Literacy – Spanning the US :: Memphis TN :: New Haven CT :: Midland TX

@LiteracyMSouth

Literacy Mid-South Building Network to Raise Reading Levels

Memphis Daily News: 1.12.2017 by  Don Wade

As a child, Knox Shelton witnessed first-hand the struggle to break a generational cycle of marginal literacy. He grew up in Jonesville, Virginia, a small Appalachian coal mining town.

“I mostly remembered the good times of being a kid,” said Shelton, who recently was promoted to the role of executive director at Literacy Mid-South. 

“But little memories come back that are very dark and scary, just to think of situations kids were in. I’m gonna make it sound like an awful town, but there were kids pulled out of school in first grade to work with their families.

“I knew a boy that was a good friend in kindergarten, left after first grade, and running into him in third grade, I could see what being out of school did to him. The parents maybe don’t understand the importance of school because they never finished school.”

Hear that story, and it almost sounds like Shelton knew he was destined to be in the fight for literacy as an adult. Shelton, 27, actually visited Memphis often as a child because his mother had a good friend living here. But he didn’t tell her that one day he would be leading the local nonprofit charged with improving reading levels for adults and children.  READ MORE @

@lvagnh

New Haven adult education opportunities expand to three satellite locations for better access

New Haven Register: 1.13.2017 by Brian Zahn

Community groups that focus on adult education and fighting poverty announced Friday three new Adult and Continuing Education Center satellite campuses that are part of a series of partnerships to heed Mayor Toni Harp’s call to make New Haven a “city that reads.”ADVERTISING

Adult and Continuing Education Center Principal Fallon Daniels said the center would assign several of its educators with a “light course load” to work on location at Project MORE, Elm City Communities (Housing Authority of New Haven) and JUNTA for Progressive Action.

In February, there also will be a Newhallville satellite campus opening at the Connecticut Center for Arts and Technology, according to Veronica Douglas-Givan, family and community resource coordinator for the Adult and Continuing Education Center.

Douglas-Givan said the community partnerships demonstrate how the Elm City is full of “hidden figures,” referencing the No. 1 movie in the domestic box office this week of the same name based on the real life story of three black women mathematicians working for NASA and striving against racial segregation.

“Adult and Continuing Education Center Assistant Principal and state Rep. “Toni Walker is not here today, but she said to me, ‘Remind them it’s all about access,’” Douglas-Givan said.

Douglas-Givan said the Literacy Volunteers of Greater New Haven reports that 30 percent of New Haven’s adults cannot read, and center staffers, including her and Walker see a lack of access to resources as a contributing factor.  READ MORE @

@read4literacy

Midland Need to Read helping adults who are illiterate

CBS7: 1.05.2017 By Julia Thatcher

Midland Need to Read is helping adults who are illiterate. But illiterate doesn’t just mean being unable to read.

People come to West Texas from all over the world, a lot of people, because of the oil. However, not everyone who comes here knows English.

32,000 Midland residents qualify for services being offered at Midland Need to Read, but they're teaching more than just reading.

“Literacy, can include really any basic skills that make you a functional adult so in today's society digital literacy is a big part of that so computers, smart phones, and tablets also mathematics is another thing,” explained Jessica Smith, the resource development director for Midland Need to Read.  WATCH