October 29, 2008

We Need to Revive the National Workplace Literacy Program to Improve
the Economic Competitiveness of Our Present and Future Workforce

Tom Sticht
International Consultant in Adult Education

Millions of adults with the lowest literacy skills are found in workplaces.
The National Assessment of Adult Literacy (NAAL) of 2003 indicated that 29
percent of adults who scored below basic on the prose scale on the National
Adult Literacy Survey (NALS) of 1993 were employed full-time. In 2003 the
percentage of adults with below basic prose literacy scores who were
employed full-time rose to 35 percent, a statistically significant increase
in full-time employed adults with literacy skills at the lowest level. This
means that some 10.8 million adults with the lowest level of literacy
skills can be found working full-time in workplaces in the United States. 
An additional 10 percent of adults, over 3 million,  in the lowest level of
literacy in 2003 were working part-time. This was a two percentage point
increase from 1993.

The fact that the percentage of low literacy adults in the workplaces of the
United States increased in the decade from 1993 to 2003, resulting in over
13 million adults with below basic levels of literacy, suggests a need to
revive the federal government’s National Workplace Literacy Program (NWLP)
of the late 1980s through the mid-1990s.  The NWLP provided grants for
developing and delivering adult literacy, numeracy, and English language
education programs directly in or in close proximity to the places where
low literacy adults work.

Research from before the NWLP, during the NWLP, and up to the present has
indicated that workplace literacy program generally produce outcomes that
are especially important during hard economic times. First, employers are
more likely to implement workplace programs that focus directly on
improving some aspect(s) of the functions that the employer must perform,
such as recruiting from a larger pool of available workers, making job
training more effective, increasing productivity, decreasing waste, sick
leaves, and providing opportunities to promote good workers to higher
levels of responsibility.

Second, employees are more likely to value education that will directly help
them enter into a specific line of work, or to increase their chances of
keeping a job, or making more money, or making them more generally
employable in the world of work.

Third, a number of workplace literacy programs have indicated that even
though the program was focused directly on their jobs, employees often
reported other important outcomes beyond improved work performance,
including things like improved confidence outside the workplace in the
community, continuation of education outside the workplace program, and
improvements in their educational activities with their children or
grandchildren (e.g., reading more with them; helping them with their
homework).

These “multiplier effects” of even brief workplace literacy programs provide
returns on investment beyond improved working ability. They provide for what
I call “double duty dollars” meaning that a dollar spent on adult basic
education may also provide increases in parenting, grand-parenting, health
care, and social behaviors in the community. Many dollars are often spent
in special programs to get these various outcomes, only here one gets these
outcomes for free--as a “spin-off” from the dollar spent on adult basic
education.

Adult educators are sometimes leery of workplace literacy programs that
focus on improving job-related literacy because they think that this
results in just a narrow band of improved literacy. But a number of
research projects from before, during, and after the NWLP have now
indicated that work-focused literacy or English language programs can
produce not just gains in job-related literacy, but also general literacy
as measured by standardized tests such as the Tests of Adult Basic
Education (TABE) or Adult Basic Learning Exam (ABLE).

Other research on literacy for job training indicates that the more focused
literacy or English language programs are on a specific occupational field,
the more likely the program is to retain students to completion and result
in the achievement of a job qualification certificate and a job. General
workforce employability programs do not achieve these types of outcomes to
the extent as more specifically focused programs.

When asked why he robbed banks, Willie Sutton reportedly replied, “Because
that is where the money is.” That is why we need to revive the National
Workplace Literacy Program, because that is where some 13 million adults
with the lowest literacy skills are. If we invest in the education of
working adults, we can increase the competitiveness of America’s workforce,
while in many cases improving the educability of America’s children, the
workforce of the future. In hard economic times, we need to get “double
duty dollars” from our investments in adult education.

Thomas G. Sticht
International Consultant in Adult Education
2062 Valley View Blvd.
El Cajon, CA 92019-2059
Tel/fax: (619) 444-9133
Email: tsticht at aznet.net