Grit, Grace, and Gratitude

By Kim Jacobs

Told through the stories of families, Grit, Grace, and Gratitude shares how one woman's desire to teach adults to read turned into a nationwide movement to lift families out of poverty.

Grit, Grace, and Gratitude tells the powerful stories of families who gained knowledge, courage, and the confidence to pursue educational and career goals—often against all odds of any success—and through their own grit, grace, and gratitude not only survived but thrived.

This book also shares the history of a nonprofit organization that propelled a small but successful program model in Appalachia into a national movement; of an organization that continues thirty years later to provide guidance, practice, and strategies to consistently deliver family literacy program models that work.

And, this is the story of a journey—the journey of a woman who every day embraces her own grit, grace, and gratitude—to advocate for families who have no voice. Her voice is strong, and her vision is simple—all parents want the best for their children and families, and given the proper support, all families can succeed. They just need a place to start.

Family literacy is that place.

• Language: English
• Publisher: National Center for Families Learning
• Release date: Oct 30, 2019
• ISBN: 9781393789598

Book preview

Introduction and Historical Overview

The story of family literacy began long before the implementation of the first program in the hills of eastern Kentucky in the mid-1980s. It came before its first funders embraced the concept of parents and children coming to school together to learn together. Its origins predate the years when the federal government defined, with specific terminology, the four components of a family literacy program. It was born before Even Start, the nation’s federally funded family literacy program, and before the U.S. Elementary and Secondary Education Act told us what parent involvement should look like in public schools.

Family literacy, some may argue, has always been with us. Parents reading to their children has long been a ritual for some families. Going to a bookstore or library to choose books is an activity both parents and children may enjoy. Family literacy has evolved from story hours at libraries, school book fairs, Dr. Seuss book subscriptions, bedtime routines, and television shows like Sesame Street. Children listening to parents read, and sharing in the wonder of books, are nightly routines in many households.

But not so much in others.

The condition of poverty impacts literacy development. And the relationship between literacy and education of adults and poverty is clear. According to the National Bureau of Economic Research, children of parents with low literacy skills do not have the same chance for educational success as children of literate and educated parents—in fact, they have approximately a 72% chance of being at the lowest reading levels, will likely earn poorer grades, and have higher absenteeism and retention rates.

The statistics regarding poverty in the lowest literacy levels are grim. According to the U.S. Poverty Statistics released in 2019 by the U.S. Census Bureau, unemployed adults make up 30% of the poverty threshold, and adults without a high school diploma are 26% of the threshold. More than 36 million adults in the United States cannot read or write. About 50% of the two million immigrant families who enter the U.S. annually lack a high school education and knowledge of English language skills, according to the Center for Immigration Studies. And low literacy skills in adults are estimated to cost U.S. health care systems about $232 billion annually, as reported by the American Journal of Public Health.

Yes, the relationship between literacy and poverty is very clear.

When adults struggle with reading, they often sacrifice more than the ability to comprehend written words—low literacy affects self-esteem, jobs and careers, and relationships. When parents experience the consequences of low literacy skills, they often unknowingly pass their insecurities about reading, school, and work on to their children. When they wrestle with bedtime routines, the bond and relationship between parent and child around books suffers. And when parents avoid the entire routine, children may never experience the power and pleasure of being read to from a parent’s lap.

However, when parents work to create their own educational successes—increase their language and literacy skills and position themselves in the workforce—their children’s educational success follows. When programs exist to support families as they come to school to learn together, when they provide a platform upon which parents can network and learn new skills, when adults can practice intergenerational reading strategies with supportive guidance, and when parents can work with each other—and with their families—to improve their own communities, family literacy not only improves lives, it makes a difference.

That is family literacy.

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The story of family literacy addresses the needs of an entire nation—from sleepy small towns, to rural farmland and isolated reservations, to bustling cities.

Family literacy shares a legacy with rural and small-town America, and how struggling to rise out of poverty—to become educated and literate beyond seemingly insurmountable barriers—can be a dream come true.

It is the story of a Navajo woman who went back to school, became a teacher, earned three degrees, and now is the Dean of Early Childhood for her community school. It’s the story of her five daughters, all college educated, and all working full-time jobs. It is the story of Regina, a family literacy program graduate in Appalachia, whose main parenting goals for her children were that they stay out of prison and off drugs. It’s the story of those same children who now own their own businesses and call themselves entrepreneurs.

This is family literacy.

Family literacy is the story of big cities and urban meccas of decay and poverty. It is the story of African American and Hispanic/Latino family literacy programs in Detroit that improved reading scores and attendance of elementary school children and self-efficacy and English language skills of parents. It’s the story of the Maldonado family of Los Angeles, who lived in a garage when the mother enrolled in a family literacy program. It’s the story of her quest to learn English, of her sons going to college, and of her family buying their first home.

