<div dir="ltr"><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;line-height:normal;font-size:11pt;font-family:Calibri,"sans-serif""><span style="font-size:12pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif"">09/01/2023</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;line-height:normal;font-size:11pt;font-family:Calibri,"sans-serif""><span style="font-size:12pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif""> </span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;line-height:normal;font-size:11pt;font-family:Calibri,"sans-serif""><span style="font-size:12pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif"">September Highlights for Adult
Education and Family Literacy</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;line-height:normal;font-size:11pt;font-family:Calibri,"sans-serif""><span style="font-size:12pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif""> </span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;line-height:normal;font-size:11pt;font-family:Calibri,"sans-serif""><span style="font-size:12pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif"">Tom Sticht, International
Consultant in Adult Education (Ret.)</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;line-height:normal;font-size:11pt;font-family:Calibri,"sans-serif""><span style="font-size:12pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif""> </span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;line-height:normal;font-size:11pt;font-family:Calibri,"sans-serif""><span style="font-size:12pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif"">The month of September offers two
special days and one special week for celebrating adult literacy educators and
learners in the United States and around the world. </span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;line-height:normal;font-size:11pt;font-family:Calibri,"sans-serif""><u><span style="font-size:12pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif""><span style="text-decoration-line:none"> </span></span></u></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;line-height:normal;font-size:11pt;font-family:Calibri,"sans-serif""><u><span style="font-size:12pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif""><b>September 4
Labor Day:</b></span></u><span style="font-size:12pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif""> On Labor Day we celebrate the workers of our
Nation and thank them for providing the abounding plenty enriching the lives of
the large majority of adults and children living in the United States of
America. We also recommit ourselves to helping those who are not sharing in
this plenty, as was done some six decades ago when President Lyndon Johnson
initiated a national “war on poverty”. </span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;line-height:normal;font-size:11pt;font-family:Calibri,"sans-serif""><span style="font-size:12pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif""> </span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;line-height:normal;font-size:11pt;font-family:Calibri,"sans-serif""><span style="font-size:12pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif"">A decade later I wrote about
reading and career education in military and civilian job contexts and discussed skirmishes in the “war on
poverty” aimed at helping low literate adults qualify for work in both of these
functional contexts (Sticht, 1975). This work helped stimulate the passage of
the National Workplace Literacy Program (NWLP) by the U.S. Congress (Rosen,
2008). The NWLP was later discontinued but workplace literacy and career
education programs have continued to operate. Later, Rosen (2017) served as
Program Management Moderator for a webinar on creating career pathways for
Adult Basic Education and English Language Learners featuring examples of
integrated education and training workforce programs. </span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;line-height:normal;font-size:11pt;font-family:Calibri,"sans-serif""><span style="font-size:12pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif""> </span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;line-height:normal;font-size:11pt;font-family:Calibri,"sans-serif""><span style="font-size:12pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif"">Interestingly, in 1990 I chaired
the California Workforce Literacy Task Force established by the State
Legislature that called for greater investments in workforce literacy
education. Now, over three decades later, California’s Employment & Training Program (2023) is
funding educators to create or expand workplace literacy training in the State.
Hopefully this will enable many more citizens to celebrate Labor Day with
better education, income, and civic engagement. </span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;line-height:normal;font-size:11pt;font-family:Calibri,"sans-serif""><span style="font-size:12pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif""> </span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height:normal;margin:0in 0in 10pt;font-size:11pt;font-family:Calibri,"sans-serif""><u><span style="font-size:12pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif""><b>September 8 International Literacy Day</b>.</span></u><span style="font-size:12pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif""> </span><span style="font-size:12pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif";color:black">From 1979 through 2003 I served on UNESCO’s
International Literacy Prize Jury. </span><span style="font-size:12pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif";color:black">Upon my retirement from the
Jury in 2003 </span><span style="font-size:12pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif"">Mr.
