• In the international ranking, Canada ranks 4th of the countries compared in this study: behind Norway, Switzerland, and Bermuda but ahead of the USA, Italy and also the Mexican state of Nuevo Leon. More countries will be added later.
• Currently, the people who need training most are the least likely to be able to access adult education and training programs. Governments and business tend to support skill upgrading for people with the highest skills and do less for people with the lowest skill level.
• Literacy skills erode if not used regularly. Canadians who do not exercise their literacy skills at work, at home, or through continued education, will experience a deterioration of their skills over time.
• The ALL survey confirms the existence of a digital divide and this appears to be connected to skill levels. About 20% of Canadians do not have access to home computers. Those without computer access tend to have lower literacy levels than the rest of the population. Computer proficiency is strongly tied to earnings.
• Adults who say they are the healthiest have higher average literacy and numeracy scores, while those who report poor health have the lowest average proficiencies.
• Labour markets no longer replenish themselves sufficiently through young people coming out of school. We need to help less-skilled adults acquire the skills they need to participate fully in our economy and our society.
• Most immigrants to Canada (regardless of their skill level) are disadvantaged in terms of employment, even compared to low skilled native-born adults.
• The relationship between formal schooling and literacy skills is complex. Even a high school education is no guarantee that a person has the literacy skills they need to succeed.

More about the ALL Survey

The Adult Literacy and Life Skills survey is a large-scale, comparative study that profiles the skill& of adults in 6-OECD countries and also provides national snapshots. ALL follows up a similar study from I 0 years ago (the International Adult Literacy Survey, 1994). More than 23,000 Canadians from every province and territory participated in the new study; five times the sample in the IALS study ten years ago.

The survey rated peoples' ability to deal, with everyday literacy demands. Literacy is defined as "using printed and written information to function in society, to achieve one's goals, and to develop one's knowledge and potential".

Participants were tested and their literacy skills were gauged on a continuous scale from 0- 500 (with 0 being a complete lack of skills and 500 being the theoretical maximum proficiency). These "scores" were grouped into five proficiency levels derived from a theoretical framework that identify increasingly more complex skills as the level increases (Level I is the lowest skill level and level 5 is the highest). Grading skill levels on a spectrum accepts that we no longer speak of literacy as an either/or skill set, but rather, as a continuous measure that ranges from less skilled to higher skilled.

On this scale, level 3 is the minimum skill level considered necessary to meet the challenges of today's world. This idea of 'minimum skill level' recognizes that the demands of our knowledge-based society and economy are escalating faster than ever before and the minimum literacy skills required to meet these challenges is evolving to match.