This, also, is family literacy.

And so, we celebrate.

From the hills of Appalachia, to the urban streets of Detroit, to the isolation of the Navajo Nation, family literacy has given hope, provided skills and confidence, and prepared children and adults for school and their futures for three decades. This specific model of family education programming—delivered with intensity and over time—has produced consistent and sustainable outcomes for families. This one effort—family literacy—has made a difference for poverty-stricken families.

Family literacy.

The powerful stories within these pages are those of families who gained skills, knowledge, courage, and the confidence to pursue educational goals and careers—determinedly following the road to success and walking themselves out of poverty, together with their children. The stories shared here are not only those of families, but of an organization that shaped and formed the family literacy movement as it moved across the nation with the bold mission of eradicating poverty through education solutions for families. This organization influenced national policy, impressed funders, and worked in tandem with corporations, foundations, other nonprofit partners, federal agencies, and city and state governments to grow family literacy—and to innovate family literacy programming as both families and the nation changed.

And finally, this is the story of a woman. A tale that shares her incredible vision and her belief in a humble and simple truth—that all parents want the best for their children and their families, and that given the proper supports, all families can succeed. They just need a place to start.

This book is their story. This story is their legacy. This legacy is their gift to the next generation.

Historical Overview

In 1989, at the end of the first year of the Kenan Trust Family Literacy Program, Sharon Darling concluded her paper, Breaking the Cycle of Illiteracy: A Family Affair, with the following statement:

Education is still the most important variable for escape from poverty and welfare, and education still sets the course for hopes and dreams.

Thirty years later, the National Center for Families Learning (NCFL), founded and led by Sharon Darling, has stayed the course of this message. In fact, it is the guiding beacon for the organization and remains its mission.

NCFL works to eradicate poverty through education solutions for families.

The organization’s history is rooted in combating the codependency that exists between poverty and low literacy in families. For three decades, and across the nation, NCFL has worked to secure funding for programs, establish and maintain program models in communities of need, and provide the supports necessary for successful program implementation—including advocacy at the federal level. At the core of this work, always, is the family.

The education reform shift that occurred in the 1980s laid the groundwork for the family literacy movement, designed to attack both poverty and low literacy issues. With low student achievement in the forefront of the nation, legislators and educators began to look at parental involvement to help children reach higher academic standards.

The Kentucky Parent and Child Education (PACE) program, first implemented in 1986 in Appalachia, tackled the issues by working with families. Developed by Sharon Darling when she worked for the Kentucky Department of Education and funded by the state legislature, PACE was the first program of its kind to bring parents and children to school to learn together.

PACE drew national attention through an award from the Ford Foundation and Harvard Kennedy School of Government for Outstanding Innovations in State and Local Government. This recognition paralleled the interest of the William R. Kenan, Jr. Charitable Trust in North Carolina. In 1988, the Kenan Trust asked Sharon to consider implementing programs in North Carolina and Kentucky. Excited at the possibility, Sharon was ready for the challenge of offering family literacy to more families and accepted. Implemented in both states, The Kenan Trust Family Literacy Project provided seven model programs, four in North Carolina and three in Louisville, Kentucky. In 1989, the Kenan Trust also invested in the work by providing the original funding dollars for the nonprofit organization, the National Center for Family Literacy.

Once firmly established, this national model of family literacy programming began building on PACE and Kenan program roots; however, the next several years would bring growth, replication, and innovation to the model, fueled by both federal and corporate funding sources.

Congressman William F. Goodling and Senator Paul Simon used these national models to lay the groundwork for the federally funded Even Start, designed to integrate early childhood education, adult literacy, parent education, and interactive parent and child literacy activities for low-income families. Today, several federal programs include family literacy in the legislation as an allowable expenditure.

One of those federal programs was the Bureau of Indian Affairs’ (BIA) Family and Child Education (FACE) program. From 1987 to 1989, BIA leadership met with Sharon Darling and visited PACE programs in Kentucky. In 1990, NCFL partnered with the BIA to pilot FACE in six BIA-funded elementary schools. Like Even Start, FACE built from the principles of the PACE and Kenan models.

In 1991, Toyota’s donation to NCFL established the first programs, Toyota Families for Learning. The funding initially supported the implementation of family literacy programs in fifteen cities across the United States and was built from the national model. This generous support created a pattern for innovation and future expansion of family literacy programming for years to come. The Toyota-funded programs have influenced federal and state legislation and leveraged over $350 million in additional funding to replicate and sustain programs.

