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This report
describes the Literacy in Libraries Across America (LILAA) persistence
study, which is concerned with increasing the persistence of Adult Basic
Education (ABE) and English for Speakers of Other Languages (ESOL) students
in library literacy programs. In the context of this study, “persistence”
is defined as students’ ability to continue their learning efforts
long enough and at a level that is intensive enough to ensure significant
progress toward their literacy goals. Improving one’s literacy is
a challenging and time-consuming endeavor, especially for adult students
with low initial literacy levels. To be successful, programs that provide
literacy instruction to adult students must support not just their learning
but also their ability to persist. The efforts of five such programs to
improve student persistence are the primary focus of this study and this
report.
Many public
libraries in the United States provide literacy instruction or arrange
for tutors to help patrons improve their literacy skills. Library-based
literacy programs are an important component of the national adult literacy
system, because libraries are often able to serve adult students who do
not have access to literacy instruction elsewhere, either because their
literacy skills are too low or because they are unable to attend classes
at the times when other education providers offer them. Funded by a special
grant from the Wallace–Reader’s Digest Funds, this study evaluates
a set of strategies initiated by five library-based literacy programs
to enhance persistence among their students. Those strategies include
better student orientation, more tutor training, enhanced communication
between the program and the students, more computer-based learning resources,
and better monitoring of student activities, progress, and goals. This
study will evaluate and document these strategies over a period of three
years, and its findings not only will help the five programs learn from
their experiences but also will share those experiences with the larger
field of adult literacy.
I. The Library Literacy Programs in This Study
The five
libraries participating in the LILAA persistence study are the New York
Public Library in New York City; the Greensboro Public Library in Greensboro,
North Carolina; the Redwood City Public Library in Redwood City, California;
the Queens Borough Public Library in Queens, New York; and the Oakland
Public Library in Oakland, California. In the two New York City-based
libraries, the study focuses on specific literacy programs operating in
six branches: Fordham and Wakefield in the Bronx, Seward Park in Manhattan,
and Flushing, Rochdale Village, and Central in Queens. In Greensboro,
the study focuses on the Glenwood and Chavis branches.
The library
literacy programs in the persistence study differ substantially in many
aspects of their operations. Some programs primarily provide ESOL services,
while others provide literacy instruction and adult education for students
who are native English speakers. Some of the programs are fairly small,
serving fewer than a hundred students, while others are much larger and
serve hundreds. Most of the programs use volunteer tutors to provide individual
one-on-one tutoring, but several programs also provide classes and other
forms of group instruction. All the programs have computer labs where
students can practice their literacy skills using educational software,
but the relative importance of computerized instruction varies across
the programs.
II. The Research Team and the Research Design
The evaluation
of the LILAA persistence study is being conducted by the Manpower Demonstration
Research Corporation (MDRC), a private nonprofit organization that tests
initiatives to improve the well-being and self-sufficiency of poor people,
and the National Center for the Study of Adult Learning and Literacy (NCSALL),
based in the Graduate School of Education at Harvard University. The reports
from this study reflect the ongoing collaboration among the two research
organizations, the literacy program staff, and the students.
The evaluation
has two distinct components. The NCSALL team members lead a qualitative
research effort to study in depth the workings of the individual programs,
their efforts at improving student persistence, and the factors affecting
student persistence. Data collection for the qualitative component includes
extensive ethnographic interviews, participant observation, documentary
analysis, photography, focus groups, and Internet discussions. The MDRC
team leads a quantitative research effort to collect and analyze program
data over time. These data include such measures as students’ demographic
characteristics, retention in the program, hours spent in literacy activities,
and personal goals. By studying how these measures change over time and
relating such changes to the strategies to improve persistence, the quantitative
research aims to document the effects of those strategies. The two components
of the research are highly integrated and will inform one another at all
stages of the study.
III. Themes Related to Student Persistence
Student
persistence is a multidimensional concept. For students in literacy programs
to be successful, they must remain active in the program long enough,
participate for enough hours every week, receive instruction that fits
their needs, and overcome barriers and distractions that may interfere
with their ability to persist in achieving their goals.
Much of
the persistence study is centered on three categories of “themes”
that are developed for the first time in this report. Such themes describe
student persistence and its patterns, the forces supporting or inhibiting
persistence, and the relationship between program interventions and persistence.
Programmatic themes explore the organization and integration of the literacy
programs within the larger library systems and the programs’ reflection
of such core library principles as open access, privacy, and the respect
and care that library programs show for adult students. Instructional
themes that have been identified in the research include the quality of
curricula and student assessment, the roles of technology, and the use
and experience of volunteer tutors. Lastly, student-based themes focus
on learning disabilities, students’ cultural and personal identities,
their sponsors, and their personal goals. All of these themes, and their
manifestation in the five libraries’ literacy programs, are described
extensively in this report.
IV. Strategies to Improve Student Persistence
Staff members
at each of the five sites in the LILAA persistence study have identified
specific strategies that they plan to implement to increase student persistence
in their literacy programs. These strategies fall into four categories:
informational strategies, support strategies, operational strategies,
and programmatic strategies.
A.
