Federal Report Finds Mixed Results on Adult Literacy

Washington

Adult literacy has remained virtually unchanged over the past decade, concludes a new nationwide report, which also found that high school graduates’ ability to interpret certain types of written materials actually fell over that time.

The study, “National Assessment of Adult Literacy,” released here Dec. 15, found that literacy remained mostly stagnant in two categories measuring the ability to understand basic literature and documents. But the report also found an increased ability among those 16 and older to perform basic math and computation found in written materials.

The study, administered by the U.S. Department of Education’s National Center for Education Statistics, is a follow-up to a similar study...