The attendance of fewer than 10 people at a lecture given by Vivyan Adair on Monday seemed to vaguely echo the lack of attention given to what she deemed as a prominent issue overlooked in today’s society.

Vivyan Adair, chairwoman of Elihu Root Peace Fund and associate professor of women’s studies at Hamilton College in New York, spoke in Morrill Hall about the cyclical obstacles of welfare recipients and the benefits of higher education provided to those recipients.

She is also the founder and director of the ACCESS Project at Hamilton, which assists low-income parents in completing an education at the college. The project has created a touring exhibit of success stories, “The Missing Story of Ourselves,” which will be on display through Sept. 28 at Unitarian Universalist Fellowship, 1015 N. Hyland Ave.

The church took the exhibit because they saw it as an opportunity to get the community involved in an important issue, said Rev. Brian Eslinger.

“It is really personalizing the plight of so many families as a result of the changes in the welfare system that don’t allow for education, which is used as a primary means that people use to get out of poverty,” Eslinger said.

The church has received a positive response to the exhibit, as they had “very strong attendance” Sunday, when Adair spoke.

Adair began her lecture with a haunting account of her own past and the trauma of living as a single, battered mother with limited government assistance.

She later went on to emphasize the fact that through government assistance, she was able to attend college and eventually earn a Ph.D.

Throughout the lecture, Adair brought life to individual welfare recipients and adamantly beset the stereotype of a “single mother who has children to increase her welfare check.”

“These stereotypes reduce the complexity of the situations of people on welfare, and are used [by politicians] to justify [stricter welfare] policies,” Adair said.

Adair cited welfare reforms, which she felt were more accurately called “deforms,” in 1996 and 2002 that made it extremely difficult for welfare recipients to obtain a college degree and thus end their reliance on the program.

“There was very little debate,” she said of the welfare reforms.

Adair said the issue is barely on the radar as the gap between the rich and the poor increases.

Photographs on large screens coupled with biographies of others with similar paths as Adair’s lent to her main point that higher education can halt the reoccurring problems of welfare recipients.

An example of one of her success stories was Fransheneka Watson, who at 13 years old became the head of a broken household.

After she was expelled from her high school for absence due to family problems and five years’ work at a fast food chain, Watson took out loans to go to college.

“Five years ago, my goal was an office job. Today, I am planning to earn a Ph.D. in psychology or go to law school,” said Watson in the “Missing Story of Ourselves.”

Adair concluded her lecture by opening up to discussion and questions from the audience.

“I don’t think as a population there is any more cheating among welfare recipients than there is among CEOs,” Adair said to address people who believe the welfare system is wracked with “welfare cheaters.”