Koichiro Matsuura, then Director General of UNESCO, <span style="color:black">noted
that I had “…consistently… maintained that the literacy prizes should focus
upon adult literacy education.”</span></span><span style="font-size:12pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif";color:black"></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height:normal;margin:0in 0in 10pt;font-size:11pt;font-family:Calibri,"sans-serif""><span style="font-size:12pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif";color:black">However, nowadays the
literacy prizes may be awarded for educational programs for children,
adolescents, or adults. </span>UNESCO
(2023) reports that <span style="font-size:12pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif"">in
2020, at least one out of seven youth and adults aged 15 years and over
worldwide (763 million) lacked basic literacy and numeracy skills. In addition,
a significant number of children, including those who are enrolled in school,
are not acquiring basic literacy and numeracy skills, while 244 million
children and young people between the ages of 6 and 18 are not enrolled in
school.</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height:normal;margin:0in 0in 10pt;font-size:11pt;font-family:Calibri,"sans-serif""><span style="font-size:12pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif"">Given the tough financial times of
nations around the world and the massive needs of literacy education to boost
economic and social development of nations, I still think that greater
investments in adult literacy education offer a cost-beneficial way to boost
the educational achievements of both adults and their children. As I noted over
a decade ago (Sticht, 2011), “Educating those who are, or about to become ,
parents offers the possibility of obtaining payoffs for future generations even
before conception occurs. And, if we focus our limited resources on reaching
first-time parents, then one “dose” of parenting education could also benefit
succeeding children”. International Literacy Day 2023 will
focus on <span style="color:rgb(32,32,32)">‘Promoting
literacy for a world in transition: Building the foundation for sustainable and
peaceful societies’. I add: Invest in the education of adults to improve
the educability of their children.</span></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height:normal;margin:0in 0in 10pt;font-size:11pt;font-family:Calibri,"sans-serif""><u><span style="font-size:12pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif""><b>September18 to 23 Adult Education and
Family Literacy Week (AEFL</b></span></u><span style="font-size:12pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif""><b>)</b>: A focal idea for this week is family literacy and
the intergenerational transfer of cognitive skills from parents to their
children. Almost 50 years ago, in a book on Reading for Working, I presented
data showing that as education levels of parents increased so did the literacy
skills of their adult children (Sticht, 1975). Thirteen years later, in
1988, I convened a national conference
in San Diego, California on The Intergenerational Transfer of Cognitive Skills wherein
family literacy programs were described
in which the education of both parents and their children in literacy
and other abilities took place (Beeler, 1992). It was also reported that the
federal government would soon be providing funds for a family literacy oriented
program called Even Start. </span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height:normal;margin:0in 0in 10pt;font-size:11pt;font-family:Calibri,"sans-serif""><span style="font-size:12pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif""> <i>National Follow On</i>-The Even Start
program championed by Congressman William Goodling provided funds for family
literacy programs from 1988 through 2011 (Clymer, et al., 2017). However, post-2011 many states and foundations kept family
literacy programs funded and upon Rep. Goodling’s retirement the Congress
honored him by establishing the Goodling Institute for Research in Family
Literacy at Pennsylvania State University. Clymer, et al., (2017) present a
comprehensive report on the status of family literacy programs. A 2021
infographic with additional information about the national status of family
literacy programs in the United States is available on the Goodling Institute
web site. </span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height:normal;margin:0in 0in 10pt;font-size:11pt;font-family:Calibri,"sans-serif""><span style="font-size:12pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif""> <i>International Follow On-</i>Four years
following the 1988 Conference on the Intergenerational Transfer of Cognitive
Skills, working in 1993 as a member of UNESCO’s International Literacy Prize
Jury at UNESCO Headquarters in Paris, I proposed that UNESCO’s forthcoming
International Year of the Family 1994 be celebrated in part by the convening of
a World Symposium on Family Literacy. This idea was accepted and UNESCO
convened the Symposium in Paris on <span style="color:rgb(51,51,51);background-image:initial;background-position:initial;background-size:initial;background-repeat:initial;background-origin:initial;background-clip:initial">3-5 October 1994. </span></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height:normal;margin:0in 0in 10pt;font-size:11pt;font-family:Calibri,"sans-serif""><span style="font-size:12pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif";color:rgb(51,51,51);background-image:initial;background-position:initial;background-size:initial;background-repeat:initial;background-origin:initial;background-clip:initial">The 1994 World Symposium was followed-up by UNESCO
and numerous member states and some two
decades later the UNESCO Institute for Lifelong Learning
produced a report on “</span><span class="gmail-A0" style="font-family:"Grundfos TheSans OT 4SL","sans-serif";color:black"><span style="font-size:12pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif"">Learning Families – Intergenerational
Approaches to Literacy Teaching and Learning” (Hanemann, 2015). A sample of more than two dozen programs from
six different regions of the world illustrate the widespread flourishing of
intergenerational skills programs since the San Diego conference of 1988. </span></span><span style="font-size:12pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif";color:black"></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;line-height:normal;font-size:11pt;font-family:Calibri,"sans-serif""><span style="font-size:12pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif"">References</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;line-height:normal;font-size:11pt;font-family:Calibri,"sans-serif""><span style="font-size:12pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif""> </span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height:normal;margin:0in 0in 10pt;font-size:11pt;font-family:Calibri,"sans-serif""><span style="font-size:12pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif"">Beeler, M. (1992). Introduction to Part
II: Intergenerational Intervention Programs. In: Sticht,T., The Beeler, M.,
& McDonald, B. (Eds.). The Intergenerational Transfer of Cognitive Skills:
Volume I: Programs, Policy, and Research Issues. Norwood, NJ: Ablex
Publishing.Corporation. </span></p>
<p class="gmail-Default" style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif";color:black">Clymer, C., Toso, B., Grinder, E., & Sauder, R. (2017). Changing the Course of Family Literacy. </p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height:normal;margin:0in 0in 10pt;font-size:11pt;font-family:Calibri,"sans-serif""><span style="font-size:12pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif"">Policy Paper. Online at:
<a href="https://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/ED574448.pdf">https://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/ED574448.pdf</a></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height:normal;margin:0in 0in 10pt;font-size:11pt;font-family:Calibri,"sans-serif""><span style="font-size:12pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif"">Employment & Training Program.
