Why adult education must be kept alive

Budget cuts are threatening adult education and ESL. Even for the sake of boosting the worker tax base, the LAUSD shouldn't turn its back on more than a quarter-million students who value education and attend school of their own volition.

A little more than a year ago I retired from teaching adult school in Los Angeles. Since then, I'm embarrassed to admit I've forgotten most of the names of my students. But I certainly haven't forgotten the students themselves: the Guatemalan chef who wore a clean white shirt and tie to class every night; the twentysomething Cambodian woman who worked torturous hours in a doughnut shop and still found time to study, despite her obvious exhaustion; the older Korean man who knotted his long hair in a bun like a samurai and who wasn't afraid to sing "New York, New York" in front of the class.

helen mirren columbus dispatch braylon edwards