![]() |
![]() |
[ProfessionalDevelopment 2591] Re: Vote because you canMarcia Leister mleister at btc.ctc.eduMon Oct 13 13:49:02 EDT 2008
We have been reading an article in the ABE/GED class I teach. It is by John de Graaf. In it he mentions that the U.S. is at "the bottom of the pack" in voting rate. I asked my students why they thought this was so and the responses were enlightening. They said they couldn't relate to the candidates, they didn't feel the candidates were really addressing their lives. They also made comments about regardless of who is in office, they don't see their lives changing for the better all that much. This is the place where we start our discussions. Marcia -----Original Message----- From: professionaldevelopment-bounces at nifl.gov [mailto:professionaldevelopment-bounces at nifl.gov] On Behalf Of tsticht at znet.com Sent: Sunday, October 12, 2008 6:41 PM To: englishliteracy at nifl.gov; professionaldevelopment at nifl.gov; assessment at nifl.gov; diversity at nifl.gov; familyliteracy at nifl.gov; healthliteracy at nifl.gov; learningdisabilities at nifl.gov; technology at nifl.gov; workplace at nifl.gov Subject: [ProfessionalDevelopment 2590] Vote because you can October 12, 2008 Tom Sticht International Consultant in Adult Education Nothing has moved so many illiterate or poorly literate men and women to seek out teachers of literacy more than the shame of making a mark -X- for their name on public documents. Among such documents, signing voter registrations at polling places during elections have played a central roll in motivating adults to learn to read and write. In her Country Life Readers: First Book (1915), Cora Wilson Stewart, founder of the Moonlight Schools of Kentucky for the emancipation of adult illiterates, wrote about the value of voting and adult new readers studied this motivational material. Stewart, writing before women had the national right to vote, wrote: "With his vote a man rules. The man who does not vote has no voice in the affairs of his country. He cheats his country, his family, and himself. Every man should make use of his right to vote. He should always vote for the best man or for the one who stands for the best things. The man who sells his vote sells his honor." (p. 53) During World War I, soldiers in literacy classes learned to read and write using the Camp Reader for American Soldiers published in 1918. They read about their right to vote at a time when women's suffrage was available in some but not all states: "In the United States the people have a voice in the government. The President of the United States is the choice of the people. The people choose the President by their votes. In many states both sexes have the right to vote. In many states voters pay a poll-tax. A poll-tax is a tax you pay before you can go to the polls to vote. Do you have to pay a poll-tax in your state? In many states only the men can vote. In many states both sexes can vote. Do both sexes vote in your state? In the United States the people choose the government. The soldier fights for the government the people choose." (p. 33) By World War II women's suffrage was in place across the United States and in the Army Reader of 1944 soldiers in literacy programs were reminded of what they were fighting for. Discussing Private Pete, the fictional soldier that adult literacy learners could identify with because he, Pete, was also in a literacy school learning to read and write, Chapter 2 was entitled What Every Citizen Knows. The chapter says, "Pete is a free man who lives with free people. Free people have self-government. They have the right to vote. They have the right to pick their leaders. Then can make and change their laws." (p.120). But even after World War II African-American citizens who were illiterate were prohibited from voting by Jim Crow laws across the southern states of the U.S. But this situation was challenged by Septima Poinsette Clark, sometimes called the "Queen Mother of the Civil Rights Movement in the United States." Clark started citizenship schools while working for the Highlander Folk school of Tennessee and later the Southern Christian Leadership Conference at the request of Dr. Martin Luther King. She taught adult illiterates to write their names, read election laws and other legal documents needed to meet voting requirements for literacy. In four years at the SCLC she and others trained some 10,000 teachers and registered some 700,000 African-Americans to vote in the South. With the political power of the vote, it was not long before politicians were prodded into passing laws extending civil rights to millions of citizen whose voices had not been heard due to illiteracy and oppressive voting laws. Soon, adult literacy learners, and all other American adults will have the opportunity to once again choose the leadership of the United States. Adult literacy educators to need to join with the adult educators of times past and encourage adult learners to learn to read and write so they can exercise their rights as citizens. Writing about her work with adult literacy learners, Septima Poinsette Clark wrote, "How can anybody estimate the worth of pride achieved, hope accomplished, faith affirmed, citizenship won? These are intangible things but real nevertheless, solid and of inestimable value." Election day is November 4th this year of 2008. Vote as though your life and the lives of your children and grandchildren depend upon it! Because they do! And because you can! Thomas G. Sticht tsticht at aznet.net ---------------------------------------------------- National Institute for Literacy Adult Literacy Professional Development mailing list professionaldevelopment at nifl.gov To unsubscribe or change your subscription settings, please go to http://www.nifl.gov/mailman/listinfo/professionaldevelopment Professional Development section of the Adult Literacy Education Wiki http://wiki.literacytent.org/index.php/Adult_Literacy_Professional_Devel opment
More information about the ProfessionalDevelopment mailing list |