11 Million Adults Illiterate, Study Shows

WASHINGTON - An estimated in one in 20 U.S. adults is not literate in English, which means 11 million people lack the skills to perform everyday tasks, a federal study shows.

From 1992 to 2003, the nation's adults made no progress in their ability to read a newspaper, a book or any other prose arranged in sentences and paragraphs. They also showed no improvement in comprehending documents such as bus schedules and prescription labels.

The adult population did make gains in handling quantitative tasks, such as calculating numbers found on tax forms or bank statements. But even in that area of literacy, the typical adult showed only basic skills, enough to perform simple daily activities.

Perhaps most sobering: Adult literacy dropped or was flat across every level of education, from people with graduate degrees to those who dropped out of high school.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20051215/ap_on_go_ot/adult_literacy

:toast:

if one happened to catch the Series on Showtime, Masters of Horror and saw the episode " HOMECOMING" the following statement is so true and plays off your statement Itch.....

" He is not stupid. But he has a way of making stupid people feel like they're just as smart as he is".

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You took the words outta my mouth.

one in 20 U.S. adults is not literate in English.

So of those 11 million, how many are literate in Spanish and not English? Just asking. Because where I live, I get alot of "No Hablo Engles".

that was a big issue in D.C. What is the population break down there?

Oh yeah! You'd better believe it! Also in the DC area Langley Park, Wheaton, and Alexandria have significant Hispanic populations (mostly Ecuadorians, San Salvadoreans, a few Bolivians...a real mixed bag.)

There's just about everyone here. DC is a pretty international city.

Of people in the DC area were not born in the U.S., according to a study I read recently.

http://www.voanews.com/english/2005-12-13-voa80.cfm
More than 35 million immigrants, both legal and illegal, are living in the United States, according to a report released this week by the independent research group Center for Immigration Studies. The report says many of these immigrants are poorly educated and lack health care insurance.

Center for Immigration Studies Logo shows green arrows in a square pointing inward
The Center for Immigration Studies, which advocates tougher policies on illegal immigration, reports nearly eight million new immigrants have settled in the United States in the last five years. That's the largest five-year increase in American history, the report says.

The author of the report, Steven Camarota, says immigrants account for 12-percent of the total population, and 31 percent of them have not completed high school. He says that nearly 19 percent of immigrants are living in poverty, not because of unwillingness to work, but because of the low level of their education.

"A very large body of research shows that the best predictor of how immigrants will do in the United States is how much education they have when they come," he noted. "That is true actually of natives, too, I should point out -- how much you make, whether you use welfare, whether you end up in poverty -- all those things are heavily impacted by your education level."

Continued....
http://www.voanews.com/english/2005-12-13-voa80.cfm

if we counted people who are effectively illiterate, meaning they can read things like stop signs, but little more.

Rural and Mountain East Tennessee are not known for their focus on education.

These are people who were born here (families have lived here for many generations) and educated (?) here. The illiteracy rate among adults was above 25% in 2002.

I hope that is changing with the younger generation, but I wouldn't bet on it. Education is just not a priority for some people and the shame of it is that the jobs that illiterate people used to do here, textile mills and furniture factories, are gone. The jobs that are available require at least basic literacy and operation of equipment that requires training (literacy).

And how many of them are registered @ Freak Republic & Loosey-Ann? :evilgrin:

cuz ya don't have think, just follow.

Eleven million adults in the United States speak no English or know so little they can't read a prescription or sign a form, the Education Department said Thursday.

In addition, 23 million people who were born in the U.S. can barely perform such simple tasks, according to the National Assessment of Adult Literacy.

.......

Seven million adults, defined as those over age 16, spoke very little English. Four million others spoke no English at all. A majority of these 11 million were Spanish speakers, though more precise numbers weren't available.

"Eleven million people is an awful large number of folks who are ... consigned to low-paying jobs and significant periods of unemployment," said Grover Whitehurst, director of the Institute of Education Sciences, an arm of the Education Department.



http://www.montgomeryadvertiser.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20051216/NEWS/512160323/1001

Hard to tell from this report if literacy is increasing or declining overall. Interestingly, the press release put out by the organization publishing the study seems to cast the matter in a neutral to positive light:

"American adults can read a newspaper or magazine about as well as they could a decade ago, but have made significant strides in performing literacy tasks that involve computation, according to the first national study of adult literacy since 1992.

The National Assessment of Adult Literacy (NAAL), released today by the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES), found little change between 1992 and 2003 in adults' ability to read and understand sentences and paragraphs or to understand documents such as job applications."
http://www.ed.gov/news/pressreleases/2005/12/12152005.html

...according to last night's news.

That invalidates the hoo-ha as far as I'm concerned, because someone educated in another language already knows how to read, they just need to learn to read in English. They are not equivalent to true illiterates, those born in this country or elsewhere who cannot read or write competently at all. Yes, we have a lot of American illiterates, and for that our education system should be embarrassed, but it's a different category of problem.

Hekate

are probably all Faux new watchers. It's those people that this madministration counts on to vote for them--they can count on these people not being able to understand politics, but who are likely emotional voters. When the pukes start many of their campaigns, they use that emotionality to fuel these people for votes. For those of us who are emotional voters but who are literate, we vote based on research, knowledge and our ability to get facts separated from rumors.

or should that be"Send in the clowns"?

of US adults do not have the literacy skills to read a complex novel. Many do not have an effective vocabulary to speak of. The americans I meet are remarkably lacking in common sense and I live in a university town.

It's stupid out there folks.

ironic.

also dropped.