Literacy for Life: A second chance

Editor's note: This is the ninth in a series of articles focusing on literacy the Nevada Appeal will run over the next month. The project, Literacy for Life, will call attention to the problem in the area as well as programs aimed at increasing literacy levels.

Reading has always been hard for 21-year-old Sean Perry.

"Pretty much from kindergarten all the way through eighth grade, I was in special reading classes," he said. And he still struggles.

"I'm probably at a fifth-grade reading level," he said. "It's horrible. Just getting through a page maybe takes me an hour."

But where he was ready to give up before, dropping out of Carson High School as a sophomore, he says he's now determined to get a diploma.

"I'm older. I'm more mature," he said.

So every day, after he gets off work at his job working on boats at Lake Tahoe, he drives back down to Carson City to attend night classes through the school district's adult education program.

"I'm busy pretty much from 9 to 9 every day," he said. "I haven't missed any classes so far."

Ferd Mariani, director of Carson Adult High School, said the students enrolled often have a newfound devotion.

"We offer them an opportunity to finally get a GED or diploma because somewhere along the way they didn't view it as important and now they do," he said. "It offers them an opportunity to be successful."

Perry said he's working for $7 an hour and can't find any work that pays better.

"It's the best I can get right now," he said.

That is often the case. According to the American Community Survey in 2005, there were 321,133 adults over the age of18 in Nevada who did not have a high school diploma or equivalency.

The study found the poverty rate for adults over 25 without a high school diploma was 17.2 percent.

Perry hopes to graduate by February then join the Army where he wants to get trucking experience and take some college courses.

"My parents own a trucking company," he said. "My dad said I could pretty much take over if I get all my stuff done."

Mariani, who has worked as a teacher, dean, vice principal and principal in the Carson City School District, said the adult program has a distinct feeling because the students choose to be there.

"They come to us," he said. "We're not chasing them."

The high school, which holds classes at Pioneer and Carson high schools after hours, offers courses for students to work toward a GED, high school diploma or take classes to recover credits at a traditional high school.

Last year, 450 students were enrolled; 100 of them were high school seniors taking makeup classes and went on to graduate.

Across the state, the graduation rate from adult high schools is about 45 percent.

Mariani said there are a number of reasons why students drop out the first time, from boredom to falling behind and not fitting in to getting married or pregnant.

Some of those problems are remedied in the adult high school - child care is available on campus - while others continue to be obstacles.

However, he said, the incentives are magnified.

"It opens the door for them to move on," he said, "whether it's going on to community college, trade school, the military or better employment opportunities."

A brighter future, said Perry, is motivation enough.

"Just by coming here I'm already reading better," he said. "I'm not going to school because I have to, I'm going to school because I need to."

BKOUT

For more information about Carson Adult High School, call 283-1350.

For more information about Carson Adult High School, call 283-1350.