| Let's get back to basics to boost literacy rate

My mom always told me that if you could write well, you could do anything. Part of me believed that this was her way of showing support for my passion and possible future career. It seemed appropriate that my mom, an English major and lifelong writer, would at least hope I could do anything with my writing.
Yet as I progressed through college and encountered the career scene, I had to admit that my mom was right. Now, most of us don't like saying that our parents are right, and I'm braving the consequences of putting it in writing so she can read it over and over again.
Unfortunately, many other people will not be able to read it. As the National Institute for Literacy reports, "Only about one in 17 17-year-olds can read and gain information from specialized text, for example the science section in the local newspaper."
The ability to read and write should not be a restricted privilege, but with statistics like that, I can't help but feel like I am part of a very select group. But at the heart of it, I have become a published writer and successful student only because someone read to me, someone corrected my writing mistakes and someone checked my progress. It may have started with the Letter People teaching me the alphabet in kindergarten -- something so easily taken for granted -- but I know that without that, I would not be in college. Or at least not doing as well as I am in college.
Here's the plan
As schools across the country cope with budget cuts while trying to combat low test scores in areas from science to math to writing, I say we get back to the basics. It seems simplistic, but the way to improve literacy and education is not in the millions of dollars spent on computers.
Maybe it's time to depend on the humble home of a clean sheet of paper or a book, to focus on the way a word sounds on your lips and the way a sentence comes alive on a page.
In sixth grade, for instance, my class chose "Magic Spots" outside and wrote in journals -- just simple, spiral notebooks that became our "Magic Spot Books."
At about $1 per pupil, we were all given the opportunity to go out into nature, write about it and then revel in our teacher's comments about our entries. These are the things that pupils not only remember but benefit from. Now, eight years later, I still keep a journal.
Opportunity for all
So, yes, Mom, you're right. Writing can be the key to all kinds of opportunities, and it is time that those opportunities were opened to everyone.
Reading and writing only has to be a privilege if we allow it to be. We don't need to conjure up large-scale responses to our educational problems: Computers in every corner of a school and millions of dollars worth of programs still may not reach an entire community.
They are certainly ways to improve literacy and I applaud them as such, but let's not forget the basics. Let's not forget that Dr. Seuss still rhymes in the simple binding of a book. What matters is that for every child who needs it, someone is there to give the rhyme a voice.
XEmily A. Stoddard, 19, of Grand Rapids, Mich., is a columnist for Blue Jean Online. Read more articles and reviews by young women at http://www.bluejeanonline.com.