Purpose: This paper seeks to examine workplace learning strategies, learning facilitators and learning barriers of public accountants in Canada across three professional levels--trainees, managers, and partners. Design/methodology/approach: Volunteer participants from public accounting firms in Nova Scotia and New Brunswick completed a demographic…

This guide, which is intended for project directors, coordinators, and other professional staff interested in marketing adult basic skills and workplace education programs to business, presents a six-step process for developing a marketing plan. Discussed first are the purposes of marketing and considerations in marketing workplace education to…

Examines how conflicts between management and workers over division of labor are enacted in two manuals--the official manual operationalizing Internal Revenue Service (IRS) regulations and a "translation" of the official manual--governing tax examiners' work in an IRS Service Center. Finds that systemic differences between the manuals…

Discusses a research project exploring the thought it takes to do physical work, the cognitive processes involved in various blue collar and service occupations like waitressing, hairstyling, plumbing, welding, industrial assembly, and the like. Considers the way occupations are categorized, defines intelligence, and thinks about learning and…

Interviews two practitioners in the field of business communication to better understand developments in business literacy and information skills. Concludes with a brief discussion of the opportunities for business communication experts in enhancing literacy in the workplace. (SG)

Provides suggestions for designing customized basic skills instruction using work-related reading needs. Highlights opportunities for adult educators in workplace literacy. (SK)

Begins an international conversation among reading teachers and other literacy educators about the intersection of literacy and the world of work. Describes the complex workplace literacy requirements of a front-line worker in Silicon Valley. (SR)

Reviews survey and other data on workforce skill needs and literacy levels of current and future workers. Concludes that technical educators should cooperate with employers in developing a more literate workforce. (SK)

Examines the Australian Language and Literacy Council's paper, "Literacy at Work." Concludes that it concerns not only achievement of social and economic objectives but also the question of acceptable forms of governance and the state's intervention in economic and social life and the organization of the workplace. (SK)

Two Australian projects--integrating numeracy into a construction training course and integrating literacy in rural training--illustrate the development of integrated curricula and the necessity of contextualized, multiple literacies. Literacy is not a set of generic skills to be taught in isolation, but highly specific vocational and social…

This case study documents one girl's emerging literacy about workplace activities through her participation in literacy events at home over a three-year period beginning when she was three. The case study shows the girl's understanding of the functions of literacy to record and convey information, regulate activities, and transact business. (BC)

The Job Enhancement Program at Texas Instruments is designed to strengthen work skills, promote flexibility, and improve the learning skills of employees. It started with a focus on functional literacy skills, but it has evolved into a comprehensive program to assist employees with academic and job-related skills. (JOW)

Draws from a research project on young grocery and fast-food workers in the United States and Canada to discuss some of the ways in which workplace text and literacy have an impact on the lives of working youth. Concludes that educators should reject the idea that there is little to be said about the literacy practices of low-end service sector…

Multicultural immigrant workers (n=23) studying English as a second language took photographs about their lives, wrote about them, and displayed them on the Internet. The materials depicted their cross-cultural journeys and transformative experiences. The process increased their communication skills and empowered them to make workplace changes.…

As work organizations restructure to remain competitive, problem solving is being pushed down to frontline workers, and emphasis is increasingly placed on workplace learning. In this exploratory, qualitative study, we focus on workers' experiences of problems within the context of their work and how these contexts foster their learning and…