Canada's National Literacy Secretariat (NLS) develops innovative partnerships to involve voluntary and national organizations, governments, business, and labor in a national effort to make Canada a more literate society. The two main objectives of the NLS are to promote a variety of opportunities for people to improve their reading and writing skills and to make Canada's social, economic, and political life more accessible to people with weak literacy skills. Through its work with Canada's provinces and territories, the NLS has been able to set a national direction for literacy programs, meet local and regional needs in projects addressing national literacy objectives, and support projects with the following objectives: research literacy issues, increase public awareness about literacy, develop new learning materials, broaden the range of Canadians receiving literacy training, and coordinate and share information among groups involved in literacy. NLS partnerships have resulted in literacy programs for young offenders and ex-offenders, persons with disabilities, women, Canada's aboriginal people, and members of ethnocultural communities. NLS partnerships have also resulted in workplace and family literacy programs. NLS defines its success by the quality of its partnerships and works with organizations in all sectors to make plain language the standard for communications. (MN)