literacy

I’m involved in a program to increase literacy in the Delta. So, yesterday I head over to the far side of the state, over many roads that were under repair after being washed out from the flood, and landed in the middle of the town with no life. It is the most depressing area that I have ever seen. The woman who is trying to get a literacy council activated has no office and has no education. She is going to teach literacy but has like a year of college. I went to the library and it is a small room with metal shelves. They have computers and while there were young folks there, they were sending emails and not utilizing the books. The town is predominately black, yet most of the blacks are underrepresented in any of the dealings of literacy or, for instance, with what I am doing with the war veterans and their oral stories. I think that in the sixties there was a lynching there too. It is so sad and so depressing and I am hoping that by improving literacy the children of this town have half a chance, but I am skeptical. So, I’m back in my office, and I’m conferencing students—students who have educated parents and have libraries in their homes larger than the library in the small town. Disparity makes me sad.