Adult literacy and basic education programs

The purpose of our paper is to focus on two multicultural literacy programs that we have developed in different sites in a major Canadian urban centre. We compare an inner city elementary school and a provincial correctional facility (jail) in order to study two respective literacy programs, as grounded in the experience of marginalized populations, with a view to promoting the transformative reconstruction of the meaning of education for individuals. In this discussion we provide a context for understanding these two educational sites; for examining the pedagogical dimensions of them; and for sharing portraits of our participants both in custody and in the classroom; and, finally, for exploring the interactive, collaborative approach undertaken in our respective programs and in our research together. Through this research inquiry, we, like our participants, have experienced the value of sharing and writing stories about schooling and life experiences from an immigrant/refugee perspective. We have attempted to illustrate how researchers and their participants can collaborate to create alternatives for encouraging self-expression and discovery in education. Our vision of education is that more attention needs to be given to marginalized individuals and populations in the context of curricular innovations that both enhance and promote literacy development and personal self-esteem. Culturally sensitive literacy programs can have the potential to transform students, teachers, and researchers to become writers of their own educational stories and, moreover, authors of their own lives.

Globally and across the African continent, the past decade has seen an increase in the commitment to reducing adult illiteracy, inspired among other things by the Education for All (EFA) drive to halve the incidence of illiteracy among adults and youth by 2015. While literacy campaigns were less common during the 1990s, the last decade saw a new impetus for mass adult literacy campaigns as a way of improving national literacy levels. This paper examines the South African endeavour to meet its EFA target through the implementation of the South African Kha Ri Gude Mass Literacy Campaign, which was launched by the South African government in 2008 with the aim of enliterating 4,7 million adults who had little or no education as a result of the apartheid legacy. The Campaign was deemed successful receiving a number of South African awards for best practice and its work in rural and impoverished communities including the international UNESCO Confucius Prize for Literacy (UNESCO 2016). This article focuses on how the campaign utilised action-oriented processes, specifically the methods of participatory action research (PAR), to enhance the achievement of its goals. The methods of PAR were embedded in the campaign structure, comprising clusters of communities of practice (COPs) which provided fora for educators to voice and address challenges. Moreover, since the Campaign was implemented in post-apartheid South Africa, the article shows how the Campaign operations were guided by the ethos of ubuntu as necessary for redress and empowerment.

This study examined how poverty and residential mobility influence low-income adults' persistence in family literacy programs in Pennsylvania. Twelve out of 20 program directors reported that learners typically moved at least once a year. In five of these high-mobility programs moving was reported to significantly hinder persistence. Geographic location and the availability of inexpensive and subsidized housing increased mobility. The 17 learners we interviewed moved 78 times in the previous five years, for an average of once per year. One-half of the moves were within 15 miles, yet even short distance moves often delayed progress and disrupted program participation. Although residential mobility did not hinder persistence in all programs, it is part of a constellation of poverty-related problems (e.g., poor health, lack of child care and transportation) that pose challenges for learners to attend classes regularly and meet their educational goals.

We statistically examined 295 low-literacy adults' oral reading fluency measured by total word and word error rates with connected prose. Based on four fluency ability groupings in relation to standardized assessments of reading-related skills (e.g., phonemic awareness, word recognition, vocabulary, comprehension, and general ability) the results suggest that adults that read at comparable correct word rates vary significantly in the number of total words and word errors. These differences were independent of assessed general ability level. Total word and word error rates, thus, offer a picture of learner reading ability that can help instructors emphasize instruction in deficit reading components.

The purpose of this study was to develop and pilot a questionnaire that would (a) provide teachers and administrators of adult ESL ptograms with important information about their students and (b) enable large-scale data collection among these students for program-planning and research purposes. Tbe questionnaire focuses on these students' goals, beliefs, and définirions of success related to learning English, as well as theit patterns of actual EngÜsb use. The instrument was developed based on interviews with 14 adult ESL students from diverse backgrounds enrolled in community and workplace ESL programs. It was then piloted with 37 learners.

Previous research has estimated the potential social and economic benefits of increased educational attainment and skills. There is little rigorous research, however, showing that participation in adult basic skills (ABS) programs directly impacts the skill levels, educational attainment, or social and economic well-being of adults with low levels of education. Most research on adult literacy development looks only at short-term changes as students pass through single ABS programs. Research is needed that compares adult literacy development among program participants and nonparticipants across multiple contexts and over significant periods of time to provide a life-wide and lifelong perspective on adult literacy development and a better assessment of program impact on a range of outcome measures.

The Longitudinal Study of Adult Learning (LSAL) is one such lifelong and life-wide study. LSAL randomly sampled about 1,000 high school dropouts and followed them for nearly a decade from 1998–2007. LSAL followed both participants and nonparticipants in adult literacy programs, assessing their literacy skills and uses over long periods of time, along with changes in their social, educational, and economic status, offering a rich picture of adult literacy development.

This paper analyzes LSAL data to examine the impact of ABS participation on attainment of a high school equivalency diploma, the GED. The central finding is a robust impact of ABS program participation on GED attainment. GED attainment rates were elevated by 0.20 to 0.32 by ABS program participation, depending on the population modeled. Although individuals used a variety of methods for GED preparation, including ABS program participation, GED attainment rates for all groups appear to have been elevated substantially by program participation.

