Quebec is stalling in the fight against illiteracy, deplores the Literacy Foundation. More than half of the Quebec population (52%) can still be considered functionally illiterate, according to the most recent data from an international survey published this week.
In 2012, 53% of Quebecers aged 16 to 65 were unable to reach level 3 in literacy (see details below), that is to say they had difficulty understanding a opinion text in a daily newspaper, underlines André Huberdeau, president of the Literacy Foundation.
“At this level, reading the newspaper becomes extremely difficult because you have difficulty making a judgment,” he explains.
However, 10 years later, new data on literacy skills obtained as part of an assessment program by the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) show that the situation has not really improved in Quebec.
The Foundation rather expected a decrease in this proportion of around five percentage points, due to the demographic curve since older people, and therefore more likely to have a low level of literacy, have now passed the age threshold. 65 years old.
“Quebec still has a long way to go,” notes Mr. Huberdeau.
However, more detailed analyzes will have to be carried out in the coming weeks in order to determine to what extent the recent increase in the number of immigrants has weighed in the balance, specifies the Foundation.
Lagging behind in Canada
Internationally, Quebec has still progressed over the past 10 years, since its literacy skills now exceed the average for OECD countries.
However, the scenario is less encouraging at the Canadian level, since Quebec still finds itself lagging behind, occupying eighth place provincially in terms of literacy, as was the case 10 years ago.
British Columbia is now the Canadian champion in this regard, even coming fourth in the world.
Literacy skills are essential to enable a society to evolve in a knowledge economy, underlines Mr. Huberdeau.
“If we are not able to keep up, we will quickly be downgraded, we will not be able to adapt to technological innovations,” he laments. Literacy is the basis of everything.”
What are the six levels of literacy?
0: Know basic vocabulary
1: Understand short texts presenting a single piece of information.
2: Make the link between the text and the information, in a text with two or more pieces of information.
3: Read dense or long texts requiring interpretation and making sense of information.
4: Evaluate long and complex texts requiring prior knowledge.
5: Know how to integrate, evaluate, synthesize several texts and their subtleties. Requires specialized prior knowledge and understanding of logic and concepts.
Source: Read to Succeed Foundation, based on the Program for the International Assessment of Adult Competencies of the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD).
