The future of this world will one day rest in the hands of our children. How well equipped will they be to carry society forward? Perhaps the surest gauge is the success of our educational systems in preparing them for that role; from all indications, this responsibility is not being met. At a time when new technologies and the constant avalanche of information have made the ability to read, understand and apply information more important than ever, learning proficiency is not keeping pace.
On an international scale, nearly 1 thousand million people in the world are illiterate or functionally illiterate1, with between 113 million and 125 million children not attending school at risk of joining them. In Europe an estimated 10 to 20% of the population do not have the basic literacy skills vital for survival in today's world.
Statistics show the problem to be as devastating as ever, a situation which portends a constantly precarious economic scene. Internationally, the impact of illiteracy in the workplace is an estimated 1183 thousand million annually due to lowered productivity and resultant unemployment and crime. Businesses are forced to develop their own remedial programmes to teach employees the basic reading, writing and computational skills necessary to function on the job.
This problem pervades all of society. In March 2000, the heads of state from member countries of the European Union gathered in Lisbon, Portugal. There they set the ambitious 10-year target of turning the European Union into “one of the most competitive and dynamic economies in the world.” They correctly identified education as a vital element to achieving that objective — specifically, “increasing the quality and effectiveness of education and training systems in the European Union.” Clearly, this goal cannot be met without the means to ensure a quality education for all students.
There is also the tremendous cost to the international community of underdeveloped nations where illiteracy is the norm. How are these countries to become productive, or merely self-sufficient, if broad segments of their populations are unable to read and learn?
Finally, beyond the purely economic factors, how can any individual be truly competent, capable and free-thinking if he or she lacks the means to assimilate information easily?
Is this just the way it is? Or is there some missing step, crucial to the successful relay of knowledge?
top 1. The World Education Forum defines functional illiteracy as “the insufficient acquisition of basic knowledge during compulsory schooling which can place adults affected by it in situations of social, and especially economic, exclusion.” UNESCO provides this definition: “An inability to carry on any activity for which the continuing ability to read, write and do arithmetic is necessary in the interests of proper functioning of the group and community.”
