COMMON FRAMEWORK FOR A LITERACY SURVEY PROJECT
Literacy Survey
Publicity Guidelines
May 2014
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Table of Contents
PREFACE ................................................................................................................4
1. INTRODUCTION.............................................................................................7
2. LITERACY PUBLICITY ACTIVITIES .........................................................8
3. FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS (FAQ’S) ........................................ 11
ANNEX 1: SAMPLE INTRODUCTION LETTER ............................................ 14
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Preface
The Publicity Guide builds upon a project “Common Framework for a
Literacy Survey” which was executed by the Caribbean Community
(CARICOM) Secretariat under funding provided by the Inter-American
Development Bank (IDB) Regional Public Goods Facility. The main aim of
the project was intended to design a common approach to the
measurement of literacy in countries. This common framework is built
upon international methodologies and fundamentally the International
Survey of Reading Skills (ISRS) that enable reliable measurement of
literacy than what presently exists in the Region.
The literacy Survey is designed to measure functional literacy. In other
words, it will determine an individual’s literacy level by employing a
series of questions designed to demonstrate the use of their literacy
skills. This involves two steps – the objective testing of an adult’s skill
level and the application of a proficiency standard that defines the level
of mastery achieved. The assessment measures the proficiency of
respondents on three continuous literacy scales - prose, document and
numeracy. In addition, it will collect information on reading component
skills. Component skills are thought to be the building blocks upon
which the emergence of reading fluency is based. Information on the
reading component skills will be collected from people at the lower end of
the literacy scale only. The testing phase is preceded by a selection
phase, which includes the administering of a Background or Household
questionnaire and post the selection of the respondent from the specific
household an initial pre-assessment is undertaken through a filter test
booklet to determine what type of assessment should be undertaken in
the testing phase.
A consultant, Mr. Scott Murray of Canada was hired to undertake the
provision of services on this project.
The CARICOM Secretariat
(including Regional Statistics and Human and Social Development
Directorate) and the CARICOM Advisory Group on Statistics (AGS) were
instrumental in the execution of the project throughout all phases. In
addition, there was participation by Member States and some Associate
Members relative to the technical rollout of the instruments and
documents.
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<< The paragraph that follows can be country-specific>>
This Publicity Guide is aimed at providing the public in <<country
undertaking the Literacy Survey>> with knowledge about the survey to
be conducted in order for them to have an understanding of its
importance and to enable their cooperation on the survey. These
guidelines are prepared based on those recommended under the IDBfunded CARICOM project.
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1.
Introduction
National Literacy Assessment Systems are, by definition, expensive,
technically and operationally demanding and politically sensitive. Welldesigned and executed Literacy Surveys can lead to dramatic and lasting
improvements in the quality of education specifically it can improve the
quality and equity of educational and labour market outcomes for adults.
Further, the onerous nature of the literacy survey in terms of information
gathering- assessment/testing phases implies that there is need to
inform the public about its conduct and the benefits that can be derived.
The success of a survey such as the <<Country Name>> Literacy Survey
depends on the number of respondents who provide information.
Therefore, an effective public awareness campaign should be developed
to ensure that there is a greater understanding of the survey process, the
importance of conducting such a survey, the usefulness of the survey
data, who are expected to benefit and how that benefit would be
achieved.
The purpose of this Publicity Guide is to set out the approach to
developing a publicity programme aimed at raising the awareness of the
public about the survey being conducted and its usefulness and benefits
in an effort to encourage full participation in the survey prior to data
collection and during data collection. It is noteworthy that the aims of
the publicity programme are not only to dispel any anxiety regarding the
purpose of the survey but also to provide standard responses to
frequently asked questions (FAQs) relative to the literacy survey.
The guidelines start with this Introduction as Section 1; Section 2 will be
on the literacy survey publicity activities including a list of literacy
survey publicity messages. The Publicity guide concludes with a list of
FAQs relative to the literacy survey in Section 3
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2.
Literacy Publicity Activities
Any Literacy Survey will impose a heavy response burden upon selected
respondents. Therefore, it is necessary to take steps to raise public
awareness of the study. The underlying goal of such publicity is to make
the population aware of the study in terms of its objectives and
importance to encourage participation of the public particularly the
selected individuals within the selected households.
Publicity activities should commence close to the start date of the pretest or the household listing activities depending on which would be
carried out first. These activities should continue throughout the data
collection phase.
Methods that can be used in promoting the any Literacy Survey include
the issuance of press releases to be published in strategic community
newspapers, giving interviews to the various media (including
Newspapers, Radio and television), and putting background information
on the websites of the Education Ministry, Statistics Offices, and other
stakeholders. A carefully worded letter could also be prepared outlining
the objectives and importance of the survey, and distributed to the
selected households. A draft letter is included Annex 1.
Key messages that should be included in the publicity materials are as
follows:

The Literacy Survey is a National undertaking in which several
countries

The Survey is being executed the Central Statistics Office on
behalf of the Ministry of Education and in collaboration with
<<funding agency/ies>>.

Not all the households in the country will be visited for
interview. <<Sample size>> households have been randomly
selected to participate.

Only one randomly selected adult aged 15-64 years will be
required to participate from each randomly selected household.
Selected respondents are encouraged to participate, as the study
is crucially important to national economic and social
development.

The overarching goal is to generate literacy and numeracy skill
profiles that can be compared within the Region and to
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international benchmark data for a range of countries

The data will be used by a range of users, including adult
educators and governments, to determine if the current level of
skill is sufficient to support national social and economic
objectives and to identify groups within the population who are
most in need of skill upgrading.

