Hello all! In just under 48 hours, we will be posting here every 30 minutes as part of Blogathon to benefit Literacy Chicago. The clock is ticking, the stories are coming, and the pledges are adding up. Be a part of it by sponsoring us now, and we’ll see you Saturday morning!
This morning dawned warm and muggy in Chicago, with an estimated high of 94. I, however, am sitting in my basement with a hoped-for high of over $2,500, typing out this first of the 48 entries that will appear here, with the monotony and yet hopefully refreshing quality of raindrops in a slow storm, over the next 24 hours.
This is my fourth Blogathon in total, my second as a monitor, my second in Chicago, my first in this house. Like last year, I have a stash of grapefruit juice and the invaluable assistance of Tish. But this is the first time we have the real thing: information and interviews from the people at Literacy Chicago, whose stories say everything you need to know about why we chose this organization to sponsor, why we are so committed to them, and why sponsoring us by pledging to them is the best thing you can do with 5 minutes any time today.
Books fall open, you fall in. And with that — following an introduction by the estimable Tish — we’re off.
The summer is fierce this morning. The clouds have boiled away and the sky reminds me of the pale, washed-out blue of an ageing mosaic chip in a mural. The thick, wet, air clings to my skin and turns my black hair into a mat of tangles. The front covers and first few pages of the books surrounding me peel upward from the humidity making them look like they are panting for breath. I sympathize with them.
Something about this day, puzzlingly, makes my body feel good and inherently at ease. I investigate and the answer comes quickly. This is the quiet, early-morning swelter of Bombay (yes, I still call it Bombay) in the early summer. I am subconsciously filling in the missing sounds – the distant jingle of a cow bell from the ox-carts carrying everything from vegetables to people, the raucous chirping of the morning birds, the ululation of vendors hawking everything from milk to blocks of ice under sack-cloth and fresh squeezed mausumbi juice. My body remembers days like this well.
As a child, on mornings like this, I could be found on the couch in the living room. Still in my pajamas, freshly scrubbed clean by my grandmother and curled up with a book. I would stay like that for hours, reading to the background scritch scritch of my grandmother sweeping out the courtyard and the rest of the house. Attempts to dislodge me would be met with a frown of extreme displeasure and further curling up.
For me, this is a day for being with words, for writing and reading stories and rejoicing in the gift of literacy. This is, as the inestimable Pico points out, our second blog together in Chicago and our first where we are blogging about a cause that has been as much a part of both our lives as breath and water. The organization in question, Literacy Chicago, is nothing short of amazing. We have stories and factoids and ruminations. We have the amazing energy, passion and fondness that the place inspires in anyone that steps through its doors. We have chocolate covered raisins.
It takes $500 for Literacy Chicago to teach someone to read, write and do basic math. We’re starting a hair’s-breadth away from helping 5 people to become literate and lead normal lives – please join us as we blog and help us get there and beyond. Your comments, moral support and anything you can give, no matter the size, is deeply appreciated.
“The secret of getting ahead is getting started. The secret of getting started is breaking your complex, overwhelming tasks into small manageable tasks and then starting on the first one.” - Mark Twain
Introduction to Adult Literacy, Part I
Below is a reproduction of a certified mail form.
Use the following information to fill in the receipt for certified mail. Then fill in the “TOTAL Postage and Fees’ Line.
1. You are sending a package to Doris Carter.
2. Her address is 19 Main St., Augusta, GA 30901.
3. The postage for the package is $1.86
4. The fee for certified mail is $0.75.
Can you do it?
In 30 minutes, I’ll tell you who can’t.
The certified mail question below was part of a test given by the U.S. Department of Education in its 2003 National Assessment of Adult Literacy.
65% of adults tested entered the correct name and address on the proper lines.
75% entered $1.86 and $0.75 on the correct lines. 78% correctly totaled the fees entered.
Between 22 and 35% of adults tested could not fill out this form correctly.
Literacy is not only the ability to read and write books, magazines, blogs, or any of the other myriad forms of entertainment we take for granted. It is the ability to comprehend and function in the world.
Coming up in 30 minutes: profile of an organization out to change these statistics, one opportunity at a time.
“The only difference between our staff and our students is opportunity.”