(2023). Workplace Literacy Program. Online at: </span><a href="https://etp.ca.gov/wp-content/uploads/sites/70/2022/10/ETP_WorkforceLiteracyPilotProgram-Guidelines.pdf" style="color:blue"><span style="font-size:12pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif"">https://etp.ca.gov/wp-content/uploads/sites/70/2022/10/ETP_WorkforceLiteracyPilotProgram-Guidelines.pdf</span></a><span style="font-size:12pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif""></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin:0in 0in 7.5pt;line-height:normal;font-size:11pt;font-family:Calibri,"sans-serif""><span style="font-size:12pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif";color:rgb(51,51,51)">Hanemann, U. (2015).
Learning Families: Intergenerational Approaches to Literacy Teaching and
Learning. Online at: </span><span class="gmail-MsoHyperlink" style="color:blue;text-decoration-line:underline"><a href="https://uil.unesco.org/literacy/learning-families/learning-families-intergenerational-approaches-literacy-teaching-and">https://uil.unesco.org/literacy/learning-families/learning-families-intergenerational-approaches-literacy-teaching-and</a></span><span class="gmail-MsoHyperlink" style="color:blue;text-decoration-line:underline"><span style="color:rgb(51,51,51)"></span></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin:0in 0in 10pt;line-height:115%;font-size:11pt;font-family:Calibri,"sans-serif""><span style="font-size:12pt;line-height:115%;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif"">Rosen, D. (2008). International Workforce Literacy Review
› United States A report prepared for the Department of Labour. Online at: </span><a href="https://thehub.swa.govt.nz/assets/documents/International%20Workforce%20Literacy%20Review,%20United%20States.pdf" style="color:blue"><span style="font-size:12pt;line-height:115%;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif"">https://thehub.swa.govt.nz/assets/documents/International%20Workforce%20Literacy%20Review,%20United%20States.pdf</span></a></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height:normal;margin:0in 0in 10pt;font-size:11pt;font-family:Calibri,"sans-serif""><span style="font-size:12pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif"">Rosen, D. (2017). Webinar: From Policy
to Practice: Designing Career Pathways for ABE/ESL Online at: <u><a href="https://community.lincs.ed.gov/sites/default/files/9.11_ABE%2BESL_CP%20%284%29%20%281%29%20508%20%288%29_0.pdf">https://community.lincs.ed.gov/sites/default/files/9.11_ABE%2BESL_CP%20%284%29%20%281%29%20508%20%288%29_0.pdf</a></u></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height:normal;margin:0in 0in 10pt;font-size:11pt;font-family:Calibri,"sans-serif""><span style="font-size:12pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif";color:black">Sticht, T. (2011). Getting
it Right from the Start: The Case for Early Parenthood Education. Online at: </span><a href="https://www.aft.org/sites/default/files/Sticht.pdf" style="color:blue"><span style="font-size:12pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif"">https://www.aft.org/sites/default/files/Sticht.pdf</span></a><span style="font-size:12pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif";color:black"></span></p>
<div style="border-top:none;border-right:none;border-left:none;border-bottom:1.5pt solid windowtext;padding:0in">
<p class="MsoNormal" style="border:none;padding:0in;margin:0in 0in 10pt;line-height:115%;font-size:11pt;font-family:Calibri,"sans-serif""><span style="font-size:12pt;line-height:115%;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif"">Sticht, T. (1975).
Reading For Working: A Functional Literacy Anthology. Online at: </span><a href="https://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/ED102532.pdf" style="color:blue"><span style="font-size:12pt;line-height:115%;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif"">https://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/ED102532.pdf</span></a><span style="font-size:12pt;line-height:115%;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif""></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="border:none;padding:0in;margin:0in 0in 10pt;line-height:115%;font-size:11pt;font-family:Calibri,"sans-serif"">UNESCO (2023) Concept Note for
International Literacy Day 2023. Online at: <a href="https://www.unesco.org/sites/default/files/medias/fichiers/2023/08/ild-2023-cn-en.pdf" style="color:blue">https://www.unesco.org/sites/default/files/medias/fichiers/2023/08/ild-2023-cn-en.pdf</a><span class="gmail-MsoHyperlink" style="color:blue;text-decoration-line:underline"></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="border:none;padding:0in;margin:0in 0in 10pt;line-height:115%;font-size:11pt;font-family:Calibri,"sans-serif""><span class="gmail-MsoHyperlink" style="color:blue;text-decoration-line:underline"><span style="text-decoration-line:none"> </span></span></p>
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