Title: Illiteracy in America: Troubling Statistics and How Schools Can Help | Resilient Educator
Headings: Crisis Point: The State of Literacy in America
Crisis Point: The State of Literacy in America
The history of American literacy
Schools + learning to read
Female literacy
Literacy as a social justice issue
The achievement gap
The literacy crisis today
What other studies are finding about literacy
What we can do as educators
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Content: According to the Smithsonian, after the slave revolt of 1831, all slave states except Maryland, Kentucky, and Tennessee passed laws that made it illegal to teach slaves to read and write. The Alabama Slave Code of 1833 included this following law: “ Any person who shall attempt to teach any free person of color, or slave, to spell, read or write, shall upon conviction thereof by indictment, be fined in a sum of not less than two hundred fifty dollars, nor more than five hundred dollars.” That was a whole lot of money in 1833. Why were they so concerned about slaves learning to read? Because if slaves learned to read, they could access information. They could read newspapers. They could read books and understand their rights. They could organize and rise up against the institution of slavery. Slave owners wanted to keep their slaves uneducated and powerless because they understood that literacy represents power.