[Congressional Record Volume 140, Number 146 (Saturday, October 8, 1994)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page E]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Printing Office [www.gpo.gov]


[Congressional Record: October 8, 1994]
From the Congressional Record Online via GPO Access [wais.access.gpo.gov]

 
             RECOGNIZING MS. ANNA HUNT BIVINS OF CLEVELAND

                                 ______


                           HON. LOUIS STOKES

                                of ohio

                    in the house of representatives

                        Friday, October 7, 1994

  Mr. STOKES. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to recognize a remarkable and 
inspiring individual in my district in Cleveland, who both reminds and 
teaches us about two important keys to life--education and 
determination. Ms. Anna Hunt Bivins received her equivalency high 
school diploma this summer, 60 years after leaving high school without 
her diploma. That achievement is itself worthy of praise, but that is 
just part of the picture.
  Ms. Bivins has raised 8 children, and 2 step-children, and more than 
30 young ones call her Grandma. Her nurturing was not exclusively for 
her own children though, as she became a tutor in her General 
Educational Development class to help with their final exam. As a model 
of poise and self-respect in the Cleveland School District for 21 
years, she shared her love for the kids by trying to keep them in 
school, from becoming mothers and fathers too soon, and by teaching 
them lessons of virtue and dignity.
  But the most telling aspect of her story, Mr. Speaker, is that on the 
way to take her equivalency exam, Ms. Bivins was knocked down and 
attacked for her purse. She refused to give up her handbag, even when 
the attacker threatened to hit her, and held him off until another 
student scared off her assailant. While she was unnerved and unable to 
take her exam that day after studying for the GED for a year, this 
setback did not deter her from reaching her long-awaited goal: She 
later took that exam and received her diploma.
  Mr. Speaker, let us all recognize Ms. Anna Hunt Bivins as someone 
from whom we could all learn a lesson. Just as she would not relinquish 
her purse to her assailant, Ms. Bivins would not give up her desire for 
education, nor would she give up on kids that some perhaps had written 
off. Her commitment to education, not only for herself, but for the 
students whom she loves, teaches our youth about being responsible, 
about achieving goals, and about not letting anything stop us from 
reaching those goals. Recently, the Cleveland Plain Dealer newspaper 
featured Ms. Bivins in an article that painted a wonderful portrait of 
hope.
  I ask that this article be entered into the Record for my colleagues 
to read. Please join me in recognizing this outstanding citizen, Ms. 
Anna Hunt Bivins.

           [From the Cleveland Plain Dealer, Sept. 12, 1994]

           For Woman, 75, Education Was Worth Going Back For

                          (By Anjetta McQueen)

       Cleveland.--It would be hard to say education is not 
     important to Anna Hunt Bivins. After all, she had been out of 
     school for 60 years and was mugged during final exams, but 
     that did not keep her from getting an equivalency diploma. 
     And nothing stops the 75-year-old grandmother from helping 
     others get theirs.
       ``Learning is never-ending,'' Bivins said in a recent 
     interview at her East Side apartment. ``It's something you 
     can always benefit by.''
       This summer, after a year of study, she received a 
     certificate for completing the high school equivalency 
     program. She was featured as the program's speaker of the 
     year. All the while, she helped tutor fellow General 
     Educational Development students in classes at Our Lady of 
     Fatima Community Center, at E. 67th St. and Quimby Ave. in 
     Hough. Recently, she has been recovering from a car accident 
     injury.
       Bivins, who dropped out of high school at 15, said she was 
     glad to help a program that gave people a second chance. Two 
     years ago, after rearing eight children and two step-
     children, the twice-widowed Bivins watched her last child 
     graduate from high school and decided she should, too.
       She started classes at Our Lady of Fatima.
       ``She was really a lovely student,'' said Linda Sullivan, 
     the Cleveland schools' GED instructor at Our Lady of Fatima, 
     who recalled Bivins bringing doughnuts, coffee and tea to 
     class. ``She inspired a lot of the younger students.
       ``And she kind of mothered us all.''
       For the most part, Bivins enjoyed her experience. The math 
     was a little hard, she said, but she got through it. By July 
     1993, she was ready for her final test.
       ``Age brings wisdom,'' Bivins said, leaning forward to 
     shift weight off her back. ``I had sense enough to know 
     this.''
       The exam was going to be easy, she remembered thinking as 
     she walked down the stairs to the Cuyahoga Community College 
     Main campus classroom, where the test was held. But lost in 
     her thoughts, she didn't notice the boy until he had knocked 
     her down and grabbed her purse straps.
       ``He threatened to hit me,'' she recalled. ``I told him, 
     `You're just going to have to hit me.'''
       ``That young man needed to be in somebody's classroom,'' 
     she said. ``He wasn't more than 17 or 18.''
       The teen ran when one of Bivins' classmates came to her 
     aid, but she knew she wouldn't be able to take the test.
       ``Back upstairs, I just fell apart,'' she said. ``But I 
     came back.''
       Bouncing back seems natural to Bivins, who spent most of 
     her recovery time fielding phone calls from grandchildren and 
     church friends.
       ``I've been slowed down on account of this spinal injury,'' 
     she said. ``I have to wear this back brace most of the time. 
     But it's not going to stop me from going to church or doing 
     my work.''
       All around her neat apartment are signs of a vibrant, 
     youthful woman tempered with classic Southern charm: In the 
     living room, plastic coasters were stacked neatly on a glass 
     coffee table with a full candy dish. An aerobic step, a ski 
     exercise machine and a small stack of videos rested in 
     another room.
       On almost any afternoon in Bivins' home, one can also find 
     a freshly baked cake filled with homemade jam or jelly and 
     her latest sewing project pinned snuggly to an old 
     dressmaker's mannequin.
       Besides cooking and sewing, she also models, sells Avon 
     cosmetics and teaches Bible classes at Unity Baptist Church 
     on Kinsman Rd.
       Her other hobbies include singing with a local gospel group 
     called Flight to Glory and spoiling her grandchildren.
       ``Grandchildren?'' she asked, spreading dozens of snapshots 
     with smiling faces onto her dining room table. ``Oh, I 
     stopped counting at 30.''
       Growing up came in a hurry for Bivins in New Orleans, where 
     she dropped out of the 10th grade to work in her father's 
     store and married at 18 as a way out of the house. She said 
     dropping out of school left her hurt and embarrassed.
       ``In those days, they didn't care whether you finished 
     school,'' said Bivins, who added that all of her children 
     finished high school. ``During my day, it was the thing to 
     marry young and grow up with my children.''
       Now, among the GED students whom she sees, there are still 
     young girls whose life choices also made them miss out on 
     high school.
       ``These are young women barely 30 years old, unmarried with 
     five or six children,'' Bivins said ``I ask them why do they 
     do that. They just drop their heads.''
       Bivins, who came to Cleveland in 1947, spent 21 years 
     urging students--girls especially--to do well and behave in 
     school. She worked as a hall monitor for Cleveland schools, 
     one of the few jobs she could get without a high school 
     diploma.
       ``I was always telling them to be ladies,'' Bivins said 
     ``You know, to quit being so common * * * beer cans in the 
     rest room, necking with boys in deserted corridors. * * *
       ``But I love those kids,'' Bivins said. ``Many of them see 
     me now and they say, `Ms Hunt--they all still call me that, 
     you know--I wish I had listened to you.''
       ``Life is a teacher, and you're a fool if you don't pick up 
     on it,'' Bivins said. ``Even as a child, I didn't miss a 
     class.''

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