Susan Kidder
Executive Director
Literacy Chicago
9 floors above State Street, only a few buildings down from Chicago icon Marshall Field’s, the state’s largest provider of free adult literacy services is in full swing. Over 1,500 students will come here each year — not because they are required to, but because they are ready and anxious to learn basic skills like reading, writing, and computation. Some come to prepare for the GED. Some come to learn to read to their children, or to write to their parents, or to prepare themselves for better jobs. They span the spectrum in age, ethnic background, and socioeconomic status, but about 50% of them read at or below the 4th grade level when they first come. Once they arrive, many stay for years. The instruction is individualized, ongoing, and direct. The place is Literacy Chicago, and it has been doing this work for almost 15 years.
Over the next 22 hours, we’ll introduce you to a few of the staff and students that make Literacy Chicago what it is. In the meantime, we enourage you to visit them and read more about their cause and results. We’re proud to know them. And anything you can do to help them, like (for instance) sponsoring us, will make a profound difference in someone’s life.
Technically I wasn’t supposed to post this half-hour but in addition to the indomitable Miss Pico’s excellent overview of Lit. Chicago, I felt the need to talk about my first experience with them and in particular about the remarkable woman that runs the organization, Susan Kidder. I first met Susan on the 18th of April, the result of a “cold call” email I had sent her with our interest in supporting literacy in Chicago. She agreed to meet me, having no idea who I was or if there was anything the least bit legitimate about my claims. Now over the years, Pico and I have had the fortune (and in some cases mis-fortune) to meet with a number of individuals that wield considerable power – CEOs of companies worth billions, celebrities, heirs to vast banking family fortunes and titans of various industries. The awe and anxiety associated with the first of these meetings has faded gradually, mostly a result of repeated experiences with the all-too-human side of the individuals in question. We are, to be blunt, a bit jaded and not that easily intimidated.
It was with some confusion then that I realized within five minutes of meeting Susan that I was feeling that same ice-cold edge in the pit of my stomach that I associate with being five-years old and being introduced to the then President of India. If you saw a picture of Susan, this would confuse you too.
Susan’s handshake is cool, firm and strong and her eyes are bright and smiling. She radiates an aura of confidence and compassion and as I was talking to her I realized that Susan has developed that literacy that is the hallmark of great leaders – the ability to read and comprehend people, and the ability to see their flaws and strengths almost immediately but without passing judgment or closing herself to their potential. She inspires the best in the people around her, not by demanding it, but simply by letting them know that she believes they are capable of incredible things. She listens with an intensity that makes you feel like the most mundane things you have to say are important and when she moves, she resembles a quickly uncoiling spring, her actions precise and energetic. Susan is a woman who is used to getting every ounce out of every minute of her day.
As this thought occurred to me, I realized why I felt so intimidated - what Susan did with those minutes was truly and genuinely important. Those minutes weren’t spent on multiplying already gargantuan profits or indulging in celebrity. Those minutes enabled hundreds of tutors and supporters to teach thousands of people how to read, write and be literate. And I was in here, taking up her time. Susan gave me far more of that time than I had expected or frankly, had any right to take. I left her office inspired, amazed and filled to the brim with facts about literacy. She is an amazing person and a phenomenal leader. These strengths are reflected in the organization she runs, an organization which accords her immense respect.
“Susan pays attention, she does that with everybody. If someone does something good, she makes it her business to notice. She says ‘thank you for this’ not just ‘thank you’ but ‘thank you for this’ and that makes her a great boss.” – Taleah, student and volunteer at Literacy Chicago
Taleah (pronounced Thal-yah) is both a student and a volunteer at Literacy Chicago. Taleah came in to the office the day Pico and I were interviewing volunteers and tutors, just because she heard what we were doing and wanted to support us. I cannot express my gratitude to her for this and for the wonderful stories she shared with us. For the next four posts, I’ll try and re-create my experience with her to the best of my ability. Taleah, if you’re reading this, thank you and feel free to correct me along the way if I slip up.
