This document offers an overview of the Houston READ Commission (HRC), a nonprofit urban literacy coalition created by the Mayor and City Council in the Greater Houston area. It describes how the coalition of community organizations first came together in 1988, in response to a survey's finding that there are over one million functionally…

The role of higher education institutions may be changing as the public becomes increasingly disquieted by the enormity of the adult illiteracy problem. Recognizing the need to help growing numbers of semiliterate freshmen catch up, colleges and universities have set up centers to provide basic skills programs, counseling, and other services.…

The nation will need millions of workers without baccalaureate degrees in the 1990s. Preparing the "forgotten half" for these jobs will require corporate investment in training, improvement of basic skills instruction, better-focused community college curricula, and large-scale programs to upgrade reading and writing skills. (SK)

In 1990, North Country Community College (NCCC) in New York developed an outcome assessment plan as a response to a requirement of the State University of New York. The planning process began in summer 1989 with an inventory of current assessment processes and a review of their effectiveness. A new plan was then developed, reviewed, and refined.…

Data from a 1980 population census indicates that of the over 73.5 million people in Brazil who were over 15 years of age, 25.4 percent were illiterate and 27.42 percent had less than 1 year of schooling. Such data show the precarious situation of education in Brazil, particularly that of adolescents and adults. Its origins lie in the dual nature…

One of the reasons for the rapid advancement of literacy activities in Ethiopia is that different nationalities learn in their own mother tongues in their own cultures. The literacy rate before the 1974 revolution was 7 percent. The 1990 literacy rate is 75 percent. Literacy instructors in the current literacy campaign do more than instruct…

This report addresses specific problems that urban-oriented colleges and universities face in meeting the educational needs of the urban poor and disadvantaged, and explores what is being and can be done about these problems. Six programs funded by the Ford Foundation are described. Four of these deal with basic skills and related services. They…