In this article, I compare two distinct uses of "Popular Education" that emerged in Tlaxcala in the wake of the Mexican Revolution. I examine archival and oral evidence to reconstruct the situated meanings and political rationales that led to the use of the term in each case, beyond their contrasting pedagogical content. In 1917, a…

As the second decade of the new millennium begins, the authors state that it would seem appropriate to look once again at the status of literacy education as it affects adolescents and adults. Each year since 1997, an article appears in the periodical "Reading Today" listing the topics in literacy that are receiving varying degrees of attention,…

Since 1998, the Management Information System (MIS) group of the Division of Community Colleges has been responsible for compiling and publishing "The Annual Condition of Iowa's Community Colleges," commonly known as the condition report. Primary data sources for the condition report are each of the 15 public community colleges in Iowa.…

Different technologies have been used for decades to support adult education and learning. These include radio, television and audio and video cassettes. More recently digital ICTs such as computers, tablets, e-books, and mobile technology have spread at great speed and also found their way into the teaching and learning of literacy and numeracy…

The 36th Annual Adult Higher Education Alliance (AHEA) Conference was held on March 10-11, 2016 in Orlando, Florida, on the campus of the University of Central Florida. There were 48 presentations from scholars and practitioners from 20 states who participated in the conference. The contributions to these proceedings represent the best of the…

One of the greatest challenges in education today is to adapt and respond to a linguistically and culturally diverse world, and to combat social disintegration and discrimination. Participatory and collaborative action research represents an empowering and emancipatory approach to this challenge because the "target groups" become…

Multiple factors are likely to influence adult literacy regarding the natural environment and environmental issues, but very little research has been carried out in this area. The research presented in this article is intended to help address this information gap, by investigating influences on adult environmental literacy using data from a…

Current pedagogical approaches recognize literacy as a social practice and yet school-based conceptualizations continue to dominate understandings of literacy learning of individuals with intellectual disability. Such understandings lead to local or everyday literacy practices being devalued and overlooked. Thus, for adults with intellectual…

This paper explores the ways in which policy discourses have constructed rationales for addressing adult literacy over the last 50 years. In particular, we examine how policy positions the literacy learner as citizen within discourses of rights and equity. Taking the case of the UK, we compare two key documents produced at different historical…

Existing cross-national research on educational attainment does not fully address whether the same level of educational attainment generates the same level of literacy skills in different countries. We analyze literacy skills data for young adults from 19 countries in the 1994-1998 International Adult Literacy Survey and find that in all…

This study addresses the age-old problem of integrating personal and disciplinary purposes for learning. Two groups of educators participated in online professional development in which each participant assessed an adult literacy learner. The assignment required participants to synthesize assessment data representing social-humanist and cognitive…

The rate of student departure from adult literacy programs is as high as 80% within the first 12 months (Porter, Cuban, & Comings, 2005). An examination of the literature reveals two perspectives concerning learner persistence: a "control perspective" and an "acknowledgement and accommodation perspective." The control…

This paper provides Appendix D, Standard Error tables, for the full report, entitled. "Literacy, Numeracy, and Problem Solving in Technology-Rich Environments among U.S. Adults: Results from the Program for the International Assessment of Adult Competencies 2012. First Look. NCES 2014-008." The full report presents results of the Program…

With an eye toward contemporary skill building to meet community centered economic needs, organizations such as Literacy Volunteers of America are increasingly pressured to examine new avenues in promoting employment readiness skills for the newly literate. These organizations and countless others have come to the realization that being prepared…

More than an estimated 90 million adults in the United States lack the literacy skills needed for fully productive and secure lives. The effects of this shortfall are many: Adults with low literacy have lower rates of participation in the labor force and lower earnings when they do have jobs, for example. They are less able to understand and use…