The Fear Behind the Failure

Until last year, even going out to dinner with friends made 20-year-old Shawnee Schroeder nervous. When it was his turn to order, his hands started sweating and his stomach tensed.

So Schroeder listened closely as the waitress rattled off specials. He ordered whatever she said. Or sometimes he would just order whatever his friends did.

The reason: The words on the menu just didn’t make sense to him. Schroeder couldn’t read. And like hundreds of thousands of others like him, Schroeder would fake his way out of embarrassing situations, rather than own up to his secret.

About a quarter of California adults are functionally illiterate in English, according to the National Institute for Literacy. In Southern California, the numbers are staggering--32% in Los Angeles County, 20% in Orange County and 19% in Ventura County--statistics reflecting in part the large number of non-English-speaking immigrants.

Yet many are twentysomethings who, in fact, speak English and managed to make it through school without ever learning even the alphabet.

The unsuccessful ones are unemployed, poor, homeless or in jail. The successful ones hold full-time jobs as mechanics, receptionists, security guards and construction workers. They do not apply for jobs that involve tests. They often switch jobs to keep their illiteracy hidden. In fact, experts say, illiterate adults often start their own businesses rather than risk exposure.

“They wind up being these entrepreneurial people,” said Matthew Scelza, director of field services for Pasadena-based California Literacy, a nonprofit organization that provides tutoring and referral services for illiterate adults. “But they don’t have literacy skills so they have to rely on family and friends.”

Tutors say that adults develop ingenious coping skills to negotiate their way through a society in which so much relies on the written word.

“They learn the gift of gab,” said Judy Goldberg, who directs Laubach Literacy of Ventura County, a nonprofit adult literacy group. “They talk their way through any situation.”

The lying and pretending often go on for years, until something motivates them to enroll in a literacy program. Some return to school when they have children and want to read to them. Others tackle reading when they lose jobs and face daunting employment searches, or when they are offered promotions at work and are afraid to take them.

The hardest part about going back to school, Goldberg said, is the embarrassment of saying, “I can’t read and I need help.”

Working With a Tutor

In Schroeder’s case, it was a growing interest in Japanese gardens that made him face the problem. He works for a company that repairs ornamental ponds, but he wants to start his own business to design ponds and gardens. And he knows he needs to read to make that happen.

“I just want to get somewhere in life,” he said. “I don’t care anymore what people think.”

For about a year, Schroeder has been meeting weekly with a tutor, working on his basic reading and writing skills. He practices phonics, sounds out words and constructs basic sentences. He divides words into syllables and studies spelling.

Schroeder, who lives in Northridge, traces his illiteracy to elementary school, when his classmates made fun of him for stuttering and getting stuck on words. Whenever he had to read in front of the class, he panicked. He just could not do it.

Soon, trying to read at all made him feel anxious and alone. So he stopped trying.

He struggled through middle school, sitting in the back of the classroom and hoping teachers would not call on him. He often stared at the clock, counting the minutes until the bell rang. And he skated through high school, rarely doing his homework and ditching class two or three days a week. The only classes he did well in were art and physical education, Schroeder said.

Other students who cannot read cheat their way through school, or misbehave enough to distract teachers from their illiteracy, tutors say. And sometimes, kindhearted teachers help students cover up to spare them the shame, they say.

Schroeder eventually quit, dropping out as a junior at Canoga Park High School. Yet the challenges did not stop with his formal schooling. They were everywhere. Schroeder couldn’t read grocery labels or Yellow Pages listings. He could not fill out job applications or credit card forms. He could not read advertisements or complicated bills.

But he always got by--somehow. He would ask family members to help fill out applications, buy food based on the pictures printed on the labels and have friends read his mail.

At the movie theater, he would let his friends decide on the feature because he could not read the titles. At the doctor’s office, he would make up excuses to leave so he could have someone help him fill out the medical history questionnaire. When he got a new television or stereo for Christmas, he would toss the instructions aside and figure out how to assemble it on his own. At tax time, he would take his paperwork to a consultant.

In preparation for his driver’s license test, he had his aunt read the manual to him. And instead of taking a written test, he took a verbal exam. Although he passed with a score of 100%, he still could not read maps, street signs or directions.

“I remember him getting awful frustrated,” said his aunt, Jody Schroeder. “But he had a good memory. And he relied on that.”

When he bought a new truck, he brought a friend along to read the contract aloud. He wanted to know exactly what he was agreeing to before he signed on the dotted line.

“You have to be able to read the fine print, because the salesman isn’t going to tell it to you,” he said.

In other cases, like that of Daniel Pedroza, 32, it was a learning disability that proved a barrier to reading. Until he decided to try again two years ago, when he entered an adult literacy program in Pasadena, Pedroza said he had no idea he was dyslexic.

Pedroza blames his teachers for not recognizing his condition and helping him overcome it. As a result, he lost his motivation and got Fs in most classes--but the school, Eagle Rock High, still let him graduate, he said. Every year, he would befriend some of his teachers so they would pass him. The teachers would just skip him when the class read aloud, Pedroza said.

“That diploma doesn’t mean anything to me,” he said. “I missed out on learning to read. I felt like I got cheated.”

After high school, Pedroza said, he had to quit six jobs because of his illiteracy. “I’d go up the ladder, and then would come the paperwork, so I’d have to quit,” he said. “I just avoided the promotion and went and got another job.”

Pedroza said he faced daily battles because he could not read. He remembers getting an envelope in the mail that looked important. So he showed it to a friend, who told him he needed to report for jury duty.

The Courage to Try

For years, Pedroza did not go to the doctor because he worried about completing forms. Now that he can read, he goes whenever he feels the slightest pain. It also helps that his new insurance company provides a card with all the pertinent information.

When he finally decided to go back to school, he looked through the phone book. But it took him months to find a program--he was looking under S for “school,” rather than R for “reading.” On the first day of class with California Literacy, he drove around the block a few times before building up the courage to go inside.

As he walked into the room, Pedroza saw a bag of colored magnetic letters he couldn’t recognize. He was 29 years old and humiliated.

But he left the classroom that day finally knowing the alphabet. Two years and 160 classes later, he reads everything he can get his hands on.

Schroeder said he too was nervous the first time he met with his tutor. When he started, he could read only a few three-letter words. Now, he often picks up newspapers and magazines and gets stuck only on the big words.

Slowly, the insecurities are fading and the confidence is growing. “However long it takes, I’m going to keep going,” he said. “It makes me feel better, because I have goals and things that I want to do. I’m still young, I still have a chance to bring myself back up.”

For more information about adult literacy programs, call California Literacy at (800) 894-READ.

Shawnee Schroeder, above, says: “I just want to get somewhere in life. I don’t care anymore what people think.” Daniel Pedroza, left, says he made it through high school even though he couldn’t read: “That diploma doesn’t mean anything to me. I missed out on learning to read. I felt like I got cheated.”

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The Highs and Lows of Adult Literacy

California counties with the highest and lowest percentages of functionally illiterate adults--those who can read a little but not well enough to fill out an application, read a food label or read a simple story to a child. The lower the number, the better.

Imperial: 41%

Los Angeles: 32%

Colusa: 31%

Tulare: 30%

Merced: 30%

San Francisco: 30%

Kings: 29%

Inyo: 16%

Nevada: 15%

Sonoma: 15%

El Dorado: 13%

Placer: 13%

Marin: 13%

Mono: 9%

Source: National Institute for Literacy