PRESIDENT'S MESSAGE

AACE is concluding another successful year, meeting its mandate within its financial targets. The energy and dedication of those who have accepted the challenge of leading our organization into the new year speaks well for the whole AACE membership and for the future that it continues to have as THE adult educators' professional association in Alberta (and beyond - as we have quite a few members who live outside of this province).

The Board continues to work toward AACE's goals of broadening its network by inviting 'sibling' organizations to become affiliate members and joining/initiating cooperative ventures. Our very successful Fall Workshop with ADETA (see the report on page 4) reaffirms this direction. We welcome any suggestions/ideas that members may have for joint ventures with other organizations or professional associations which have similar goals and values to those of AACE'S.

As it is very important that adult educators be represented in all key adult learning events in this Province, but especially in policy-making ones, AACE sent two representatives to the second ' annual Minister's Forum on Adult Learning (see report on this page 1) again this year. We also have been meeting annually with the Minister of Advanced Education and Career Development, in conjunction with a face-to-face Board meeting in Edmonton in February (most of our Board meetings are held by teleconference) for the past several years. In these meetings, the Board discusses adult educator concerns, raises issues requiring attention by the Alberta government and offers ideas on the place of the formal and informal adult educator community in Alberta's 'Adult Learning System'.

One other important initiative that the Board has been exploring for AACE members is a long term disability insurance package with Sovereign Investments Ltd. of Red Deer. For those of you interested in such a package, please take time to examine the insert enclosed in this newsletter. The Board has spent considerable time with Steve Dodsworth, of Sovereign Investments Ltd., to put this package together and we feel that this resulting package is a very good deal for those needing one. If you are interested, contact Steve (phone: 403-342-4484, fax: 403-341-3466) for details on creating a package that meets your individual needs.

AACE is posed for an exciting and prosperous 1997, thanks to your individual and collective support in 1996! The Board and myself wish you a safe and joyous Christmas, and a prosperous New Year.

Sincerely, John Melicher

International Adult Literacy Survey
by Anne Scott,
President of the Alberta Association for Adult Literacy. (This article originally appeared in Literacy Action, October, 1996)

In conjunction with National Literacy Week, the Canadian report on the International Adult Literacy Survey (IALS) was released at a news conference in Ottawa. The IALS measured literacy levels according to three scales (document, prose and quantitative) along a continuum, with Level 1 skills as the lowest, and Levels 4/5 as the highest. In the IALS, prose literacy is the ability to understand and use information from written text. Document literacy is the ability to locate and use information from any type of document such as job applications, payroll forms, bus schedules, maps, tables or graphs. Quantitative literacy is the ability to perform an arithmetic function to do such things like balancing a checkbook, calculating a tip on a restaurant bill, or completing an order form.

Level 3 is seen as the minimum desirable level of literacy skills for a person to possess in order to have the necessary skills required in the home, in the workplace and in the community. The news from this report indicates that literacy levels among Canadians are basically the same as they were five years ago; although new graduates from secondary schools since 1989 are generally more literate than those who graduated ahead of them. According to the IALS, 22% of adult Canadian who are 16 years of age and older have Level 1 skills. In other words, these Canadians have serious difficulty dealing with printed materials of any kind. In Alberta, the statistics are somewhat lower - 15% of our population fall into this category. Another 24 - 26% of Canadians (or 21% of Albertans) fall into the second lowest level - they read, but not very well.

The IALS confirms much of the information that we already know about literacy. It shows that society rewards those who are literate, and penalizes those who are not. It indicates the relationship between educational attainment and literacy skills. People with no secondary education are most likely to have Level 1 literacy skills. Those who have some secondary education are the largest number with Level 2 skills.

The IALS shows that there is a continuing need for literacy services for older Canadians - because 40% of Canadian over 65 years of age have not completed primary school. Of the number of people who receive social assistance support, 60% have not completed secondary school.

A significantly larger proportion of immigrants have Level 1 literacy skills in their new language than non-immigrants. It is interesting to note that in Canada, the proportion of immigrants with Level 4/5 skills is higher than the proportion of non-immigrant Canadians.

The IALS also indicates that literacy skills vary by occupation and that document and quantitative skills are particularly important in the workplace. The survey shows that literacy skills are both a cause and a result of employment success. The workplace gives people an opportunity to practice their literacy skills and inability to find regular employment may result in a reduction in people's literacy skills levels. Chronically unemployed youth (16 - 25 years of age) are a serious concern because they generally do not have the opportunity to increase their literacy skills through workplace training. An unemployed person is three times as likely to have Level 1 skills than a person who is employed. There is also a major income penalty for having lower literacy skills - 71% of people with Level 1 skills had incomes less than $18,000 per year.

These are just some of the findings in the IALS and I have included them in the newsletter so you have up-to-date statistics when you are talking about literacy and literacy issues. If you want more information, please contact the AAAL office (phone: 403-297-4994; fax: 403-297-4849).