Why adult education must be kept alive

This retired teacher gives many reasons for schools to continue their adult education classes. He worries about the cuts the districts are making and shows how wrong they are.  - - Donna Poisl

By John McCormick

A little more than a year ago I retired from teaching adult school in Los Angeles. Since then, I'm embarrassed to admit I've forgotten most of the names of my students. But I certainly haven't forgotten the students themselves: the Guatemalan chef who wore a clean white shirt and tie to class every night; the twentysomething Cambodian woman who worked torturous hours in a doughnut shop and still found time to study, despite her obvious exhaustion; the older Korean man who knotted his long hair in a bun like a samurai and who wasn't afraid to sing "New York, New York" in front of the class.

During my 11 years in the classroom, I primarily taught English as a second language. I taught students who were illiterate not only in English but also in their native languages. I taught students whose grasp of English grammar was superior to mine. I taught teenagers. I taught 70-year-olds. And I taught every age in between. I taught in classrooms, in a community center, at a former public library, at a church and even a few times on the roof of a school.
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