Both FACE and Toyota programs continue to grow strong and adapt to family and community needs. Even after thirty years of innovation, programming has not strayed far from the original course of four essential and integrated components of family literacy—because it works.

While this rich story of family literacy, and the organizational history of NCFL, might be succinctly summarized, the stories of three decades of service and dedication go much deeper. This thirty-year time span is bursting with the inspirational stories of families: essential stories that also include the dogged determination of NCFL leadership, the dedication of program staff and influencers, and the commitments of policymakers, sponsors, and funders.

The story of family literacy is many stories—stories of lives intersecting along the way. One story building upon another, to the sustainable end of providing education solutions for families in poverty.

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So, let’s start again, from the beginning.

Chapter One

The Learning Was Contagious

I only wanted to teach adults to read.

Sharon Darling

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After I had my first child, I went to a cocktail party over the Christmas holiday in 1969 and met a gentleman who was running an adult reading program in Louisville, Kentucky. We chatted about jobs and he said, What are you doing now? I told him I was staying home with the baby, on maternity leave from my second-grade teaching position. He thought about that and replied, Why don’t you come to the church Monday morning and see what we’re doing in adult education? I said I’d be interested, but I would have to bring the baby—which, as it turned out, was not a problem at all. I arrived, someone swept Michael away to the nursery, and the gentleman opened the door to a classroom where six men sat looking back at me.

This is your new teacher, he said to them.

And with that, I was on my own. I spent the next three hours with these men scared to death because I had no idea how to teach grown men to read, which was what they all expected. So, we talked. Each of these men had stories of real pain in their lives—stories of standing next to a coworker and trying to act like they could read the bulletin board. Stories of times when their wives read for them because they struggled and were so ashamed because of it. And stories of their children bringing a book and asking them to read, the child being brushed aside out of shame.

So, I stayed. And by the time I got my baby out of the nursery, I had decided to come back.

That was the beginning of my commitment to adult learners and adult education. I wanted to find the best ways to teach these men. I wanted to help them use literacy to improve their lives.

About the third day I was there, a man came into the classroom carrying a banjo and he said, Lady, can you teach me to play this banjo?

I said, No, I can’t. I don’t play any music.

He quickly countered, You can’t teach me to play the banjo? Can you teach me to read then? So, I can read this? He pointed to a music book. If you can teach me that, then I know I can teach myself to play the banjo.

There’s no way I’m going to be able to help this man, were the words going through my head, but I said, Well, have a seat. And he did learn to read. Over time, he shared his story. He had lived in Tennessee for a long time and he was now living in the middle of Indiana. He talked about learning to read road signs. He was excited because he could now take the interstate and drive down to Tennessee to see his family—but he also shared that sometimes he nearly ran off the road as he sounded out the words! This was such a real opportunity in his life, to visit his family, and finally feel a sense of freedom that he could drive to another state. To do the things he couldn’t do before.

Along the way, he learned to read well. And at the end, maybe he was with me a year-and-a-half, he asked me a question. Teacher? Could you come out to my camper? I want to show you something.

So, I got the baby and we went outside. He pulled down a banjo and played Up on Cripple Creek. He had met his goal. That’s what he wanted: to play the banjo. And even though I didn’t think I could do it, I had helped. I realized then that you can’t pigeonhole people and their goals. You must look at people as they are.

My job was to help those men achieve their goals.

That experience taught me that once students achieved that first goal, they can set other goals and achieve them, too. Then they start to feel like they can learn. They want to do more. That was my introduction to adult literacy and teaching adults to read.

And the learning was contagious.

Those six men became twelve. Soon, women were coming because the word got out that the program had someone who would help them learn to read—which was not what usually happened in adult education back then. What usually happened was that adults would come, and teachers would immediately test. From the students’ perspective, they would get handed a standardized test to see where you were. The adult students were scared to death about something like that. It was really intimidating.

So, before long, the numbers grew, and I was running two or three classes at the church and women were bringing their children. The nursery was getting full.

Adult literacy was now a big part of my life.

I taught at the church for four years, maybe a little longer, before we had to expand locations. My second son, Jason, was born during that time. By then, I was bringing both children with me and for a while, I didn’t have a car. There was a man in my class from Elizabethtown, Kentucky, who volunteered to pick the children and me up in his pickup truck. He would come get us and bring us home. One time he brought his wife, and she said, "So this is Sharon."

I guess she wanted to know what her husband was doing at school.

There were funny things like that all the time. The men were great, and the women were as well. Some men had huge gardens. I was trying to plant a garden out in the backyard at home, but things weren’t growing. They laughed at me because I was doing it all wrong. One of the students came to my house and helped me think through planting the garden.

Later,