Focus on Education: By: Antony Pellegrino Literacy: An important weapon to economic strength of NMI Part I

In our efforts in seeking new businesses to invest in the CNMI, we are operating under a great handicap. If we do not overcome it we will never become a center for sophisticated industries which depend upon a welleducated labor pool.

We must become a literate society. We must develop into a society of employees with high basic skills and literacy so that we can attract high-tech industries that require a high level of reading, writing and computation.

Investing in ourselves to develop basic skills and literacy is a smart investment. If our community is to ever become economically strong, then we must help each other to become literate. It is a proven fact that a successful community’s strength lies in her citizens’ literacy level more than on any other resources that community possesses. Study Japan’s or Singapore’s or Taiwan’s successes and you will understand this reality. These are small countries who enjoy some of the world’s highest economic levels founded on the highest adult literacy levels. Yet none of them possesses natural resources except highly trained citizens.

Unless we take immediate steps to improve the literacy level of our citizens, we will always depend on an outside labor force. At the present time the CNMI cannot offer a literate labor force to industries who would otherwise be willing to invest here. The level of literacy is one of the first things that a company inquires about. If there are not enough available literate workers, the company either decides to locate somewhere else or imports literate workers that it can quickly train.

In 1991, the U. S. Congress defined literacy as “an individual’s ability to read, write, and speak in English, and compute and solve problems at levels of proficiency necessary to function on the job and in society, to achieve one’s goals, and develop one’s knowledge and potential.”

A National Adult Literacy Survey in 1992 found that 22% of the adults in America–over 40 million people–perform at the very lowest literacy levels often equated to a fifth-grade reading and skill level. I wonder what percentage it would be in the CNMI if we were take a similar survey?

These adults–many of whom are employees in private companies and in government and also our friends–have difficulty reading directions, i.e., truck drivers, delivery persons, taxi cab drivers; calculating total costs on an order form or reading instructions, i. e., administrative staff, retail store clerks; and interpreting charts,and graphs, i. e., persons in manufacturing, hospital assistants. These are only a few examples where low literacy is often encountered. It is all around us and in many cases serious.

I do have statistics to back up my comments through research and personal contacts with the general public. Also being close to the public school system, I know that many families do not have books or magazines in their homes. Many of us do not enjoy reading and writing. How many of us adults have library cards and frequent the Joeten Kiyu Public Library?

I would venture to say that not many of us read a book a year or subscribe to national magazines. We do little writing unless it is a brief note or a letter to someone. But before anyone jumps on me and says, ” What is this jerk saying about us? Is he such a hotshot?”, let me cite some U. S. national statistics and the reasons why I am bringing up a very sensitive subject such as adult literacy. (Part II will be on tomorrow’s edition.)