The Initiative

The Brown Chair in English Literacy Initiative will support research, teaching, and outreach projects in five broad areas of literacy:

• Literacy and Culture: Helping youth and adults throughout Arkansas and beyond develop and employ literacy through cultural and creative practices (e.g., gardening, sewing, filmmaking, songwriting, painting, etc.)
• Literacy and Policy: Helping literacy scholars, educators, students, and non-profit organizations develop and pursue literacy research that can and/or will be translated to policy in Arkansas and beyond.
• General Youth and Adult Literacy: Helping youth and adults throughout Arkansas and beyond read and write more richly, productively, and critically in many parts of their lives—personal, familial, professional, political, emotional, and spiritual.
• Literacy and Work: Helping adults throughout Arkansas and beyond prepare and retool so that they will be able to participate more fully in high-quality jobs that call for careful and critical reading, writing, listening, speaking, discussing and problem-solving.
• Academic Literacy, K-16: Helping students throughout Arkansas and beyond develop the abilities to read and write so that they can succeed in school and achieve the highest level of education they desire.

To learn more about how you and your organization can work with the Office of the Brown Chair on any of these initiatives, call Eric Darnell Pritchard at 479-575-4301 or write them at ep036@uark.edu.