Why Our Work Matters

Since 1968, Peninsula READS has been serving the Hampton Roads area, working to address a pressing issue that has wide and varied impacts on our community: low-level literacy.  Each year, Peninsula READS serves about 250 adults, working one-on-one with them to grow crucial and necessary skills in reading, writing, mathematics, and computer literacy, as well as offering small group English lessons for speakers of other languages.

But the results of these efforts extend far beyond the people who physically enter the Peninsula READS office; when an adult gains literacy skill, it benefits themselves, their families, and the community as a whole.

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According to the National Center for Education, 43 percent of adults age 16 and older read at or below the basic level. What’s more, the 2003 National Assessment of Adult Literacy found that about 31,120 adults in the Virginia Peninsula Area alone were either purely or functionally illiterate — roughly 6 percent of the total population. This lack of literacy skills has wide-reaching effects on the lives of these adults in our community. They struggle to find employment, to understand and control their health and health care, to help their children with homework, and get by in their daily lives.

When you support Peninsula READS, you help to improve the lives of your neighbors beyond just helping them read a book.