When a child can’t read, their chances of incarceration, homelessness, and unemployment increase. That’s why Oakland-based NAACP activist Kareem Weaver believes literacy is one of the greatest civil rights issues of our time and is fighting for better reading instruction. “What good is winning the right to vote if we can’t even read the ballot?” Fed up with the bleak reading scores in his own community, Kareem files a petition with the Oakland Unified School District demanding change.
The Right to Read shares the stories of Weaver, a teacher, and two American families who fight to provide our youngest generation with the most foundational indicator of life-long success: the ability to read. "It’s a jaw-dropping indictment on the historical and present failings of the country’s educational and political leadership. But it’s also a passionate call to action to remove the hold that the educational theory of whole language literacy has had on American education for a century..."—
The Hollywood Reporter.
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