The methods used to assess skills have been developed and
refined through an international collaboration spearheaded by
Statistics Canada. Survey instruments have been adapted for
use in the Region.
National study teams should bear in mind that publicizing the survey
before the actual data collection could be counterproductive as literacy
surveys can be viewed as instruments of power and are expensive to
implement. Therefore, such adverse reactions can have a significant
negative impact upon response rates.
For this reason, it is recommended that publicity prior to data collection
should be factual and politically neutral. It is also recommended that
advocates of the Literacy Survey be identified in advance. These
advocates should be familiarized with the survey objectives and design
and should participate in media training.
Media training involves spokespeople being grilled in a confrontational
journalistic style so that they get to practice and refine their answers
before facing questions from real journalists.
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3. Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ’s)
Q1. What is the CARICOM study?
The CARICOM Common Framework defines a regional comparative approach
that seeks to profile, through the testing of a representative sample of the adult
population, the true level and distribution of adult skills in three skill domains:
prose literacy, document literacy and numeracy.
The Framework also seeks to identify the factors that are associated with the
acquisition, maintenance and loss of skills through the course of life. In
addition, the study examines the influence that skill exerts on social, economic,
health and educational outcomes in individuals, families, the workplace and in
entire economies and societies.
The study provides valid, reliable and comparable estimates of skill in the
following domains:
Prose literacy is the knowledge and skills needed to understand and use
information from texts such as editorials, news stories, poems, and fiction;
Document literacy is the knowledge and skills required to locate and use
information contained in various formats such as tables, forms, graphs, and
diagrams;
Numeracy is the knowledge and skills required to effectively manage the
mathematical demands of diverse situations.
Q2. Why is the study important?
The study consists of two elements: a house survey in which one adult per
household is assessed and an analysis program that seeks to inform policy in
the area of adult skills. The study is important because analysis has shown
that differences in the skills measured are associated with large differences in
the social, economic, health and educational outcomes realized by individuals
and societies.
These differences are large enough to have a material impact on the quality of
life of individuals with low skills. Furthermore, differences in outcomes have
been shown to be associated with large differences in key indicators of the
overall economic performance of nations.
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Q3. Who will participate in the survey?
Persons aged 15-64 years will participate in the survey. However, only
<<sample size>> households will be contacted and only one person per
household will be interviewed. Both the households and the individuals will be
selected randomly.
Q 4. Who will use the survey data and how?
The data in this survey provide a wealth of information to help policy makers,
educators and social advocates understand the relationship between skills and
labour market, social, health and educational outcomes. They will be used by
academics, policy makers and researchers, among others, to further our
understanding of this relationship. The reports will also be essential reading
for those who set policy for education, the workplace and society.’’
Q5. Is the CARICOM Survey comparable to Adult Literacy and Life Skills
(ALL) survey and the International Adult Literacy survey (IALS)?
The studies can be compared, yet at the same time the ALL survey builds upon
and refines the IALS. The ALL survey measures prose literacy and document
literacy exactly the same way IALS did, enabling us to track changes over time.
However, the CARICOM Survey adds the reading components measures to
provide better information on the skills of low-level readers.
Q6. How will the data be collected?
Trained interviewers will make house visits and administer a carefully designed
and validated standardized skill test to a representative sample of adults.
Respondents were also asked a series of questions about their demographic
background and other characteristics related to skill.
Q7. How is literacy different from educational attainment?
Literacy is different from educational attainment because it provides a true
measure of an individual's skill level. Within any group of individuals
possessing the same level of educational attainment, it is natural to observe
large differences in skill level despite the fact that they all have the same
credential and were exposed to the same amount of education. This makes
educational attainment an unreliable measure of an individual’s skill level even
at the point of graduation.
Since education does not “fix” literacy for life these differences in skill actually
grow larger as people age. Some adults manage to improve their skill level over
time while others lose some of the skill they had through lack of use, illness
and accident.
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One also sees changes in skill level at particular levels of educational
attainment that can be traced back to changes in the quality of education over
time - both improvement and deterioration. For example, the quality of a high
school diploma appears to have been rising steadily in Canada at least judged
by the steady improvement in average literacy skill observed in the Adult
Literacy and Life Skills (ALL) survey data.
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Annex 1: Sample Introduction Letter
<<Country Logo>>
<< National Statistics
Office Logo>>
Date
Dear Sir / Madam
The <<Survey Execution Agency>> in collaboration with the <<Partner>> is
currently conducting a National Literacy Survey in <<Country Name>>.
The purpose of this survey is to learn more about the ability of the adult
population in <<Country Name>> as it relates to their understanding and use of
written information. This survey is extremely important as the information
collected will be used to plan and implement improved education programmes for
all adults.
Please note that only a relatively small part of the population of <<Country Name>>
has been selected to participate in this survey and so your answers are very
important, as they will be used to represent many others.
The <<Country Name>> Literacy Survey is conducted under the authority of the
Statistics Act, which means that any answer that you give will be kept strictly
confidential. Therefore, at no time would any information be published that could
identify you or your household.
Within the next few weeks, field officers will be conducting the literacy survey. Our
officers will be provided with ID cards from the <<Survey Execution Agency>> to
legitimize their status in the Survey.
If you would like to know more about the survey, please call the <<Contact
Information>>.
Thank you in advance for your cooperation.
Yours Sincerely
_______________________________
Director (Survey Execution Agency)
____________________________
Ministry of Education
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