There is considerable evidence from surveys in Canada, Israel and elsewhere
that literacy in the local language, more even than years of schooling, is
the best predictor of economic success in a society.

If total adult-ed enrollment in the US is 2.5 million, and ESL enrollment is
1.1 million, this is a small percentage of the adults who need to improve
their literacy skills. If we just look at the immigrant population of the
US, of roughly 38 million people,  31 %  did not complete high school. In my
experience here in Canada, a significant percentage of immigrants with
university degrees are also functionally illiterate in English. It is safe
to assume that the rate of functional illiteracy amongst immigrants is
higher than the national average in the US, which is reported to be over
40%. So maybe 15 to 20 million immigrants in the US need to improve their
English literacy.

The CAL survey only covers people up to level 6 on the SPL scale. It is fair
to assume that many children of  these immigrants, even of the "advanced"
learners would suffer "word poverty" entering school and have difficulty
catching up. Thus the problems are perpetuated.

While it is essential to help the lowest level learners, it should also be
considered important to raise the literacy level of all immigrants, both to
improve their own professional opportunities, and, perhaps even more
important, for the influence this will have on their off-spring.

I believe that the classroom can only be one part, and perhaps only a small
part, of a larger literacy effort, if any significant change is going to be
achieved.

In my view we need to simplify the measurement of literacy so that learners
can understand what the goals are, work on their own, and measure their
progress.

In my view the simplest measure of literacy is the number of words known.
This can be easily measured on cloze tests with a high "pass/fail"
threshold, based on content that has been read (and listened to) by the
learner, and which contain words that the learner claims to know.



Steve Kaufmann
www.thelinguist.com
604-922-8514
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