It had been observed that new technologies are of growing importance and in many facets of everyday lives and livelihoods around the world. These information and communications technologies (ICTs), especially mobile devices, have special benefits for learning, both in and out of schools. The larger percentage of adults in Nigeria use smartphones which, by observation, outsmarts and outnumbers sets of television available in the country. The study 64 reported in this paper sheds light on the attitude, challenges and lesson learnt using mobile technology for learners in adult literacy programmes. The study adopted a quasi-experiment method where Twenty (20) participants were purposively selected in advanced literacy class. The learning model was designed around the context of curriculum being offered by learners. The challenges of ambiguity of mobile technology are the major constraints and the cost of data for learners. The feeling of being too old to use mobile technology to learn makes adults to see it as a sheer waste of time. The study recommended that the government should provide infrastructures specifically in the area of technology for proper integration in adult literacy programme and the provider should sensitize the learning community regarding the benefits of technology for integration.

The non-literate adult citizens in Nigeria are often faced with the inability to apply mental intelligence in their lifestyles which is reducing their worth and relevance in the 21 st century literate society. The study therefore, seeks to equip adult learners with basic literacy skills for cognitive sustainability in Lagos state, Nigeria. Four research questions were raised and answered; and four hypotheses were tested to guide the study. The study adopted descriptive survey research design. The instruments adopted for the study were Key Informant Interview (KII) and a Questionnaire. A 20-item questionnaire titled "Adult Learners' Basic Literacy Skills Questionnaire", (ALBLSQ) was developed by the researchers. The instrument was validated using content and face validity according to the standard approved by the National Mass Education Commission in Nigeria, and the State Agency for Mass Education in Lagos state, Nigeria (NMEC/NOGALSS). A total of one hundred and eighty (180) questionnaires were administered purposively to adult learners across the six NMEC/NOGALSS literacy centers in Lagos state, and one hundred and forty-five (145) were retrieved. The reliability of the instrument was confirmed using a test retest procedure, which gave a correlation coefficient of 0.87. The data was presented using frequency distribution tables, percentages and Bar Charts. The data was analyzed using Spearman Rank Order Correlation Coefficient and T-test statistical tools to test the hypotheses at 0.05 significance level. The study revealed that a significant difference exists between the performance of adult learners before intervention and the performance of adult learners after intervention of the adult basic literacy programme amongst others. The study concluded and recommended that the curriculum of the adult basic literacy should be designed to have a combination of English and mother tongue language as medium of instruction in order to aid cognitive development among adult learners, inter alia.

For several decades now, the problem of empowering the Nigerian youths for self-reliance to checkmate unemployment has been a great concern to the nation. The poverty level and the inability of most parents to sponsor their wards in school have greatly contributed to youths drop out of school. Many of such youths are used as ad-hoc workers. In order to supplement and assist their parents’ efforts, some joined peers who were thugs, hawkers and sometimes criminals who pick pockets, and commit other crimes. Youths have also become tools in the hands of politicians for purposes of political campaigns and perpetration of heinous vices.

This study intended to evaluate the service of Information Literacy Programs (ILP) as provided by the Riphah International University. Information literacy is an effective way to improve the interest of students towards the better use of library resources and services. The objectives of this research project were to determine, the methods being used, allotted time length, the frequency and students' perceptions about ILPs. The study depicted that, lecture, individual help and workshop/seminars methods were being used to educate students. Literacy classes are being arranged on a monthly basis with one hour time length. The participants opined they recommend literacy classes for their friends because ILPs improved searching as well as skills to use library's digital and other resources.

In the changing environment of the 21st century, universities should develop very innovative ecosystems by doing right investments on human capital, research and development, buildings, laboratories, dorms, and other facilities on the campus while decreasing their costs and expenses in order to increase scientific and technological oriented innovations and outputs. For that reason, most of them are looking toward Big Data Management (BDM), which is a very new and dynamic subject to conduct properly and to make right decisions at the universities.Data analytics and data mining have increased and attracted the attention of most of the leaders, managers, administrators, researchers, and even educators who try to make massive data-related investments and decisions. More importantly, since the funding of higher education has become important issues for most of the governments and higher education management, the importance of BDM will increase in higher education much more than ever before. However, not all the universities are so successful in managing their small or medium-sized data.In this research, how universities are investing by improving their data was analyzed in three different universities in Istanbul.More strategically, how data analytics and mining can make changes and transformation higher education institutions by investing right resources under the promise of Big Data Management was critically studied. In this study, the impacts of big data mining and management on higher education institutions’ sustainable funding, financing, planning, success, research and development, and innovation were critically studied. By taking into account the perceptions and the experiences of the experienced experts (6), faculty members (12), managers (4), and technical people (12), who were charged in using data analytics and mining at two state and one private universities, the investment of the universities had analyzed in order to understand critically the effects of the BDM. In the study, the phenomenological analysis was used by asking thirty-one research questions in the semi-structured interviews. While taking into account the observations of the researchers, the collected data of this study were systematically studied in data analysis software-program NVivo 10. The results showed that a few number of the investments had correctly done by using data mining and data analysis. As the participants had mentioned that the data would not have done anything if the higher education management had not taken into account and applied.So, according to the participants (75%), the university management understanding and policies should be changed in order to take in consideration the results of the big data.Even though a great amount of data had produced through the systems of the universities, the analysis, the segmentation, and the selected attention of the data had become dependent on the higher education management.The participants (28%), who were active in planning, funding, and investing, agreed that the investments done according to the results of the big data had better educational, financial, socio-economic, cultural, technological,environmental, and even individual benefits and outcomes. In conclusion, although a little data mining and analysis has properly used in making right investments, the universities are highly convinced on the positive effects of the BDM in their short-term and long-term investments in order to increase their impacts.