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The word is out

Literacy blueprint and specialized funding a first for the NWT

Kirsten Murphy & Kevin Wilson
Northern News Services

Yellowknife (Feb 23/01) - A $2-million funding boost and a five-year plan to improve the lives of Northerners with literacy problems was unveiled by Education minister Jake Ootes yesterday.

Background

  • Literacy: an individual's ability to listen, speak, read, write, compute, problem solve in one or more of the NWT's official languages at home and in the work place.
  • For the first time, the Education department has identified the ages, incomes, health and justice problems of people with insufficient literacy skills in "Towards Literacy: A Strategy Framework for 2001-2005."
  • The good news: the number of NWT high school graduates is on a five year rise: from 28 per cent in 1993, to 41 per cent in 1999.
  • The bad news: only 50 per cent of students who enter high school graduate -- 25 per cent drop from the national average of 75 per cent.
  • The Education department's $2-million for literacy programs will be divided between colleges, workplace literacy programs, Aboriginal groups, and libraries in smaller communities.

    -- Source:Towards literacy: A Strategy Framework, 2001


    • Towards Literacy: A Strategy Framework 2001-2005 is the first report of its size and scope identifying literacy and numeracy as a government priority.

    Yellowknife's Albert Lebrun asked Education Minister Jake Ootes how the announcement would help people like him. LeBrun, 37, is a mine employee who only recently learned to sign his name.

    Ootes said Aurora College and literacy agencies will be handling the funds.

    "I'm pleased to release this strategy in draft form. After some further consultation, I hope to be in a position to finalize it later this spring," Ootes told the crowd.

    The 75-page document details the health, social, justice and economic consequences of low literacy levels throughout the Northwest Territories. It's goal is to increase NWT literacy rates for children, working adults and seniors.

    There are no specific stats on who can or can not read and write for their age-level in the NWT.

    That may change with this new directive.

    Cate Sills, NWT Literacy Council executive director, applauded the direction policy makers are taking.

    "We're really pleased to see the government has prioritized the strategy and resources," Sills said.

    The $2-million is slated for workplace-, aboriginal-, library- and community-based literacy programs territorial-wide.

    "This has been a long time coming and it's very, very welcome," Sills said.