In this appeal to the readers of The Berkeley Daily Gazette to contribute to a fundraising drive for the Rainbow Sign, Mary Ann Pollar emphasized the role the Rainbow Sign played in the education of local Black youth.

Located on Grove Street (now Martin Luther King Way), the Rainbow Sign was just a few short blocks from Berkeley High School and Malcolm X Elementary and often included schoolchildren among its visitors.

After two girls skipped school to try to catch a glimpse of Nina Simone at lunch when she came to dine at the Rainbow Sign, Pollar recalled Simone pulling the girls aside and “talk[ing] to them for 45 minutes about the importance of education, commitment and working hard for goals.” Even more to this didactic end, Pollar suggested that “if a kid doesn’t like to read, put him together with a poet.  Then he’ll not only read but write and put the punctuation in the right place.”