Dollar General Guest Presentation Series #1
Nashville, Tenn.
Oct. 18, 2006

Conference Proceedings: Full Report

Adult literacy is a critical global issue. In the United States, a huge gap exists between federal funding for adult literacy and the actual monies needed to meet the needs of local communities. To bridge that gap, adult education and literacy organizations must continue to form strategic partnerships with businesses and other advocacy organizations. The five “C” keys to success in meeting the challenges of adult literacy are coordination, communication, cooperation, collaboration and connections.

Those were the consensus findings of the first in a series of three meetings on adult literacy sponsored by the Dollar General Literacy Foundation and the National Coalition for Literacy in Nashville, Tenn., Oct. 18.

Background

The number of adults who need remedial literacy services leveled off last year, noted Peter Waite, executive director of ProLiteracy America and vice president of U.S. programs for ProLiteracy Worldwide. The “full picture” on literacy, however, isn’t clear yet, he said. “There are non-graduates, legal immigrants, illegal immigrants—we need to realize the population is growing significantly, so, in reality, we are just keeping up,” he explained.

Therefore, he said, the U.S. needs to invest additional resources to combat adult illiteracy—an investment that will pay huge dividends. Raising literacy increases basic skills for workers, improves the health care delivery system and boosts the corporate bottom line, Waite said. Individuals want to sign up for adult education programs, he said, primarily because they want to “feel better about themselves.”

Both cash and collaboration are needed, Waite said. The $1 billion spent in state and federal funds needs to be doubled, and private sector dollars must be cultivated. Unfortunately, he said, adult illiteracy is a “problem that won’t ever go away.”

Beverly Thompson, director of the Christian County Adult Education and Family Literacy Program in Kentucky, agreed it is difficult to break the vicious cycle of illiteracy. Children of high school dropouts are more than five times more likely to drop out themselves, she said.

Adult education advocates should promote lifetime training, not just basic skills, and foster compassion for adults who may have squandered their first chance at education, Thompson said. Most of all, she said, adult education organizations must find ways .to reach the large numbers of individuals whose literacy needs are not being met.

Indeed, adult education programs are serving only 3 million of the more than 93 million people who need services, according to Lynn Selmser, policy director of NCL and former staff member of the House Committee on Education and the Workforce for more than 13 years. The federal government is preoccupied with K-12 education, which makes it imperative that adult education groups find partners to meet the challenges of adult literacy, including raising health literacy levels, she said. “It’s important especially for older Americans to be able to read prescriptions, pill bottles and dosages,” she said.

To conquer adult illiteracy, collaboration is essential, conference speakers said. “It’s clear that federal funds won’t cut it. In many cases, we have to get 40 percent of our funding from other sources,” said NCL President Sherrie Claiborne. To make up the difference, literacy groups must develop partnerships with businesses such as Dollar General, she said. Last year, Dollar General raised more than $5 million for adult literacy from cash cubes at its stores and expects to raise $6 million to $7 million this year.

Dollar General’s Contribution

Dollar General recognizes the importance of adult education, said David Perdue, CEO and chairman of the board. “Someone asked me, What was the number one challenge as CEO? The answer is adult literacy,” he told the conference. “The hardest part is finding and keeping educated young people.”

His company has been promoting adult literacy since its founder championed the issue 67 years ago, Perdue said. More than 50,000 adults have picked up cards seeking literacy services from Dollar General, whose stores serve the lowest-income households.

Perdue expressed confidence that, through cooperative efforts, NCL and other adult education advocacy groups could “beat the demon” of adult illiteracy. “Big things can happen when you partner. Be demanding, it’s time for that,” he said. “I have enthusiasm for what you are doing—I want to be a part of it.”

Denise Torr, senior manager of Dollar General’s Community Initiatives Division, urged literacy supporters to build partnerships with locally owned businesses, which have a clear-cut stake in adult education and will be good advocates in the community. “It’s like a field of dreams,” she said. “Build it and they will come.”

She also advised attendees to market the adult literacy issue more effectively. “We need to do a better job selling our issue. You need to be able to say what and why in about 30 seconds or less,” she explained. “Businesses need facts—quantitative, not qualitative. They need to see the return on investment,” she said.

Partnering with Business

Consultant Cheryl King, study director of the newly created National Commission on Adult Literacy, agreed with Torr’s assessment about the potential of corporate commitment to adult education. “There is a natural synergy among adult education, corporate responsibility and economic development,” King said.

While there is currently no single database of corporate giving for adult education, a March 2006 report from the Council for Advancement of Adult Literacy details the continuing philanthropic programs for adult literacy developed by nine major national corporations: Dollar General, IBM, Pitney Bowes, Scripps Howard, Starbucks, Time Warner, UPS, Verizon and Wal-Mart.

The report, The Role of Corporate Giving in Adult Literacy, found that some corporate support for literacy is provided through company foundations, while other support funnels directly from public affairs or other corporate offices. With the exception of Dollar General, most corporate donors distribute their local giving on a decentralized basis. “Varying degrees of guidance and oversight are provided by national corporate giving offices,” the report said. “Grant-making to national leadership organizations is centralized.”

State Activities

To make up for the gap in federal funding on adult literacy, advocacy groups are also seeking partnerships and funding from state organizations.

Tennessee
For example, in Tennessee, which has more than 1.2 million people without high school diplomas, the Tennessee Department of Labor and Workforce Development maintains career centers to help match skills with jobs. The agency partners with economic development to bring new businesses to the state and pays for on-the-job training for new employers moving into the state, according to Bob Henningsen, deputy commissioner for the department.

