Adult literacy and literacy education have long been a global agenda. China's literacy education has been developing amid the backdrop of international commitments and goals of adult literacy. Since the founding of new China in 1949, adult literacy policy in China has been continuously evolved within the changing political, economic and social…

In the final article of the forum, the field of adult basic education has mounted a strong response to COVID-19's disruption of classes and educational practices. As educators begin to think about the long-term consequences of this disruption, it might be useful to consider the ways that these changes and innovations could be built upon. In the…

Federal accountability policies requiring rapid, measurable outcomes have increasingly shaped the nature and type of public literacy services available to adults. However, little empirical research has explored the impact of accountability policies on program practice in adult basic education, and almost no research has focused on the effect on…

As the largest funder of adult basic education (ABE) in the nation, providing over $600 million through its Basic Grants to States (U.S. Department of Education, 2019), the Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act (WIOA) drives ABE policies and practices. In a review of the announcement on Title II, the phrase "transition to" is repeated…

This paper analyses research that has impacted on Australia's most recent national policy document on adult literacy and numeracy, the National Foundation Skills Strategy (NFSS). The paper draws in part on Lingard's 2013 paper, "The impact of research on education policy in an era of evidence-based policy", in which he outlines the…

US public adult basic skills education, as adult education researcher Thomas Sticht has often pointed out, is on the margins of public education. By many measures, in the past decade it has experienced significant further decline. In the last decade and a half, according to Sticht's (2015) analysis, "enrollments in the Adult Education and…

In the United States, adult and workforce education (AE) seems to be located, simultaneously, both everywhere and nowhere in particular. Ongoing shifts in national economic demands and changes in requirements for training and education have brought learning in the adult years into the federal public policy arena. Sometimes referred to as lifelong…

The major purpose of the study was to look into change and continuity in the policy and practices of adult basic literacy initiatives in Ethiopia and to deduce lessons that can be drawn from the experiences for the future of adult basic literacy program in the country and elsewhere. Data was obtained through critical review of documents on the…

The major purpose of the study was to look into change and continuity in the policy and practices of adult basic literacy initiatives in Ethiopia and to deduce lessons that can be drawn from the experiences for the future of adult basic literacy program in the country and elsewhere. Data was obtained through critical review of documents on the…

This paper presents the perception of practitioners of the impact of the Moser Committee recommendations and the Skills for Life agenda it generated. The paper further explores areas of convergence and divergence between practitioners' perceptions and the underpinning values of the Moser Committee recommendations. The study utilised a range of…

This paper analyses Botswana's commitment to lifelong learning policy and discusses how it can help the state achieve its vision for sustainable development. First, it argues that while Botswana is renowned for its economic success, it still fails to address positively such traditional challenges as poverty, unemployment and income inequality,…

Adult literacy is a long-lasting issue in modern US and adult literacy education often falls off the radar of the support system for education. This study examined and synthesized extensive literature relevant to adult literacy education with a focus on minorities in the US. It identified progresses and challenges in three major issues in adult…

This article addresses the question, How do changes in policy discourses shape public representations of literacy learners and the goals of adult literacy education? It examines specifically how the agency of adult literacy learners is constructed. We carry out a critical discourse analysis of two key adult literacy policy documents from the U.K.:…

The paper analyses the status and characteristics of adult literacy campaigns and programmes since 2000. Global trends are analysed in terms of the ten key aspects of the suggested framework for successful literacy campaigns and programmes. Four case studies on major literacy campaigns in Brazil, India, South Africa and Indonesia are used to…

This article offers an ethnographic case study of two Adult Basic Education (ABE) teachers' characteristics and their literacy instruction. It draws on the New Literacy Studies tradition and used ethnographic tools (in-depth interviews, classroom observation and the think-aloud protocol) to explore the characteristics of two ABE teachers and…