This article presents a quasi-experimental study evaluating Morocco's Agency for Adult Education "Literacy for Empowerment" program, using propensity score matching to compare data from participants and nonparticipants. Framed within a theory supporting an all-inclusive concept of literacy, the study was guided by two main questions, and…

The purpose of this self-study guide is to help adult literacy education providers collect, organize, and analyze evidence that they can use to improve program performance. It was designed to help educators consider which types of evidence to collect and which components of adult education instruction may be important for evaluating…

Previous studies have documented the personal transformation that many low literate adults undergo when they engage in literacy campaigns. In particular, research has captured how improved literacy leads to a greater willingness and capacity to speak out, or what is often referred to as voice. This paper focusses on the impact of an adult…

This article focuses on the implementation of the Cuban "Yes, I Can" adult literacy campaign in Indigenous Australian communities in north west New South Wales (NSW). It examines the interplay between empowerment, disempowerment and commodification in education in Australia in order to assess what new elements the Cuban "Yes, I…

In 2008, New York City's Center for Economic Opportunity (CEO) launched the Young Adult Literacy (YAL) program to improve the academic and work-readiness skills of youth who are not in school, do not have a job, and have very low literacy skills. The YAL program targets 16- to 24-year-old young adults who read at the fourth-through eighth-grade…

The UNESCO Institute for Lifelong Learning (UIL) has just published its fifth policy brief, entitled "Making Large-Scale Literacy Campaigns and Programmes Work." The brief provides policymakers with a set of recommendations based on an analysis of adult literacy campaigns and programmes that took place around the world between 2000 and…

Different technologies have been used for decades to support adult education and learning. These include radio, television and audio and video cassettes. More recently digital ICTs such as computers, tablets, e-books, and mobile technology have spread at great speed and also found their way into the teaching and learning of literacy and numeracy…

UIL has published a second edition of a collection of case studies of promising literacy programmes that seek to empower women. "Narrowing the Gender Gap: Empowering Women through Literacy Programmes" (originally published in 2013 as "Literacy Programmes with a Focus on Women to Reduce Gender Disparities") responds to the…

Literacy is the foundation of lifelong learning and a crucial element in the universally recognised right to education. However, illiteracy continues to exist as a global challenge, and many individuals still lack the basic literacy skills that are needed to engage in further learning opportunities and for the economic and social development of…

When it became clear that existing literacy efforts would not be enough to enable some countries to reach Education for All (EFA) Goal 4 (a 50 percent improvement in levels of adult literacy), UNESCO launched the Literacy Initiative for Empowerment (LIFE, 2006-2015). 35 countries with literacy rates below 50 percent and/or a population of more…

This chapter examines the characteristics and performance of adult immigrants and adult English language learners on the National Assessment of Adult Literacy. These factors are related to key social outcomes such as involvement in the labor force, income, and welfare participation, and the data reported can be used in making decisions about…

This document provides summaries of conference papers and discussions at a workshop focused on improving the quality of literacy education in developing countries. The workshop was attended by 20 project leaders and observers from 11 countries: Bangladesh, Cambodia, China, Costa Rica, India, Laos, Nepal, Pakistan, the Philippines, Sri Lanka, and…

The Literacy Plus Project, begun in 1985, provides tutoring for English-speaking adults aged 16 and over who live in the Hayward (California) Public Library service area, and whose reading and writing skills are below eighth-grade level. During the 1988-89 program year, the program trained 84 tutors (goal: 100) using a program developed by the…

This packet, which is intended for literacy program leaders throughout Oklahoma, contains the materials developed by the Literacy Office of the Oklahoma Department of Libraries for its 1995 literacy awareness campaign. The first third of the packet is a project guide that includes the following materials: overview of Oklahoma's first statewide…

This handbook documents the Prison Literacy Project (PLP) in order to provide a model for other community groups to follow in developing their own literacy projects. The PLP worked to have prison residents learn to read or significantly raise their reading levels through an ongoing literacy tutoring program. All project participants were involved…