Twelve articles in this special issue look at changes in adult basic education (ABE) including the following: changes in policy, the overhaul of welfare, state governance, workforce development, family literacy, the connection with employment and training, contextualized literacy, health education, political and economic literacy, adult literacy…

Throughout its history, adult literacy education has been defined, researched, and controlled by external entities. Action research is now enabling literacy practitioners and learners to gain a voice through production of their own knowledge. The applicability, benefits, and inherent risks of practitioner action research are discussed. Contains 53…

This article is about mainstreaming gender equality in adult basic learning and education (ABLE). Gender equality is defined as equal rights of both women and men to influence, participate in and benefit from a programme. It is argued that specific gender analyses of emerging patterns of gender relations is helpful in formulating gender equality…

The EFA Global Monitoring Report of 2002 contains two interesting paragraphs. In this article the author aims to explore what lies between those two paragraphs, in order to put forward some ideas about the role and future of literacy and its relation to human rights. The author hopes to show the continuing importance of adult literacy work and the…

The purpose of the study was to better understand reasons why some welfare recipients in adult basic education (ABE) programs do not appear to advance their skill levels and to identify strategies to help them make progress. A questionnaire was returned by 117 ABE teachers in welfare programs, who rated the frequency of occurrence of various…

In this article, the author shares the voices of adults whose lives have been changed by their enrollment in a set of innovative college readiness programs geared toward adults. These women and men have overcome obstacles between them and college that they believed were insurmountable--fear, inadequate academic preparation, lack of information…

In September 2006, the State Board approved a new System Direction to guide the two-year-college system for the next ten years. One of three primary goals for the system is to increase educational attainment for the economic development of the state and the economic well-being of Washingtonians. Since 2000, State Board staff has provided periodic…

This report aims to encourage and support Australian providers to extend their provision of English language, literacy, and numeracy courses by using flexible delivery strategies. An introduction describes the project's purpose and methodology. Chapter 2 discusses good practice, principles of adult basic education, adult learning, and flexible…

This publication is an update of an earlier Ohio Literacy Resource Center workplace literacy bibliography and contains 20 resources from 1993 to the present. Items have been selected based on a number of criteria: they had to be of high quality, have practical use, and be readily available to a wide audience of workplace literacy practitioners.…

The Literacy Community Planning Process (LCPP) was intended to assist Ontario communities in comprehensive planning to meet the needs of adult learners requiring training in basic literacy and numeracy. In the first phase, 59 local LCPP committees and 4 literacy networks submitted community profiles to the Literacy Section of the Ontario Training…

A study focused on the extent to which historical and contemporary subjectivities interplay with structural and cultural constraints to influence the decision making and human agency of Mexican American adults of the Southwest in nonparticipation in adult education. The issue of nonparticipation was explored from a social action paradigm. Data…

The literacy skills of General Educational Development (GED) program graduates were compared to those of high school graduates and high school dropouts who did not pass the GED test. The sample of 1,012 young adults (ages 21 to 25 years) studied was obtained by selecting all Whites, African Americans, and Hispanics who were studied in the Young…

The history of technology use in adult literacy programs was reviewed, and attitudes enhancing and limiting the use of technology were examined. Among the key findings of the analysis were the following: (1) the value of technology for literacy instruction is based on its provision of privacy, individual control, immediate feedback, and…

Thirty literacy practitioners participated in a free-ranging discussion of the potential and the issues arising from the rapid introduction of new technologies to literacy education (adult basic education and English language training). After an introduction, the report includes the presentations of various participants, including Peter Goulding,…

A study examined issues of teacher professionalization within adult literacy education. Relevant research and theory on professionalization were reviewed, the historical experiences of other professional fields were examined, data on state certification requirements for adult basic education (ABE) teachers were analyzed, officials from states…