U of M Professor Receives Harold Love Community Service Award
For release: April 26, 2004
For press information, contact Gabrielle Maxey

A University of Memphis professor who has worked to improve literacy among youths in under-served communities has received the Harold Love Outstanding Community Service Award. Dr. Jerrie C. Scott, a professor of instruction and curriculum leadership in the College of Education, received the honor from the Tennessee Higher Education Commission.

The award recognizes outstanding community service performed at the campus level by faculty, staff members, or students. Five students and five faculty/staff members are selected to receive the $1,000 award.

Scott is founder and national director of the African-American Read-In Chain, which began as a nationwide read-in the first Sunday in February 1989. Activities can be as simple as bringing together family members to share a book or as elaborate as organizing public readings featuring African-American writers. The event has become a national tradition with more than a million participants during Black History Month celebrations in 48 states and Africa, Australia and Germany.

Scott recently helped launch another literacy program, Boys Booked on Barbershops (B-BOB). This community-based literacy program provides children with reading opportunities during visits to neighborhood barber shops.

Scott joined the U of M in 1996 as director of the Office of Diversity and served in that position until 1999. She also has been dean of the College of Education and a professor and director of the Center for Studies of Urban Literacy at Central State University in Wilberforce, Ohio.

A graduate of the University of Toledo, she earned master's and doctoral degrees in linguistics from the University of Michigan.

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