ROANOKE TIMES 

                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: WEDNESDAY, September 15, 1993                   TAG: 9403090175
SECTION: EDITORIAL                    PAGE: A8   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: 
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Medium

ADULT LITERACY

ILLITERACY n. the state or quality of being illiterate; lack of education or culture; esp. not knowing how to read or write. Webster's New World Dictionary, Second College Edition.

In case you didn't read the news story in this newspaper last Thursday, but heard it mentioned on a talk show or around the water cooler, we've not yet become a hopelessly illiterate nation. But we are in sorry shape.

There's a shocking number of adults in this country who can't read or write, plus thousands more who are functionally illiterate, usually meaning they can't read as well as an average fourth-grader.

The findings of the congressionally ordered "Adult Literacy in America" study don't say that millions upon millions of us are illiterate under Webster's definition. They do say, however, that nearly half of adult Americans cannot read or write well enough to proficiently perform many skills required in the workplace and in society.

Millions of adults cannot write a brief letter explaining an error on a credit-card bill. Or figure out a bus schedule. Or use a calculator to determine the difference between a sales price and a regular price on a piece of merchandise.

Shall we blame public schools? Why not? We blame them for most everything else. And, indeed, the report echoes a roar of complaints from employers that the schools are turning out many students who are unhirable or need remedial education.

Interestingly, the Census Bureau's tracking of illiteracy assumes that anyone who has a high-school diploma is literate. But the new adult-literacy study finds that more than half of all high-school graduates have restricted abilities in reading and math. This data seem to be supported by the experience of Literacy Volunteers of America of Roanoke Valley; more than half of those it serves are high-school graduates.

But the schools can't take all the blame. It's at home that people have stopped reading, at home where they allow their kids to watch hour after hour of mindless television. This, in a society where you can no longer hope to get a well-paying assembly-line job by knowing how to write your name.

Not only can many people not read. Many others choose not to. Newspaper jobs aren't the only ones threatened. 


 by CNB