In Buffalo New York you would probably expect a number of people struggling to read or having trouble finding places to learn English, I mean it is a pretty poor city. As a city with a very affordable cost of living we have a high rate of refugees coming to settle in our city and obviously being from a different country English isn't taught or really used there. It is a big problem in the city as well as all over America, not only for the illiterate people themselves but for the city too. In this country if you can't read or speak English it could be very detrimental to your way of life. You would be unable to vote for government, figure out directions to a destination, read a manual to operate something, get a job, read job postings to get the job or even read some great philosophy books. It's something we don't realize because being literate it just flows with our everyday life. Picture if you couldn't read or speak English how lost would you feel? I couldn't imagine it, not being able to write, to transfer my creative thought to a hard copy. It would be horrible.
The definition of literacy according to the National Assessment of Literacy (NAAL) is using printed and written information to function in society, to achieve goals, and to develop knowledge and potential. Now I'd say that is a pretty hardy definition of literacy and rightfully so. We shouldn't just take the easy way out and suggest that if people can read at a second grade level or read at all label them literate. Well after all they can read right? No, people should be able to use information obtained from written document and apply it. But unfortunately that isn't always the case and it sometimes not the persons fault, maybe they were born into a very poor family, schools and education resources weren't always available to them. Then there are the other cases of illiteracy, where the little jerk kids don't care about their education blow it off because it isn't the cool thing to do. Then they go on becoming drug dealers or contributing to the crime rate in your city because that's all they know how to do. Or their parents don't care when they're young and the parents don't even know how to read themselves creating a sliding effect of illiterate people.
So, with future plans to go to the Peace Corps I started on a journey to not only benefit the Buffalo community with this issue but also to benefit my volunteer portion of the application. With teaching English being my main focus I came across two organizations in Buffalo that teach English to the less fortunate. My first stop was The International Institute of Buffalo located on Delaware Avenue. I set up a meeting with one of the volunteer coordinators there to get more information and to see if it was a good fit for me. Coming to find out that they seem to be a little more intense of a program there usually requiring a little previous experience. They did say I could come in for four hours a week only in the afternoon. Mostly because the guy who runs the afternoon class is a little more lenient to people with no ESL experience. Bottom line I couldn't really work it out with my work schedule and I didn't know how comfortable I was without experience. A friend of mine then turned me onto the second place, Literacy Volunteers. Currently located on Main Street in Buffalo's historic Squier Mansion but moving to the central library in a couple months due to lack of funding. This organization recruits volunteers and actually trains them for either ESL or Basic Reading tutoring. So needless to say I was a little more comfortable knowing I would be trained to teach English.
Fortunately we live in a city where people do care about their fellow neighbor. One woman that is starting up the training actually drove from the south towns to the city to volunteer. All people with different motivations of why they are there stemming from "My foreign parents didn't have this opportunity when they came over. So I want to give back." to "I'm retired looking for something to do." or "I love to read and want to share the joy I get from it." Basically the cliched remarks from everyone. I'm there because I think people should know the language, they could pass it on to their family members and help them with everyday life and be functional in society. They will be able to contribute to the community more. And that's all for the greater good, right? One thing that struck my curiosity is how these people who can't read or speak English know who to find the place? It has to be a more word of mouth strategy to get people in there. You can't exactly hand out flyers or post ads.
Regardless, this should be an interesting venture. Another cool thing to do around Buffalo for all those people who complain that there isn't anything to do around here. I don't think you even need a degree to volunteer at the Literacy Volunteers. They teach you and if you can speak and read English you should be able to teach it.
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