05-05-2011, 08:19 PM
this is pretty stunning...half of Detroit is illiterate!? what about the rest of the country? and can Detroit's illiteracy be blamed on the dereliction of the city?
do you see this where you live? i always thought illiteracy was a limited problem--- limited to pockets of abject poverty and backwardness. what is the real cause?
Daily Mail
Nearly half the population of Detroit are unable to read, research has revealed.
The study, released by the Detroit Regional Workforce Fund, found that 47 per cent of adults in the Motor City are ‘functionally illiterate’.
That means they struggle to complete daily tasks such as reading a bus timetable, filling out a job application form or reading a label on a medicine bottle.
Shockingly, virtually the entire illiterate population had completed elementary school – the level at which reading is theoretically taught.
The report noted that half of the illiterate population had either a high school diploma or a GED.
Karen Tyler-Ruiz, director of the Detroit Regional Workforce Fund, said: ‘Increasing adult educational attainment is critical to connecting the one in two city residents who are currently unemployed and underemployed to good jobs in our new economy.
‘This is a critical opportunity for Detroit, where we know that access to services to improve basic skills like reading and math are extremely limited in and around the city.’
The problem is not limited to the city. The report found that suburbs, such as Pontiac (34 per cent), Inkster (34 per cent) and Southfield (24 per cent), also suffered high rates of illiteracy.
The city, which was once at the center of America’s industrial muscle, has been devastated by the global recession.
The population of Detroit has dropped by 25 per cent in the past ten years and is now at its lowest since 1910
Almost a third of the city's 140 square miles is vacant or derelict.
do you see this where you live? i always thought illiteracy was a limited problem--- limited to pockets of abject poverty and backwardness. what is the real cause?
Daily Mail
Nearly half the population of Detroit are unable to read, research has revealed.
The study, released by the Detroit Regional Workforce Fund, found that 47 per cent of adults in the Motor City are ‘functionally illiterate’.
That means they struggle to complete daily tasks such as reading a bus timetable, filling out a job application form or reading a label on a medicine bottle.
Shockingly, virtually the entire illiterate population had completed elementary school – the level at which reading is theoretically taught.
The report noted that half of the illiterate population had either a high school diploma or a GED.
Karen Tyler-Ruiz, director of the Detroit Regional Workforce Fund, said: ‘Increasing adult educational attainment is critical to connecting the one in two city residents who are currently unemployed and underemployed to good jobs in our new economy.
‘This is a critical opportunity for Detroit, where we know that access to services to improve basic skills like reading and math are extremely limited in and around the city.’
The problem is not limited to the city. The report found that suburbs, such as Pontiac (34 per cent), Inkster (34 per cent) and Southfield (24 per cent), also suffered high rates of illiteracy.
The city, which was once at the center of America’s industrial muscle, has been devastated by the global recession.
The population of Detroit has dropped by 25 per cent in the past ten years and is now at its lowest since 1910
Almost a third of the city's 140 square miles is vacant or derelict.