In Tennessee, half of the students involved in adult education programs were between 17 and 24, Henningsen said. “It’s vitally important to collaborate and unite on the adult education issue,” he explained, because when businesses decide to relocate, they look closely at GED figures. “It only costs $230 to provide a year of training for an individual to take the GED,” he said.

Kentucky
Adult literacy is a large problem that has a significant economic impact, according to Sarah Hawker, vice president for the Kentucky Adult Education Council on Postsecondary Education. “Educational deficits are a great concern for the nation. No state with a low proportion of BA’s has a high per capita income,” Hawker said. “These are deeply intertwined.” In Kentucky, she said, “over half of the counties have less than 30 percent of their populations with GEDS.”

To boost adult education curriculum standards, they must be aligned with college standards, Hawker said. GED students must be better prepared to move into college, she said. Also, “it is very important to provide assistance to teachers and students regarding learning disabilities,” Hawker added.

Various companies—including Amazon.com and McDonald’s—are partnering with Kentucky Adult Education to try to raise college graduation rates, per capita income and literacy levels in the state, according to Janet Hoover, a senior associate at Kentucky Adult Education.

Amazon.com requires high school GED for employment, but was having trouble finding workers who met that requirement, Hoover explained. So company officials worked with local agencies to establish a partnership called Go, Earn, Do-GED. Amazon reimburses participating individuals for up to $40 in GED costs, gives them $20 gift certificates, and raises their hiring status. Since May 2005, the partnership has extended operations into 20 counties and paid for 1,200 GED tests, Hoover said. She said the program has been successful for several reasons: The local economic development agency has been a champion for the cause; Amazon.com views the effort as a sustainable contribution to the community; and the marketing efforts were coordinated and effective.

The partnership with McDonald’s, GED: Prove Yourself, featured motivational stories of adult learners on tray liners and bag stuffers in three central Kentucky locations for five weeks. The initiative proved successful: Enrollment in adult education programs increased 25 percent, and the effort cost McDonald’s no more than it would have normally spent to print tray liners and bag stuffers.

Another literacy partnership came about in Kentucky when UPS was prepared to abandon its Kentucky offices because it was losing an employee every eight weeks, according to King, who previously served as vice president of Kentucky Adult Education. UPS and literacy organizations—with the help of the governor—formed the Metropolitan College concept, where the company would pay tuition, the worker for books and offer incentive pay for those who agreed to work for UPS while furthering their education, King said. The initiative is clearly working: UPS now has a waiting list of prospective employees, and the average employee stays at the firm for about two years. In addition, enrollment is up at local colleges and universities, and more adults are obtaining their GEDs. Fifteen percent of individuals involved in the program were older than 26, she noted.

Georgia

Meanwhile, Georgia has developed two programs, The Certified Literate Community Program and Exceptional Adult Georgian in Literacy Education, said Kim Lee, program administrator and director of GED testing. The programs are designed to enhance services and raise the profile of adult education.

“We pool resources and are going to address low literacy levels in the state,” Lee said. The Exceptional Adult Georgian program is aimed at helping the public understand the value of a second opportunity at education, she said. Adult learners actually act as ambassadors traveling through the state to impart that message. Finally, the state has taken notice that most jobs now require more than a diploma and has initiated a program to help individuals transition from an ABE to postsecondary school.

Local Initiatives

On the local level, advocacy groups are also forming partnerships with businesses to advance the cause of literacy. For example, the Nashville Adult Literacy Council creates classes for employers that focus specifically on their needs and workforce skills. Businesses realize how much these programs benefit their firms and specific individuals, noted council Executive Director Meg Nugent. “One of our students said the biggest thing for him was when he could read and was able to pick out an anniversary card for his wife. His goal was to open his own business, which he did, but his biggest success was when he picked out that card.”

In Claiborne County, Tenn., the Literacy Council is actively asking local businesses to partner with them because “federal funding just doesn’t come near what we need,” according to Roger Hansard, adult education supervisor for the Claiborne County Board of Education and Commission on Adult Basic Education Administrator of the Year in 2006. The county has been able to integrate work readiness skills in the adult education classroom, he said, as well as implement an adult high school model where students obtain a traditional diploma instead of a GED.

Role of Librarians

Librarians also can play an important role in promoting literacy education, said Vivian Wynn, who recently retired from a 30-year library career and was an active member-leader of the American Library Association. Public libraries have the technology to help educate students and stem the tide against crime, she said, pointing out that 85 percent of juveniles in the court system are illiterate. Noting the connection between low income, low literacy and crime, Wynn said, “Strong reading skills are needed at most jobs. This is the key to success.”

Wynn noted that literacy is one of ALA’s seven key action areas. “Librarians fill a vital role in literacy education,” she said. “We are dedicated to serving everyone concerning literacy—birth to death, homeless, English language learners, etc.” With libraries being safe, high-visibility places for disseminating information, Wynn encouraged adult literacy programs to “partner with libraries and let us do the marketing for you.”

“Libraries often provide individual study rooms for tutoring adult learners. We provide resources for students and teachers, such as books, Internet and computers. What’s more appropriate than teaching someone to read in the library?!”

Charge to Attendees

Diane Gardner, director of Equipped for the Future in the Center for Literacy Studies at the University of Tennessee, provided this charge to attendees: “We need to make the connections clear. We need to think outside the box and start linking literacy to poverty, immigration, health, [retirement] and financial issues. We know the issues and assume everyone else does. We can’t do that. We need to do more marketing and PR and be more explicit in our campaigns.”

Adult literacy leaders used the session as a call to action, with NCL President Claiborne closing the meeting with a call for action within the next six months. Claiborne pointed to the need for more funding and said, “We are very fragile, but if we can make a difference in the three states represented here today—we can bring this to the nation!”

Conference Proceedings: Executive Summary