For many people, reading is a skill they use daily but often take for granted. When reading a book, a social-media post or this newspaper, people usually don’t think about who taught them to read. It is just another skill, like driving a car.
But what about those who did not, for whatever reason, learn how to read and write? Amanda Partridge, director of the White County Literacy Council, said the illiteracy rate in Arkansas is somewhere between 13 percent and 20 percent, and in White County, that number hovers around the 13-percent mark.
That is where the White County Literacy Council comes in. The council provides free adult literacy classes to help people in the community who never learned to read and write as children.
“The literacy council is dedicated to teaching adults how to read and write,” Partridge said.
There are many reasons adults might not know how to read, Partridge said. Sometimes they have learning disabilities and were not given a chance to learn to read when they were in school, and other times, economic factors prevented them from attending school.
“Most of our older students grew up in very poor homes,” she said. “They had to stop school very young and start working.”
Partridge said each of the literacy council’s students has a story, and their backgrounds should not prevent them from being able to read. Like with many skills, it can be difficult for an adult to go back and learn to read, but the success stories that come from the students show how important the council’s work is.
“We have one student in particular who dropped out of school when she was in fourth grade because she had to go work,” Partridge said. “We’ve had her friends come in here to tell us how much more confident she is now that she can read. She not only reads to herself, but she’s also reading out loud in small groups.”
The literacy council sees an average of 100 students a year, Partridge said, and the numbers can fluctuate seasonally because some of the students have more work at different times of the year.
The tutors who work with the students are all volunteers, Partridge said. Many of them are retired teachers or Harding University students, and the relationships they form with the adult learners give the tutors an opportunity to effect an even bigger impact in the students’ lives.
“We have some students who tell their tutors everything,” Partridge said. “We have one student who — for the first time in his life — was able to go shopping by himself. He was so enthusiastic about that. You don’t think about independence being tied to literacy, but it really is.”
The White County Literacy Council is an independent nonprofit organization and is supported by grants, individual gifts and the Second Time Around Bookstore.
The bookstore, which is run by the council, sells used books that are donated by people in the community. Partridge said the store receives several hundred books each week, and they are then sold for either 50 cents, $1 or $2, depending on the size of the book and whether is it a paperback or hardback.
Partridge said volunteers sort the donated books, and there is a steady stream of customers who come in to see what new books the store has received.
“We have a pretty good number of customers who come in, donate a sack and then buy a sack [of books],” she said. “Then they come in a week later and do it again.”
The White County Literacy Council’s annual membership meeting will be at 9 a.m. Feb. 28 at Simmons First Bank. The bank is located at 401 S. Main St. in Searcy, and the public is welcome to attend the meeting.
Second Time Around Bookstore is at 109 E. Center Ave. in Searcy. The store is open from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Tuesdays, Thursdays and Fridays; from 9 a.m. to 2 p.m. Wednesdays; and from 9 a.m. to noon Saturdays.
For more information, visit www.whitecountyliteracy.org or call (501) 278-5500.
Staff writer Angela Spencer can be reached at (501) 244-4307 or aspencer@arkansasonline.com.