We at Literacy Volunteers of Charlottesville/Albemarle firmly believe that Black Lives matter, and we commit to standing with our students, volunteers, and neighbors against systemic racism in all its manifestations.
Our mission is to provide resources for vulnerable populations to develop the skills they need to speak their truths. Our work is about giving voice to people who have trouble being understood because of language barriers. For many of our students, the U.S. is the land of their hopes and dreams. We are struggling to find ways to explain that for some, it's also the land of lynchings and police brutality. Our current citizenship textbook offers exactly 40 words explaining racism. Going forward, we commit to using better resources to tell a more complete history of the United States, especially the parts that make us uncomfortable.
We want to be actively anti-racist. To that end, we will add more anti-racism training for our staff, board, volunteers, and students. We are committed to the task of confronting oppression through education and we will work to dismantle the systems of racism that plague our country.
