He ended up becoming a carpenter, moved to Miami, Fla., got a union card and became a journeyman.
By 1992, having been injured while working in a paper factory in Michigan, he decided that he needed to set an example for his daughters and came to the Hamilton Adult Basic Literacy Education center to get his GED.
But it wasn’t as easy as all that.
“In 1973, I had all my credits to get ready to graduate, but I couldn’t read a newspaper,” he said.
“I was totally illiterate, but they were going to push me through.”
But he managed, and went back to doing light carpentry until 2006 when the economy started going under and he found himself out of work.
“I sat around dazed and confused,” he said. “Once I realized that I wasn’t going back to work, I came back here,” to ABLE.
“Now, I’m in a college writing course at Miami and coming to ABLE for reading and math,” he said, as he works toward an associates degree in social science, with the goal of becoming a freelance writer and counseling people who have been through the same struggles he’s endured.
Rebecca DeGroat also came to the ABLE center to get her GED to make an impression on her son.
“I had a child early, at age 18,” she said. “When my son was 16, he asked me where my diploma was and I had to tell him that I failed to get it because I got pregnant and dropped out of school.
“That conversation prompted me to go back because I wanted to be a good example.”
Having received her GED earlier this year, she’s back at ABLE working on her “stackable certificates” and is in line to become an optical technician.
According to ABLE Director Kathy Petrek, the program has been very busy the last couple of years as people who dropped out of high school are coming back 10 or 20 years later after realizing that they need a different skill set to find work in these troubled economic times.
There are three ABLE locations: in an office building at 633 High St., at Workforce One of Butler County in the Fairfield Crossings shopping center, and in 302 Phelps Hall at Miami University Hamilton.
People coming in to get their GEDs account for about 60 percent of business, but “we’re seeing more and more people who have a diploma or GED but come here to brush up their skills” for college, Petrek said. “Our goal is to prepare them for the Compass test, which is used to place them in college classes appropriate to their skill level.”
The “stackable certificates” have helped make the process of advancing an adult education easier, she said.
“People can continuously add on to their certifications,” Petrek said. “They can take it one step at a time rather than just jump into a four-year degree where the goal is pretty far off.”
For instance, a person can get a trained nursing aide certificate before going on to become a licensed practical nurse before becoming a registered nurse before pursuing a bachelor’s degree in nursing.
“They’re starting to do that with a lot of other fields, like information technology and manufacturing,” Petrek said. “If you can’t make it all the way through, at least you have something that can boost you up the employment ladder.
“People are more successful if they’re prepared,” she said. “If they go in and they struggle, they’re more likely to drop out, and that’s what we do here.”
Contact this reporter at (513) 820-2188 or rjones@coxohio.com.
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