The National Center for Education Statistics (NCES):
NCES gathers and publishes information on the status and progress of education in the United States. The congressional authorization for these activities (with antecedents to 1867) states that the purpose of the Center is to collect and report ". . . statistics and information showing the condition and progress of education in the United States and other nations in order to promote and accelerate the improvement of American education" -- Section 402(b) of the National Education Statistics Act of 1994 (20 U.S.C. 9001). This law mandates an annual statistical report on the subject from the Commissioner of Education Statistics.
- 1998
edition of The Condition of Education
International
comparisons of adult literacy:
From the Condition of Education report: The International
Adult Literacy Survey (IALS) assessed adult literacy performance
in 12 countries. The five literacy levels expressed along
three scales -- prose, document, and quantitative -- measure
a range of literacy, from the basic ability to locate
information within simple text, to the ability to understand
and use printed information in daily activities, at home,
at work, and in the community. As society becomes more
complex and low skill jobs continue to disappear, concern
about adults' ability to use written information to function
in society continues to increase.
- Approximately one-fifth of adults in the United States scored at or above level 4 on the prose, document, and quantitative literacy scales. Of the 11 other countries that participated in the International Adult Literacy Survey (IALS), only Sweden exceeded the United States in the percentage of adults scoring at the highest levels of literacy in any of the three domains; the only exception was Canada, which had a greater proportion of adults scoring at or above level 4 on the document scale than did the United States.
- Adults
with a college degree were much more likely to score at
level 4 or above than adults with a high school degree,
across all countries and across all three literacy scales.
In some countries, the difference between the percentages
of college graduates and high school graduates scoring
at the highest levels of literacy was relatively large
(29 percentage points for document literacy in the United
States), while in other countries, the difference was
relatively small (10 percentage points for document literacy
in the Netherlands)
- National Assessments of Adult Literacy : The National Assessments of Adult Literacy home page, a new feature of the NCES. This page incorporates links to other literacy assessment information other than what is on the NCES website
- 1992 National Adult Literacy Survey (NALS): The National Adult Literacy Survey is a data collection system of the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) that was designed to measure the nature and extent of literacy skills among the U.S. adult population (16 years old and older).
Adult Education Data and Statistics (Office of Vocational & Adult Education)
The
Federal Interagency Council on Statistical Policy:
FEDSTATS maintains this site to provide easy access to the
full range of statistics and information produced by these
agencies for public use.
U.
S. Census Bureau
provides timely, relevant, and quality data about the
people and economy of the United States.
Western and Pacific Region Reports:
The
Bureau of Labor Statistics
Regional Offices of States in the Western Pacific Region:
- Region IX & X represents the eight Western states: Alaska, Arizona, California, Hawaii, Idaho, Nevada, Oregon, and Washington
- Region VII and VIII includes ten Mountain-Plains states including Colorado, Utah, Montana, Wyoming
- Region VI represents the five Southwest states including New Mexico
Synthetic
Estimates of Adult Literacy Proficiency
Synthetic estimation uses statistical models to combine information from different data sources to estimate information not available in any one source by itself. The synthetic estimates of adult literacy proficiency presented here combine information from the National Adult Literacy Survey (NALS) and the 1990 U.S. Census to estimate adult literacy proficiencies in geographical areas not adequately sampled by NALS.
- Adult Literacy Statistics: This site provides synthetic estimates of adult literacy and census predictors for any geographic area. Synthetic Literacy Estimates, Stephen Reder, Portland State University - 1996
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