At the other extreme are career literacy workers, who can devote their time to literacy, and hone their skills, over a period of years. Both schools and community colleges are involved in literacy programming, through diverse arrangements, and recent program expansion has been quantitatively greatest within educational institutions. Different provincial and territorial traditions of adult education provision mean that the choice or the relationship between school board and college involvement varies widely. In many provinces, the continuing education divisions of school districts traditionally provide basic education. In a newer but common pattern, community colleges, organized through ministries of advanced education, are mandated to provide or to support adult literacy and basic education. Sometimes school boards and community colleges provide their own classes; and sometimes they are involved with, or administer program grants to, community or volunteer organizations.

Programming expansions outside educational institutions, in community settings and in workplaces, are likely less significant quantitatively (at least to date) but are more extensively discussed.

Community programs have proliferated since 1985. There are, for example, now about 80 autonomous literacy groups in Québec and over 150 in Ontario, 65 literacy tutoring programs in Alberta, and nearly 150 Laubach Literacy Councils across most provinces. In most provinces, scattered autonomous literacy organizations, or programs sponsored by community centres, ex-offenders' organizations, and the like — secure government funding for some or all of materials, teaching, and facilities. Many community programs rely on one-to-one tutoring, with tutoring sessions occurring in literacy program offices, libraries, or learners' homes. Tutors are usually, but not always, volunteers, and the extent of teaching is usually limited by the extent of reasonable demands on a volunteer's time — two to four hours a week. Community programs have often been at the leading edge of developments in literacy work — developing a conception of literacy as distinct from general adult education or upgrading, understanding literacy learning in its immensely various social and cultural contexts, promoting student writing and publishing, involving students in program management, and promoting plain writing.⁵² Where they have played a leading role in literacy work and advocacy, in Ontario and Québec, it has taken governments five to ten years to recognize and promote their practices.