Nearly 43 million U.S. adults lack the basic English literacy skills required to succeed in the workforce and achieve economic self-sufficiency¶
Claim · All claims
Evidence · 1 study · reviewr?·q2
Currency · newest study 2021 · not yet checked against its sources · not reviewed by a person · recheck by 2026: baselines and conditions change
Subclaims¶
Reading the evidence codes
q is the design tier, i the impact, n the sample, and the kind with its r
the rigour judged within that kind: what each code means.
This claim: no standardized effect is recorded in observations/ for it yet, so no benchmark reading is possible.
q2 i? Nearly 43 million U.S. adults lack the basic English literacy skills required to succeed in the workforce and achieve economic self-sufficiency. → Kelley Borradaile 2021
Evidence¶
Kelley Borradaile 2021¶
Kelley Borradaile, Alina Martinez, Peter Schochet. (2021). Adult Education Strategies: Identifying and Building Evidence of Effectiveness. Washington, DC: U.S. Department of Education, Institute of Education Sciences, National Center for Education, Evaluation, and Regional Assistance. https://www.mathematica.org/publications/adult-education-strategies-identifying-and-building-evidence-of-effectiveness
q2 · i? · review · r?
The report states as motivating context that "Nearly 43 million U.S. adults lack the basic English literacy skills required to succeed in the workforce and achieve economic self-sufficiency." The available text prints no source or measurement detail for this figure.
"Nearly 43 million U.S. adults lack the basic English literacy skills required to succeed in the workforce and achieve economic self-sufficiency."
Discussion¶
Related Claims¶
- Federally-funded adult ESL programs and citizenship classes largely exclude older beginner immigrants because instruction is designed for workforce-bound younger adults — related
- Philippine basic literacy is 89.8% and functional literacy 73.2%, yet BNFE serves only 1.07% of estimated adult education clientele — related
- US adult education serves only a fraction of an estimated 36 million low-skilled adults, and digital materials receive only about a quarter of the adult instructional-materials budget — related
- Only 11 percent of the 36 million low-skilled U.S. adults who could benefit from education and training are currently served by the public and private educational system — related
- Capacity gap in adult education — programs serve about four million of 36 million U.S. adults reading at a 3rd grade level or below — alongside high smart phone ownership among adult education students — related
- A review reports that digital skills gaps span demographic groups and are associated with e-learning acceptance, job performance, and earnings — related
Page metadata
| Field | Value |
|---|---|
type |
claim |
id |
43-million-adults-lack-basic-english-literacy |
title |
Nearly 43 million U.S. adults lack the basic English literacy skills required to succeed in the workforce and achieve economic self-sufficiency |
description |
Nearly 43 million U.S. |
status |
review |
evidence_strength |
weak |
newest_evidence |
2021 |
recheck_by |
2026 |
generated |
by process:wiki-ingest on 2026-10-08 |
trust |
unverified — no one has confirmed this page's content |
sources |
1 — kelley-borradaile-2021 |
Frontmatter is the page's machine-readable record — see the Schema & Guide.