individuals but their communities as well.
Now, several years out and still growing and succeeding, Ms. Mayberry sees the impact the organization has had on her local community and aims to expand its reach. In reflecting on the journey, she credits her most notable achievement as starting and managing her nonprofit through those times of uncertainty and fear that the pandemic brought. For her efforts and achievements, she received the David Ashworth Community Service Award from Central Market/HEB in 2022 and was interviewed on The Kelly Clarkson Show to share the story of her organization and its mission.
In all she has accomplished since she established Reading to New Heights, Ms. Mayberry credits her father for her success. Throughout her struggles with literacy, her father remained her biggest support; he encouraged her to keep persevering, despite the challenges, and learned alongside her to further teach her various techniques to absorb and comprehend information. In addition to her father, she credits her co-founder, Bobby Booker, for encouraging and helping her see her idea through and gives thanks to ger former leader and mentor, Michelle Cauley, who helped her discover her passion for serving the community, inspired her to explore and be inquisitive, and provided and instilled in her the gift of valuable feedback, which she is forever grateful for and wishes to pay forward in her work.
In five years’ time, Ms. Mayberry has plans to expand her nonprofit’s reach. Her hope is to grow her organization to reach a national level in order to continue to spread the message that it is never too late to learn. Through the growth of her nonprofit, she also aims to expand the services provided by her organization to include wrap-around services that can connect individuals with opportunities beyond just gaining literacy.
About Marquis Who’s Who®:
Since 1899, when A. N. Marquis printed the First Edition of Who’s Who in America®, Marquis Who’s Who® has chronicled the lives of the most accomplished individuals and innovators from every significant field of endeavor, including politics, business, medicine, law, education, art, religion and entertainment. Marquis celebrates its 125th anniversary in 2023, and Who’s Who in America® remains an essential biographical source for thousands of researchers, journalists, librarians and executive search firms around the world. Marquis® publications may be visited at the official Marquis Who’s Who® website at www.marquiswhoswho.com.
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