• Eligibility for Work Ready Servicing – Not all disability organizations offering employment support will service a learner as work ready if s/he is attending literacy training.
  • Financial – there is very little funding for adult literacy students unless they are on an employment path and are pursuing post secondary education. For students functioning at the lowest two levels, both employment and post secondary education are often a long term goal for which funding may not be available until the student has progressed to level 3 or 4 where the goal is more tangible. Funding is discussed in more detail later in this report.
  • Literacy versus Employability – because funding programs often place value on literacy as it relates to employability and the pursuit of a job, the literacy community is concerned that there is insufficient appreciation of the value that enhanced literacy skills bring to individual's lives through increased self confidence and general quality of life.

    However, there is no doubt of the direct linkage between literacy and employability. As discussed previously in this report, as an individual moves up the literacy ladder their ability to compete for and achieve sustainable employment is significantly enhanced.

  • Space – Many of the community literacy programs are conducted in a public space such as a library. They are therefore quite limited in their ability to offer accommodations. Learners find it difficult to concentrate in space where other activities are ongoing concurrently with the learning time. Additionally, the CLI programs do not have permanent space assignment and therefore, are required to secure space on an annual basis.
  • Languages – Very few literacy organizations in HRM offer programs in languages other than English. Of the 20 respondents to our survey, only one offered French language literacy training. Respondents to the Nova Scotia Provincial Literacy Coalition Survey indicated that 35 of 267 programs offered French language training and none offered training in an Aboriginal language.
  • Program Eligibility – Those high school students graduating from high school, who have participated in an Individual Program Plan (IPP), are not assessed in the same manner as other students. The Department of Education website states the following:
  • "Students on Individual Program Plans (IPP) do not write provincial exams, since their program plans do not include the full range of outcomes on which the examinations are based. It would not be fair for these students to write."
  • These students often graduate with a high school diploma, and yet their literacy skills are much lower than those expected of high school graduates. Regardless of their literacy capability, they are not eligible for many adult literacy programs and are not eligible to apply for another Nova Scotia High School Graduation Diploma for Adults or to write the GED tests.