Taleah’s personality is warm and welcoming. Talking to her you get the strong impression that this is a woman who has achieved a level of comfort with herself and those around her that many twice her age have not (though I think she would disagree with that description). She has deep, liquid-brown eyes and a face that smiles easily and often. It is not difficult to understand why she has gone from being a student to a volunteer staffer at Literacy Chicago. Her voice is confident, clear and articulate and within minutes of meeting her you feel like you have made a friend
“People think I’m a bit smarter than I am because of the way I carry myself,” Taleah explains at one point during the interview. I would strongly disagree. Taleah’s carriage and demeanor are entirely a function of not just her intelligence, but the strength of character that defines her.
Taleah first joined Literacy Chicago about a year and a half ago after seeing a flyer on the wall for the organization. When she arrived, she’d had a fourth grade education and no more. Since then she’s gone from student to being a pillar of the Literacy Chicago development team and a part of their staff. She arrived in Chicago when her family moved from San Francisco two and half years ago. Her mother’s side of the family and in particular, her maternal grandmother, had been here for nine years and as Taleah charmingly says, “We came to visit her and we fell in love with this city.”
Much of Taleah’s incredible life is very different from my own but that experience, I completely understand.
At the beginning of the interview, Taleah had mentioned the family pressures that had resulted in her stopping her education so early, I ask about some of these. She laughs, “Some family pressures he says. How about a million family pressures?” She explains that in her family, girls in particular were forbidden from going to school. I look puzzled and Taleah clarifies, “My background, well, I’m Gypsy.”
Suddenly a number of things become clearer. When I had first met Taleah, I had instinctively assumed she was Indian, her features would not be out of place in much of Mumbai and north India. Now I understood why. When I inquire, Taleah explains that the Gypsy culture has it roots in India, but that her family is from Spain, her grand mother having come to Long Island several years ago. In her family, associating with non-Gypsies is forbidden for women and to go to school, Taleah has to sneak away while her father was in prison. I am impressed. Most kids I know, myself included, barely appreciated being in school, let alone having the initiative to risk punishment to go.
My understanding of Gypsy culture is rudimentary. I do however know that most of the people I have met from that culture hated the word ‘gypsy,’ it being a legal term created by the British (a bastardization of ‘Egyptian’) and used largely to justify a series of racial persecutions. Most prefer the term ‘Traveller’ and, I believe, in Spain they refer to themselves as cale, which in Hindi literally means “black.” As she explains the restrictiveness of the culture Taleah adds, “If you think about it and get to the basis of where it started, it makes some sense.”
A quote from Sir Angus Fraser’s “The Gypsies” leaps to my mind as she says that. “The true history of the gypsy race can only be found in the study of their language,” he says. I think about the fact that the Travellers are defined by language and the fact that we are in a place where learning to use and control language is of paramount importance. I nod to Taleah. The Travellers have had a hard road. Driven from India for reasons that historians fail to agree upon and then persecuted mercilessly by the British and the Nazis (over 25,000 died in the camps), their culture has constantly been under-attack. It is no surprise, as Taleah indicates, that they are wary of outsiders and eager to keep themselves distinct.
I ask Taleah if she’s been successful in getting any of her siblings (particularly her sisters) or extended family involved in literacy and further education. She explains that she is not close to her extended family because 25 years ago her mother ran-away and married a non-Gypsy. She has tried to convince one of her cousins, but found that while “it appealed to her non-Gypsy side,” eventually her cousin declined. The cloud does, however, have a silver lining. She explains that since her 2 older sisters and older brother were placed in the custody of their non-Gypsy father, they have had a more “American upbringing” and all three of them are college bound.
We begin to talk about her experience with Literacy Chicago and Taleah’s face lights up. She describes how Literacy Chicago changed her life, “Every day in class, every day was fun. When I started, I was going through a hard time. Going to class is what got me up every morning otherwise I would sleep for 15 or 16 hours every morning, because I was like, get up to what? I have no future, I have nothing. They won’t let me have anything.” She describes the dedication of the staff at literacy Chicago, how they go beyond merely instruction to mentoring, “they see the good in the person, see what [a] person needs and they are willing to take the time out, even though Literacy Chicago is not that well funded at times and tutors don’t get paid, to give you that moral support.” That moral support she adds is genuine, “not just because [they’re] supposed to, it’s because they really believe in it and I can tell the difference.” Given how astute Taleah is, I have no doubt this is the case.
