[NLA] When Your Working Days Are Over

[Norene Peterson]

Thank you, Tom!  I needed this!  It reminds me why I have been doing this
job for the past 28 years. Not always am I teaching to help someone get a
job or to help a person move "up a level."  Sometimes they are even better
reasons.    NP =)

Norene Peterson
Adult Education Center
415 North 30th
Billings, MT 59101
406-247-3720
petersonnh at billings.k12.mt.us

----- Original Message -----
From: "Thomas Sticht" <tsticht at aznet.net>
To: <nla at lists.literacytent.org>
Cc: <tsticht at aznet.net>
Sent: Sunday, March 24, 2002 7:43 PM
Subject: [NLA] When Your Working Days Are Over


> Research Note                  March 24, 2002
> Tom Sticht
>
> When Your Working Days Are Over..What's The Sense of Literacy?
>
> Is there a reason for governments to support literacy education once a
> person's working days are over? After all, where's the return on
> investment? In 1861, Harriet  A. Jacobs wrote her book, "Incidents in
> the life of a slave girl written by herself." In it she tells the story
> of her work to help an older black man, a slave like her, learn to read,
> not for improving his productivity at work, but to reach for a greater
> reward for himself at the end of his life. In Jacob's own words, which
> includes her renderings of dialect, she describes an incident that
> occured around 1850:
>
> Quote: "I knew an old black man, whose piety and childlike trust in God
> were beautiful to witness. At fifty-three years old he joined the
> Baptist church. He had a most earnest desire to learn to read. He
> thought he should know how to serve God better if he could only read the
> Bible. He came to me, and begged me to teach him. He said he could not
> pay me, for he had no money; but he would bring me nice fruit when the
> season for it came. I asked him if he didn't know it was contrary to
> law; and that slaves were whipped and imprisoned for teaching each other
> to read. This brought the tears into his eyes. "Don't be troubled, Uncle
> Fred," said I. "I have no thoughts of refusing to teach you. I only told
> you of the law, that you might know the danger, and be on your guard."
>
> He thought he could plan to come three times a week without its being
> suspected. I selected a quiet nook, where no intruder was likely to
> penetrate, and there I taught him his A, B, C. Considering his age, his
> progress was astonishing. As soon as he could spell in two syllables he
> wanted to spell out words in the Bible. The happy smile that illuminated
> his face put joy into my heart. After spelling out a few words he
> paused, and said, "Honey, it 'pears when I can read dis good book I
> shall be nearer to God. White man is got all de sense. He can larn easy.
> It ain't easy for ole black man like me. I only want to read dis book,
> dat I may know how to live; den I hab no fear 'bout dying."
>
> I tried to encourage him by speaking of the rapid progress he had made.
> "Hab patience, child," he replied. "I larns slow." At the end of six
> months he had read through the New Testament, and could find any text in
> it.":End Quote
>
> Should a government of the people, by the people, and for the people
> deny education and literacy in the 21st century to any adults who, like
> Uncle Fred, do not seek to learn to read and write to improve work
> skills for productivity, but rather for the simple dignity that comes
> from feeling that with improved literacy they "know how to live?"
>
> Last year we learned that some 10 million of our fellow adult citizens
> were so lacking in literacy that they could not even take the National
> Adult Literacy Survey. This year the President of the United States
> asked for no more funding for adult education and literacy development
> than we had last year, which amounted to less than $200 per enrollment
> in the Adult Education and Literacy System of the United States.
>
> How far have we come in the 150 years since 1850? What would Uncle Fred
> say today? Have we learned fast? Have we got all the sense?
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