Here is a clip from one of my favorite recent posts, Erin Battat’s piece, “Transformations,” which describes her experience teaching in the Dorchester Women’s program. Toward the end of her essay she gives these two annecdotes:

“A woman in her mid-twenties came to class with a great weight on her shoulders.� Her mother�s drug addiction had destroyed everything in its path, and she was left to pick up the pieces.� Several years before, she was faced with an impossible decision: whether to continue her college education, or to take legal custody of her younger brothers and sisters.� To her, there was no choice.

I watched this student�s face as the judge told her own story about dealing with an unstable parent.� There was a look of astonishment tinged with a dawning hope: Even a judge can suffer a terrible childhood? Maybe I, too, can make something of myself?� By the end of the semester, this student had enrolled in community college, confident that even though her mother failed her, she was not doomed to repeat the past.”

Like your own post of these week, this incident emphasizes the truly democratic priniples that underlie CLTL.

Brooke

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