Jeff Carter: Illiteracy in the U.S.

An Interview with Jeff Carter: Illiteracy in the U.S.
Education News: 3.12.11 by Michael F. Shaughnessy,
Eastern New Mexico University

Michael F. Shaughnessy - I think as a society we place a high value on individual freedom, achievement, and competition. Unfortunately, this sometimes blinds us to issues of inequality and injustice.

Jeff Carter is ProLiteracy’s director of policy and government affairs.In this interview, he responds to questions about the issues surrounding illiteracy in the United States.

1) Jeff as you know, Obama has just delivered his state of the Union address and economically things are bad. What kind of governmental support can you expect for your literacy efforts?

The need for more adult literacy resources is great, (we estimate that federal and state funding combined provides adult literacy services to just 3% of those people who need it), and the impact that an investment in adult literacy would have on the economy is clear, but we still have a long way to go to help policymakers connect the dots between this issue and economic development.

But I think we are slowly turning a corner. Take, for example, President Obama’s goal that by 2020, all adult Americans will have committed to at least one year of higher education or career training, and the U.S. will once again have the highest proportion of college graduates in the world.

The President may not have intended it this way, but really, that is a call for increasing investment in adult education and literacy. Even if every state reached the same levels of high school graduation and college enrollment for high school graduates as the highest performing states do now, we will not come close to reaching his goal without a substantial effort to bring more adults who are out of school into postsecondary education. And to do that, we will need to invest in adult literacy.

3) What can the local public library do- or should they even be expected to play a role in remediation?

Our libraries many times are the first place that adults who need reading help could turn to for help. I think local libraries are a critical and under-appreciated resource. I live in Washington, D.C., and our neighborhood libraries are beacons for literacy — the most prominent physical reminder of the value we place on literacy that we have in many communities. And in practice, libraries are often used by volunteers to meet with students they are tutoring. I can envision public libraries taking on an even greater and more defined role as gateways for adult learners. Every public library in the country should have staff that are trained to counsel adult learners and help them identify literacy programs and other resources available to them either through the library or elsewhere in their vicinity.

4) I know there are costs to illiteracy- emotional, fiscal, business and industry. Could you review what you see as the main costs, and how they impact society?

This is an area where I think we still need to do more research, but some numbers are there for us already. For example, I’ve seen estimates that low health literacy costs between $106 billion and $238 billion each year in the U.S. Some contend that the effects of low literacy costs the U.S. $225 billion or more each year in non-productivity in the workforce, crime, and loss of tax revenue due to unemployment.

But the biggest cost is on our efforts to improve children’s academic achievement. Children raised in families with low educational achievement are much less likely to be successful in school. It’s a concern to us that we don’t focus more on adult education as a tool to strengthen families, and that we don’t talk about this issue in education policy as much as we talk about school reform. It’s possible that the investments we are making in school reform and pre-K education are going to be largely wasted as long as we ignore adult literacy. READ MORE !