Message-ID: <19981209202709.AAA3953@LOCALNAME> Date: Wed, 9 Dec 1998 16:24:53 -0400 From: Kerry Miller <mailto:kerryo@NS.SYMPATICO.CA> Subject: Illiteracy linked to poverty To: mailto:DEVEL-L@AMERICAN.EDU
http://www.unicef.org/sowc99Nearly a billion people will enter the 21st century unable to read a book or sign their names and two thirds of them are women. And they will live, as now, in more desperate poverty and poorer health than those who can. They are the world’s functional illiterates -- and their numbers are growing. The total includes more than 130 million school age children, 73 million of them girls, who are growing up in the developing world without access to basic education. Millions of others languish in substandard schools where little learning takes place.
[...Ours] is a broad vision of education: as a human right and a force for social change; as the single most vital element in combating poverty, empowering women, safe-guarding children from exploitative and hazardous labour and sexual exploitation, promoting human rights and democracy, protecting the environment and controlling population growth. And as a path towards international peace and security.
========== http://www5.mercurycenter.com/premium/world/docs/fordig09.htm
Illiteracy linked to vast poverty in UNICEF study
One billion people -- nearly a sixth of humanity -- will enter the 21st century doomed to poverty because they are unable to read a book, write their names or master other skills necessary to hold a job, UNICEF reported Tuesday at the United Nations. ``The consequences of illiteracy are profound -- and even potentially life-threatening. For millions and millions of children, education is literally a matter of life and death,'' UNICEF Executive Director Carol Bellamy wrote in the agency's annual report on illiteracy, ``The State of the World's Children 1999.''
[...] Even in many industrialized countries, 15 percent to 20 percent are functionally illiterate, unable to understand a job application, much less operate a computer or develop other skills necessary to survive in the competitive global economy.
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Naturally, the report is framed in terms of "finding and keeping a job," as this is the only language the North understands. (And teaching, as just another job, simply isnt competitive in the marketplace. It's too bad we can't afford to *do it ourselves*, isnt it? )
kerry