Adult Literacy Council of Concho Valley Advocates for Education

One in three residents of Tom Green County cannot write a simple sentence, said Marilynn Golightly, an employee of the Adult Literacy Council of the Concho Valley. Texas, she said, has the lowest literacy rate in the United States and Tom Green County also has an alarmingly high dropout rate. Golightly, and her team of volunteers, are working to change these statistics.

“There’s lots to be done and we have wonderful volunteers that come from all walks of life that have talents and abilities to help teach others,” Golightly said.

Although literacy is the council’s main focus, volunteers teach those in need of assistance many skills that can help in professional or daily life. According to Golightly, the council’s volunteers can teach students many useful skills, from how do dress for an interview to how to make cookies.

“If someone has an educational need and I can find a volunteer to meet that need, we can do it,” Golightly said.

Golightly estimates that about the council serves about 300 members of the community a year.

“There’s some wonderful people that want to [learn] and I wish that we had many, many more volunteers here than what we do have,” Golightly said. “What we’ve got to always do is outreach, to let people know what we’re doing.”

Traffic at the council is a bit slow in the summer. Golightly supposed that many wish to stay home to take care of kids that are home from school, that it is too hot for potential students to leave the house, or that people simply have difficulty motivating themselves.

“It’s hard to learn,” Golightly said. “And a GED is difficult. So you really have to work at it.”

Eighteen different countries are represented by the council from 11-15 tutors. As Golightly says, “We never turn away a volunteer.”

Specific curriculum offered by the council include classes on phonics, citizenship, vocabulary to use when speaking to doctors, and how to pass a driver’s test and attain a driver’s license.

“I was amazed at the number of people who drive without a driver’s license,” Golightly said. “But if you can’t read, how in the hell are you going to pass the driver’s handbook test?”

Many individuals who are taught by the literacy council have reliable jobs. For example, Golightly claimed that a gentlemen who was at the council is a firefighter from Puerto Rico who is stationed at Goodfellow Air Force Base.

“They’re not just people always on the streets,” Golightly said. “Some of them are from different countries and they want to progress, they want to move up. So they need to know more English in order to do that.”

Classes offered by the council are fairly small, perhaps with about one to three total students.

“We like to start everybody really low,” Golightly said. “It’s wonderful to progress in a hurry, you know, have success in the beginning, because any person that walks in our door that says, 'I have a problem learning,' bless their heart for walking in and saying I have a problem.”

Intergenerational reading skills are among the most important focuses of the council.

“We also know the single most important thing that a parent can do to help their children to succeed in school is for them to read,” Golightly said. “The number one determining factor of the success of the child is the reading level of the parent.”

The council is a nonprofit organization. They receive funding from a grant through United Way for their English as a Second Language program.

The Adult Literacy Council also sponsors Music in the Park, an event held the last Sunday of the month during June, July and August that is meant to bring the community together. One such event will be held on Sunday, July 26 from 7-9 p.m.

Golightly stressed the importance of education to the community as a whole; furthermore, she called the community to contribute to education by teaching others and personally dedicating themselves to learning.

"[Education] elevates our workforce,” Golightly said. "It helps the next generation of children that come along. [Education makes us] a healthier, more literate community. I want the community at large, all of us, to increase our educational level, to be the best that we can be."