Shadow Forest Authors discussion

Shadow Forest Authors welcomes a new SFA beneficiary.
ARAS - Adult Reading Assistance Scheme - is located in New Zealand. Their primary function at ARAS is to assist self-motivated adults with reading, writing, numeracy and other essential learning; in order to empower them, so that they are able to achieve independent growth and development, to reach their own goals and to fulfill their own potentials.

UP DATE - I am in contact with a couple of celebrities, which I will not name at this time, who are interested in being a voice for our cause and other ideas associated with SFA, such as World Literacy Day. Keep praying that this will all come about and that we can all make a huge impact on this worldwide problem.
Keep spreading the word and help make SFA successful, now and in the future.

I am a proud member of SFA!! Anything that helps promote literacy & uses books for such a good cause is ACES in my book!! I proudly display the SFA badge on my website, MySpace page & other sites.

My fingers are crossed that the new celeb endorsements come through!! Very exciting :)

SFA is awesome!!!!



Rai Aren, co-author of Secret of the Sands

There is much going on with Shadow forest authors, we are near 4000 on myspace and the number is climbing each day. I am also in talks with a Tasmanian politician and a celebrity, hoping to get a huge television and radio campaign going to bring awareness to illiteracy here in Australia, which I hope will be picked up by other countries to bring illiteracy well out into the open. Once I have more news on this I will post it.

That is truly wonderful news all around!! I look forward to hearing more updates on this very worthy venture!!

Rai

This is great news, Christine! I'm looking forward to seeing more updates as well and am very proud to be a Shadow Forest Author! :-)

Bad news. After a lengthy meeting with Dick Adams, Australian Labor Party MP, I left with the impression that the issue of illiteracy was considered by politicians as not a vote catcher and one that stays in the too hard basket. Dick Adams also informed that they were going to do away with the Reading Writing hotline, here in Australia. This is appalling!!! It is about time the government brought this issue out into the open. It was also brought to my attention that the Education department doesn’t like to admit there is an illiteracy issue as it reflects on teachers, the old blame game excuse. Having been illiterate myself, I have never blamed teachers for my problem, if anything, some went out of their way to help me. If this is a major stumbling block to the education department, I strongly advice they get over themselves and get illiteracy out in the open. I would be interested to know if this is an issue in other countries. To prove a point, I am going to do my own research on the blame game to see how many do or don’t blame teachers for illiteracy issues.
For updates, check out http://www.shadowforestauthors.com
CJ

Thanks for the updates, Christine. This is horrible indeed. It's scary how close the excuses and dismissals are in Australia as it is over here in the US. They are cutting programs left and right from anything creative like music to libraries and physical education. I hear they are even cutting breakfasts out which is horrible for those children who can't afford it in their own homes. It seems like anything that isn't funneling them lots of money right up front, they see as not being necessary. I'm wondering if there's anything people can do on the ground level to help counteract this. SFA and other organizations offering tutorship and readings seem to be on its way.