However, even distinctively adult curriculum and assessment arrangements, that understand literacy and learning as integrated in practical life situations, can unwittingly be an imposition on learners, and can undercut the democratic collaboration in learning that is the rightful centre of literacy work.¹⁶⁹ Indeed any "approved" curriculum, standard evaluation instruments, or time limits on study, can have the effect of constraining the learning process and reducing the effective autonomy of programs. It depends on who defines the integration of learning into life, and how. The need is for curriculum and materials development that is not closed, but that, while providing resources, is open to and indeed promotes the generation of local questions and materials.

Teacher qualifications

Questions of how "standards" relate to community specificity and program autonomy arise in many areas of literacy work. One final area that must be mentioned is that of teacher selection and qualification. Some programs (northern and native programs, inner-city programs, and union-sponsored workplace programs) select teachers or tutors from learners' communities and pay them for part-time teaching, or for training, because, as has long been recognized in international discussion, teachers from students' communities are often particularly effective.¹⁷⁰ Tutors or learners sometimes become career literacy workers. Requirements that literacy practitioners be certified teachers, or hold university degrees, could undercut such practices of community-specific teacher recruitment. Some program administrative arrangements require credentials. School board teachers of credit courses are usually required to hold teacher certification. Possession of a bachelor's degree is commonly required of community college faculty, and in some cases a graduate degree is preferred. The multiplication of training opportunities, especially in universities, increases the possibility that adult literacy teaching may become professionalized, in the sense of requiring academic credentials of practitioners.