Staggering Statistics - Feeling the Impact

• In the U.S., 30 million people over age 16 - 14 % of the country's adult population - don't read well enough to understand a newspaper story written at the eighth grade level or fill out a job application. (NAAL, National Assessment of Adult Literacy)
• Low family income and a mother's lack of education are the two biggest risk factors that hamper a child's early learning and development. Children's reading scores improve when their parents are involved in helping them learn to read. (National Center for Family Literacy - NCFL)
• 85% of all juveniles who interface with the juvenile court system are functionally illiterate. (NAAL)
• Low literacy and crime are closely related. The Department of Justice states, "The link between academic failure and delinquency, violence, and crime is welded to reading failure." Over 70% of inmates in America's prisons cannot read above a fourth grade level. (www.literacytexas.org )
• The United States ranks fifth on adult literacy skills when compared to other industrialized nations. (NAAL)
• Adults with a bachelor's degree earn an average of $51,206 a year, while those with a high school diploma earn $27,915; those without a high school diploma average $18,734. (U.S. Census Bureau, 2005)
• Medication errors - many as the result of misread or misunderstood prescription labels - are the most common medical mistakes causing up to 7,000 deaths each year. (2005 White House Conference on Aging)