Informational Strategies
As a first
step in addressing the issue of student persistence, the library literacy
programs have been asking their students (and sometimes staff members
and tutors) how the programs can better support student persistence; such
information was gathered by using focus groups, interviews, surveys, E-mail,
List Serves, and staff meetings. For example, staff at Oakland’s
Second Start program conducted five focus groups with students and tutors
during the first half of 2000, interviewed individual students who had
left and returned to the program, and sent out a survey to all students
and tutors. The staff compiled this information and discussed the results,
finding few surprises. As expected, students asked for longer program
hours, more classes, and a shorter wait to be matched with a tutor. The
research did, however, produce two promising new insights: (1) students
were more responsive to the idea of quarterly or semiannual reassessments
of their literacy progress than staff expected them to be; and (2) students
asked for more services for the entire family, focused not only on literacy
but also on such critical topics as violence prevention, nutrition, hygiene,
and manners. Thus, Second Start’s implementation of informational
strategies suggested new program components that might increase student
persistence.
Informational
strategies also include quantitative data collection, such as tracking
students’ participation records and demographic characteristics.
Two of the sites, Oakland and Greensboro, worked directly with the research
team to develop a new database system for collecting quantitative data.
This system will benefit both the research effort and program management.
B.
Support Strategies
As this
report was being prepared, a number of new support strategies were under
consideration by the programs, and several had been implemented. Lack
of child care is often mentioned as a barrier to participation, but providing
child care is expensive and potentially exposes programs to liability
issues, so it is not yet a widely adopted support strategy. One exception
is Redwood City, where Project READ offers preschool activities in the
library for young children whose parents are meeting with a tutor or using
the computers. Programs also have initiated family-based literacy activities,
such as “family literacy night” in Oakland, which help address
child care issues and at the same time offer valuable learning opportunities
for the children.
Transportation
problems are another barrier to participation, more so in some of the
programs than in others. Oakland already provides transportation vouchers
to its students, and other programs have considered doing so, but internal
logistical reasons are making implementation difficult in some programs,
and the inadequacy of the public transportation system in general is a
problem in other programs.
Other support
strategies that have been implemented or are under consideration include
stress reduction classes, better information and referrals to outside
agencies, and special services for prospective students who are on waiting
lists.
C.
Operational Strategies
Staff members
at most of the programs are considering operational strategies that include
increasing the hours of operation, improving student access to technology,
and hiring more staff. Some programs already have extended their operating
hours, which is easier to do when a program is located in its own space,
rather than within a library building where hours may be less flexible.
Second Start
in Oakland and the New York Public Library have both expanded their operating
hours in order to be more accessible to students who work. This is an
increasingly important consideration as more adult students move from
welfare to work. In January 2000, Second Start added three more night
sessions per week. Similarly, Saturday hours are now offered at the Fordham
branch of the New York Public Library, and library staff at this site
will monitor student participation to determine whether persistence increases.
D.
Programmatic Strategies
Potential
programmatic strategies to increase student persistence include making
the curriculum more relevant to students, recruiting students in innovative
ways, redesigning tutor training, redesigning student and tutor orientations,
focusing on student and program goal-setting, and marketing other library
services.
Beyond the
literacy program’s services, students may be unaware of the variety
of resources available to them in the library, such as help with tax forms,
access to the Internet, and various social and cultural events. Greensboro
Public Library has begun to develop a campaign that will market many such
library opportunities to students and potential students. This campaign
began with a community-wide effort called Community of Readers, the goal
of which is to increase both persistence rates and the use of library
resources.
In another
example of programmatic strategies, Redwood City’s Project READ is
paying special attention to the problems facing students who have learning
disabilities and other special needs. During each student’s initial
assessment, staff members ask a series of questions designed to discover
that person’s learning challenges. Later, a learning specialist discusses
these challenges with the student’s tutor, identifying teaching strategies
and making recommendations for individualized instruction.
For many
students, tutors represent the face of the literacy program. Tutors need
training and ongoing support to provide high-quality instruction, and
several programs in the study are seeking to increase student persistence
by improving their tutor training. For example, in the fall of 2000, the
New York Public Library program completely redesigned its tutor training
process.
The Queens
Borough Public Library program is seeking to improve student persistence
by making goal-setting an explicit part of the program experience and
by creating specific benchmarks based on the traditional school calendar.
The program will be structured around modules of instruction, and students
and tutors will be encouraged to focus on completing the modules. Students
will also set goals in the fall and will check on their progress toward
these goals several times during the year.
Orientations
for new students entering the program are another focus of programmatic
strategies to increase persistence. At Second Start in Oakland, orientations
for new students are planned and implemented by current students, whose
participation in this activity is part of an effort to increase their
voice in setting the direction of programming.
V. What to Expect from the Persistence Study
Specific
lessons regarding the implementation and outcomes of persistence strategies
in library literacy programs for adult students will emerge as the study
continues. The present report describes the five library literacy programs
and their efforts to increase student persistence through the fall of
2000. In 2002, an interim report will describe the first full year of
implementation and present an early analysis of quantitative persistence
data. A final report, to be completed in 2003, will present analyses of
all the data collected, including an analysis of how persistence affects
student performance on a battery of standardized literacy tests. The final
report will also include estimates of the costs of implementing persistence
strategies and will advise program designers and policymakers about how
to increase student persistence.
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