LITERACY:
Childhood Literacy is very important in life. Education and reading is necessary for the society of the future no matter where an individual chooses to/is forced to live. Reading should be a right for all that society should take seriously and no child should be left behind. This section will list some facts about and benefits of childhood literacy. Being able to read, write and use technology are basic skills that ALL should be taught and required to learn. Anything less would be cruel and a shame on any civilized society.
31 FACTS
1: In order to productively function in today's society, one must be literate in order to read the menu at a restaurant, use the computer and arrange their ride on Uber in addition to access the benefits of most other areas and advancements/enjoyments of technology. (Literacy Partners)
2: A third of all children—and more than half of low-income and minority youth—fail to graduate from high school on time due to reading material difficulties and poor writing skills for papers and report. (America’s Promise & ProLiteracy)
3: The current approach to teaching literacy skills fails many students and instead of being proactive waits until students fail and are clearly behind with blatant evidence of failure in order to receive help. (www.getreadytoread.org)
4: Only 1/3 of students entering high school are proficient in reading. (National Assessment of Educational Progress)
5: Two-thirds of 8th -graders do not read proficiently at grade level. (National Assessment of Educational Progress)
6: Boys lag behind girls in reading proficiency in all 50 states. (Center for Education Policy)
7: More than a third of all juvenile offenders read below the 4th -grade level. (Scholastic: “Adolescent Literacy: A National Reading Crisis”)
8: The Majority of Jobs to day require some form of post secretary education which in order to obtain post secondary education reading and writing is a critical part regardless of subject class.
9: Children in classrooms without literature collections read 50% less than children in classrooms with such collections. (International Reading Association)
10: Studies have proven that increased family engagement in educational programs is linked with increases in child reading achievement and other academic successes (such as high school graduation rates). (The Pew Charitable Trusts: Pre-K Now)
11: Adults with lower literacy levels are generally less skilled for the changing employment environment with rapid technological advances and thus given less opportunity to participate in training programs to acquire necessary skills. (Educational Testing Service)
12: The U.S. military spends $70 million per year on remediation for recruits. (Ohio Literacy Resource Center)
13: An adult without a high school diploma earns 42% less than one with a diploma. (U.S. Dept. of Education)
14: High school dropouts have an unemployment rate 4 times greater than that of high school graduates. (Ohio Literacy Resource Center)
15: 65% of U.S. 4th -graders read below grade level, according to their results on the 2013 National Assessment of Education Progress reading test. (U.S. Dept. of Education)
16: 64% of U.S. 8th -graders read below grade level, according to their results on the 2013 National Assessment of Education Progress reading test. (U.S. Dept. of Education)
17: Nationally, 2013 reading scores of 4th - and 8th -graders improved, respectively, by 8 and 6 percentage points over 1992 scores. (U.S. Dept. of Education)
18: Job Opportunities for young adults who lack proficient literacy skills are shrinking and children growing up today without literacy skills have very little prospects for a successful and productive economic life. (Alliance for Excellent Education)
19: Over the past four decades, the share of jobs requiring some form of post secondary education continued to rise, while the literary performance of American 13-17-year olds remained flat. (National Assessment of Educational Progress, U.S. Dept. of Education)
20: More than 60% of 12th -grade students scored below “proficient” on the 2013 National Assessment of Education Progress reading test. (U.S. Dept. of Education)
21: 27% of 12th -grade students scored below “basic” on the 2013 National Assessment of Education Progress reading test. This means they don’t have even partial mastery of the appropriate gradelevel reading knowledge and skills. (U.S. Dept. of Education) Despite the above-average performance of U.S. students on international comparisons does not necessarily mean that their literacy skills are adequate or satisfactory for the demands of the modern economy and democracy with the high skill technological jobs on their way. About 2/3 of all students do not attain proficiency in knowledge-based literacy and comprehension skills by the end of middle school. (Education researchers Reardon, Valentino & Shores)
22: About 2/3 of 4th -graders, ¾ of 8th -graders and ¾ of 12th -graders were reading at the “basic” level in 2011. About 1/3 of students at each grade level were reading at the “proficient” level. (National Assessment of Educational Progress, U.S. Dept. of Education)
23: 75% of unemployed adults have reading or writing difficulties. (National Institute for Literacy)
24: In the early 1980s, the U.S. led the world in high school and college graduation rates. Today, the U.S. ranks, respectively, 20th and 16th . (Organization for Economic Co-Operation & Development)
25: Demand for basic adult education is high, with at least 160,000 people on waiting lists that exist in nearly every state. (National Council of State Directors of Adult Education) (Also one of the many examples and inspiration for the Movie Nigh School).
26: Over half of today's job openings in the legitimate formal sector require workers with at least 1 year of college level education. (Center on Education and the Workforce)
27: 40 million adults in the U.S. read and write at or below the 5th -grade level. (National Center of Adult Literacy)
28: . In the U.S., more than 30 million adults do not have a high school diploma. (Organization for Economic Co-Operation & Development)
29: 20% of U.S. adults with a high school diploma have only beginning literacy skills. (Organization for Economic Co-Operation & Development)
30: The U.S. ranked 16th in literacy out of 24 countries in a recent assessment of adults’ skills. (Organization for Economic Co-Operation & Development)
31: 1 in 5 children have serious difficulties learning to read. (National Institute of Health)
BENEFITS OF LITERACY
1: For every dollar that gets spent on adult illiteracy, society reaps $7.14 in returns—whether through increased revenues or decreased expenditures. (Literacy Partners)
2: If the male graduation rate increased by just 5%, the U.S. would see an annual savings of $4.9 billion in crime-related costs. (Alliance for Excellent Education)
3: By age 2, children who are read to regularly display greater language comprehension, larger vocabularies and higher cognitive skills than their peers. (Child development researchers Raikes, Pan, Luze, Tamis-LeMonda, Brooks-Gunn, Constantine, Tarullo, Raikes & Rodriguez)
4: It will make the American Work Force more Competitive.
5: It allows for easier free flow and access of ideas.
6: With more job opportunities it lowers the burden of the American Tax Payer on Government assistant programs and foreign aid spent in other countries.
7: It allows critical thinking and imagination being whisked away in the stories to develop.
8: It will make the World a better place and create a more level playing field for all.