About this archive
theliteracyinstitute.org was the website of The Literacy Institute at Virginia Commonwealth University, a partnership between the Virginia Literacy Foundation and VCU that ran adult and early literacy projects in Richmond from 2002–2003. The site was updated until December 2017. After that the domain lapsed and passed through other hands: by 2023 it carried an empty WordPress template, and in 2025 an unrelated foreign-language business site.
This archive brings the Institute’s pages back at their old addresses. It is not run by VCU, the Virginia Literacy Foundation, VALRC or any of the people named on these pages, and it does not speak for them.
How the pages were restored
- Text comes from the Internet Archive’s Wayback Machine captures of the site between 2007 and 2018. Each page says which capture it is based on.
- Original wording is kept, including dated phrases (“currently”, “will host”). Obvious typos are corrected silently, apart from a few noted on the page.
- Removed on purpose: direct phone numbers and e-mail addresses of individual staff, the web contact form, links that now go to unrelated sites, and pharmacy spam that had been injected into one staff bio by 2012.
- Not recovered: the PDF files of the LESLLA proceedings and the photographs that rotated on the old home page, which showed children in Richmond preschools.
- Old addresses ending in
.phpor.htmlredirect to the matching page here. - The Institute’s last known mailing addresses are kept on the contact page, with pointers to organizations that still offer help.
What is new
Blocks headed “Added in 2026” and the Field Notes section are new writing for this archive. They summarize what happened to the programs and what later research found, with sources named in the text. They are not the Institute’s words.
Design
The layout follows the 2009–2013 design of the original site: the pale-to-olive header band, the black menu bar, the tan “Our Projects” column on the left and the black footer with its “Top of the page” link. It has been rebuilt to work on phones. The logo is a redrawn open-book mark in the spirit of the original, not a copy of it.
Photo credits
All images are in the public domain or carry no known copyright restrictions.
| Image | Source | Rights |
|---|---|---|
| WPA posters: Free classes for adults, Get ahead!, We are all ignorant on some subjects, The world wants new knowledge, new skills | Work Projects Administration Poster Collection, Library of Congress, via Wikimedia Commons | Public domain |
| WPA poster: Little Miss Muffet … reading a picture book | Arlington Gregg, WPA Poster Collection, Library of Congress, via Wikimedia Commons | Public domain |
| Star pupil, 82 years old, reading her lesson in adult class, Gee’s Bend, Alabama, 1939 | Marion Post Wolcott, Farm Security Administration; New York Public Library, via Wikimedia Commons | Public domain |
| Library of Virginia, 800 East Broad Street, Richmond | City of Richmond Planning and Preservation Division, via Wikimedia Commons | Public domain |
| Richmond Public Library main branch, postcard | VCU Libraries Commons, via Wikimedia Commons | No known restrictions |
Corrections
If you worked at the Institute and something here is wrong, or you would like your name removed from a staff list, the request will be honored. Corrections that can be checked against the original captures are preferred.
Questions readers ask
Is this the official website of the Literacy Institute?
No. It is an independent archive of the old public website. It is not run by VCU, the Virginia Literacy Foundation, VALRC or anyone named on these pages.
Why are phone numbers and e-mail addresses missing?
They belonged to individual staff members and most stopped working years ago. Keeping them would only send messages to the wrong people.
Can a former staff member ask to be removed?
Yes. Requests to correct or remove a name from the staff lists will be honored.