A New Marriage Proposal

(2 of 3)
To enter the course, couples must be unmarried with a child under age 1. Faverey recruits them by calling parents in CSC's Head Start programs. The group is mainly African Americans and Hispanics in their 20s and 30s, populations in which single-parent households are prevalent. While white families have an 81% chance of including a married couple, Hispanics have a 67% chance and African Americans a 46% chance. For low-income couples like the ones in the class, trading vows is often a lower priority than managing day-to-day dramas like finding housing, treating a health condition or looking for work. "When you're living in a perpetual state of crisis," says Edwards, "how do you think about an engagement ring?"

Edwards' couples have begun thinking about marriage, however. More than 80% have identified marriage as a goal. Two of the 35 couples in the program have married, and 10 have become engaged, including Ramona Rose, 27, and Lance Hankerson, 26. Neither Rose nor Hankerson works, for health reasons — he has multiple sclerosis, and she suffered disabling complications while pregnant with their daughter Maelyn, now 10 months old. (Rose also has a daughter, Zaria, 4, from another relationship.) Both Rose and Hankerson grew up in Delaware Terrace, and Hankerson says he harbored a crush on Rose from age 11. But it was just two years ago that she finally relented to his flirting--"'cause I was ready for one of the good guys," says Rose. She says she signed up for the course "to save our relationship" from constant arguments, especially about how her bingo habit affects their finances. Hankerson reluctantly agreed to participate, but midway through the course, the couple was ready to give up. "I picked fights," Rose confesses. "I cut him off. I always had to have last, first, in-between words." Hankerson often deflects conflict with a joke--"Sometimes I want to happily choke her," he says. The soft-spoken father says Faverey drew him out during the home visits and showed Rose how to listen. "She helps us see both sides," he says after the last class, as Faverey checks on the couple's progress toward their goal of leaving public housing. "Is there any way you can keep coming?" Hankerson asks her. After the course ends, the home visits drop to one a month, stopping when the CSC'S $177,374 grant runs out in December.