Based on my personal experience and instructor's reports, students who have participated in modified education programs or who completed eight years or less of formal education, and who do not have well developed literacy skills in their first languages, face nearly insurmountable odds if they hope to gain significantly higher literacy skills that will allow them to participate in employment training and educational programs that lead to recognized credentials. These students will not likely gain literacy skills that will allow them to obtain a GED, enter an apprenticeship program (most require Grade 10 and 12), or gain a high school diploma. Without these credentials, they will most likely remain in the same low–paying, insecure, and often demeaning jobs that they can now get with their low literacy skills. In addition, their formal education histories seem to influence their ideas about the role of the program in their lives.

The instructors noted that students with higher levels of formal education such as Hannah, Marion and Maritza, viewed the program as a short–term phase in their lives: they would participate, gain what they needed, and move on. Whereas, students with lower levels of formal education tended to view the program as a "primary activity and…a primary way they identify themselves," explained one of the instructors.

How typical is this group of students of all students in literacy programs? There is no readily available answer, but a re–examination of the IALS data, conducted by Sussman (2003), could lead to some indicators of the make–up of literacy program participants. "Years of education remain the strongest predictor of literacy levels…[and] 81% of the Level 1 group never completed secondary school" (p. 100). In addition, half of that group (42%) never even started high school (ibid.). If all the students in literacy programs are at IALS Level 1 (they are the ones who will acknowledge that they need to improve their skills), then it is possible that one third of students in programs could have eight years or less of formal education. Not included in this group are students with disabilities who attended modified educational programs; their numbers would add to this rough estimate.

Formal education experiences have been discussed in relation to resistance to joining programs (Quigley, 1993) and in relation to learning values (Zieghan, 1992), but research that examines the relationship between childhood literacy development (gained most often through formal education) and adult literacy development is rare. Bynner and Parsons (2000) found that adults who had obtained a "basic skill threshold" in school by the age of 16 were protected against the impacts of weakened literacy skills during periods of unemployment. In comparison, those who had poor skills at 16 experienced the strongest negative impacts on their literacy and numeracy skills when unemployed. Their research suggests that the literacy skills developed during childhood are a predictor of the skill level that is maintained in adulthood. Does literacy development have a window of opportunity that must be developed in childhood? Can adults make up for a lack of childhood literacy development? If they can, under what conditions will this occur? And if they can't, what is the role of an adult literacy program?