• Community & Human Services
• Literacy Services & Agencies
• Citizenship, Immigration & Refugee Resources
• Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual & Transgender
• Local History
• Things to See & Do
• Living in Southern Arizona
• Green Living
• Volunteering
• Regional Planning

Learn More About Literacy

Online Resources

Thinkfinity

A powerful educational platform created through the merger of two highly-acclaimed programs - Verizon Literacy Network and Verizon MarcoPolo. In addition to the more than 55,000 standards- and research-based educational resources and comprehensive professional development for K-12 teachers, literacy instructors and volunteers, Thinkfinity offers the literacy community: online courses; best practices; appropriate measurement tools; activities and instruction for English language learners and ESL instructors; model programs; how-to instruction on program development, volunteer recruiting and community engagement; searchable databases of hundreds of literacy organizations in need of volunteers; studies, research and statistics highlighting the importance of literacy development across the life span.

Washington Learning Systems

Free reproducible language and early literacy activities in English and Spanish. To download materials, click on the purple button that says "Free Parent Education Handouts." These materials include forty-six home and community activities for adults and preschool children that encourage early language and literacy development in young children. They are appropriate for children with disabilities as well as children who are developing typically.

Wish You Well Foundation

The Wish You Well Foundation mission: Supporting family literacy in the United States by fostering and promoting the development and expansion of new and existing literacy and educational programs.

Articles and Reports

Assessing the Nation's Health Literacy: Key Concepts and Findings of the National Assessment of Adult Literacy (NAAL) (PDF)

Describes the outcomes of the federal study, NAAL, and how its implications affect the health care of patients with limited health literacy.

Early Childhood Development: Economic Development with a High Public Return

PowerPoint of a presentation in PDF format given by Rob Grunewald from the Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis. Includes statistics.

Educational Testing Service's (ETS) America's Perfect Storm Report

Three powerful forces -inadequate literacy skills among large segments of the population, the continuing evolution of the economy and the nation's job structure, and an ongoing shift in the demographic profile of the nation, powered by the highest immigration rates in almost a century - are creating a "perfect storm" that could have dire consequences for our nation, according to a report ETS released on February 5,2007 in a National Press Club Newsmaker press conference in Washington, D.C.

ExpectMore.gov

The US Office of Management and Budget (OMB) has released its Program Assessment Rating Tool (PART) report evaluating the effectiveness of adult education and literacy efforts funded under the Workforce Investment Act. View the full report.

The Geography of Immigrant Skills: Educational Profiles of Metropolitan Areas

Immigrants are now one-in-seven U.S. residents and almost one-in-six workers. They are a significant presence in various sectors of the economy such as construction and hospitality on the low-skill end, and information technology and health care on the high-skill end. While border enforcement and illegal immigration are a focal point, longer-term U.S. global competitiveness rests on the ability of immigrants and their children to thrive economically and to contribute to the nation's productivity.

Indirect County and State Estimates of the Percentage of Adults at the Lowest Literacy Level for 1992 and 2003

Provides estimates on the percentage of adults who lack basic prose literacy skills, for all states and counties in the U.S. An interactive web tool also allows you to compare between two states, two counties in the same state, two counties in different states, across years for a state, and across years for a county.

Literacy Behind Bars: Results from the 2003 National Assessment of Adult Literacy Prison Survey

This new report, based on the 2003 National Assessment of Adult Literacy survey data, about the literacy skills of incarcerated adults in the US, was released by The National Center for Education Statistics. The report focuses on the English literacy skills of incarcerated adults between 1992 and 2003. It compares the literacy of adults in the prison and household populations and across groups of prison inmates with different characteristics, including race/ethnicity, gender, educational attainment, age, language spoken before starting school, and parents' educational attainment. Major findings indicate that the average Prose, Document, and Quantitative literacy scores of the prison population were higher in 2003 than in 1992. Incarcerated White adults had lower average prose literacy than White adults living in households. In addition, incarcerated Black and Hispanic adults had higher average prose literacy than Black and Hispanic adults living in households. In 2003, 37 percent of the prison population did not have a high school diploma or a GED, compared with 49 percent in 1992.

Literacy in Everyday Life: Results from the 2003 National Assessment of Adult Literacy

This report presents findings from a 2003 literacy assessment. "It examines changes in literacy levels for the total adult population of the United States, as well as for adults with different demographic characteristics (gender, race, age, and ethnicity). Changes in literacy levels are reported for 2003 as well as between 1992 and 2003. In addition, the report describes how American adults age 16 and older at varying literacy levels use written information in their everyday lives. Specifically, this report describes the relationship between literacy and a number of self-reported background characteristics including education, employment, earnings, job training, family literacy practices, civics activities, and computer usage."

Looking Through a Wider Lens: 2007 Education Week's Annual Quality Counts Report

Quality Counts 2007 begins to track state efforts to create seamless education systems from early childhood to the world of work. For the past decade, Education Week's annual Quality Counts report has tracked state policies for improving K-12 education. But children's chances for success don't just rest on what happens from kindergarten through high school. They are also shaped by experiences during the preschool years and opportunities for continued education and training beyond high school. View a more detailed report for the state of Arizona (PDF).

The Next Chapter: A School Board Guide to Improving Adolescent Literacy (PDF)

A 2006 report from the National School Boards Association (NSBA). This report "gives school board leaders a set of research-based strategies that will allow them to work effectively with schools and communities to raise the literacy level of all students."

Return to top