Reading is essential to learning and Trenton is trying to build basic skills [L.A. PARKER COLUMN]

In a class of 24 Trenton third graders, the chances are that only three can read adequately. Four can do math on grade level.

Julie O’Connor, an urban education writer for NJ Spotlight News, injected that insight for an article entitled “As Trenton schools struggle, Camden’s improve. Why?” The article includes these offerings from local education leaders.

“Violence and vandalism are down”, Trenton Public Schools Superintendent James Earle says, and he’s sought to build a rapport with staff, standardize the curriculum and ensure that teachers are actually trained in it, among other things. The Earle reveal about violence and vandalism deserves note because no public admission existed that either event ticked upward. Earle added, “We have really bright kids who can’t communicate that on the test,” he notes, also acknowledging, “I know we need to improve (the scores) so our kids can have great opportunities.”

But the politics of education in Trenton is quite different than Camden, according to Gene Bouie, a longtime Trenton School Board member.  “Even though we’re dealing with a similar problem, what might be working very well in Camden might not work necessarily that well in Trenton, just because of structure. You have to be organized in a certain way to execute on certain things.”

This topic regarding education needs clarity — learning to read in early stages of life works in Camden, Newark, Princeton, Hightstown, etc. A critical aspect of reading demands parental participation, mothers and fathers willing to invest time to assure children make necessary strides in not only learning to read but to love reading.

Amazing statistics exist about early childhood literacy and vocabulary building. Here’s how many words kids would have heard by the time they were 5 years old, according to a 2019 Ohio State University study.

Never read to, 4,662 words; 1-2 times per week, 63,570 words; 3-5 times per week, 169,520 words; daily, 296,660 words.

Young children whose parents read them five books a day enter kindergarten having heard about 1.4 million more words than kids who were never read to. Talk about jump starting learning and getting a serious head start on learning. The report underscored the impact childhood literacy has on education. Various articles note reading almost any material to newborns boosts brain development and builds language, literacy, and cognitive skills.

One might rightfully expect that if reading/literacy plays such an important role in building a foundation for education, a place like education-challenged Trenton should have reading labs, tutors, books, etc. available for households. We should double-down on learning instead of dummy downing our children with absurd revelations that Black or Hispanic kids don’t test well. But this is Trenton, a city that closed four satellite libraries 15 years ago, an action that signaled a step away from education. We reap the fruits of poisoned seeds imbedded in the lead-contaminated soils of this capital city. It’s a disturbing, dastardly, disinvestment of education wrapped in past fears of what intelligent Blacks might achieve.

Some slaves learned to read and write in conditions much worse than Trenton, shadowed by the potential amputation of fingers or toes, public whippings of 39 lashes or more, imprisonment, even death if their owner discovered they could make sense of words and sentences. Literate slaves were considered uncontrollable, trouble, and prone to revolution. White slave owners experienced social backlash as Negro lovers and received significant fines or prison time if they educated their property.

If learning attracted such vengeance then it must connect to unimaginable power, success, wealth, and freedom.

L.A. Parker is a Trentonian columnist. Find him on Twitter @LAParker6 or email him at [email protected].