Assignment 1

          My name is Matthew Lemons. I am a senior at NJCU in the fire science program. I am a career firefighter in Summit New Jersey. I am married and have a 14-month-old son. I have been blessed with a beautiful family and successful career and am thankful for both every day. 

Literacy is important for our society and myself personally. Being able to read and communicate is the basis for a cohesive society. Both of parents are college educated and had a strong commitment to raising my brother and I to be well educated. My parents were extremely supportive and encouraging from a young age to learn how to read and write. My parents taught us the importance of not just reading the words but to gain an understanding of what the words meant, what picture the author was trying to convey to the reader. Growing up, my mother was strict about my brother and I playing video games during the daytime. She preferred we spent that time learning or reading, using our free time constructively instead of “wasting it.”

          My brother and I had very different tastes growing up in what we chose to read and take interest in. My brother discovered the world of architecture and chose to read as much as possible about it, today he is an architectural engineer and works on building skyscrapers in Philadelphia. I was fascinated by history, more specifically military history. Coming from a long family of military and public service, I found it particularly interesting in reading about places, battles, time periods, and challenges of time periods in which my family members were in the military. It gave me a better understanding of what my ancestors did and how the world was during their lifetimes. I should note, my father did an ancestry type search and found my family dates back to the Jamestown colony in Virginia from the 18^th century. There was never a shortage of reading material growing up!

          My father was my role model growing up. My father worked in an office building in Manhattan, New York, and seemed to read constantly. Obviously for work he was required to read through the appropriate paperwork and reports, but what fascinated me the most was how he would read on the train to and from the city on his way to and from work. I recall taking the train with him countless times for “bring your kid to work day” and noticing that on the train in particular he almost seemed out of place. In an early morning train filled with commuters everyone seemed to be playing on their PDAs or blackberry’s or sleeping. But not my father, my father would be reading, sometimes the book from his nightstand, other mornings the newspaper, but he never wasted an opportunity to read.

          I feel literacy is vital to a successful society. As a fireman, I am not generally required to read during an emergency incident/response. However, reading and writing are the basis of communication, and without communication my job would be impossible. Being able to communicate with dispatch, other apparatus, the Incident Commander, and the general public is one of the most important aspects of firefighting. Being able to accurately give and receive information, usually in the dark and through a radio, is challenging.

          Literacy and communication are also vital in my personal life. Marriage revolves around being able to communicate appropriately with a spouse. Wants, needs, expectations and more are all a part of communication. Without literacy, problems will arise.