VALBEC has established links over the years with Canadian adult literacy practitioners through visiting academics and the journal 'Literacies'. Tannis Atkinson will present her perspective on the Canadian situation for adult literacy programs and practitioners that will most certainly have resonance with current trends in the adult education environment in Australia.

Research about adult literacy in Canada flourished in the 1990s: at the same time as Statistics Canada took the lead on the International Adult Literacy Survey (IALS).
This fund supported scholarly research and a number of initiatives supported the development of practitioner and practice-based research. In the past decade, the National Literacy Secretariat was shut down and responsibility for adult literacy was transferred to the federal department of Human Resources and Skills Development. Since this shift, virtually the only research supported by government is work that elaborates on, or applies, the framework and findings of IALS. Little value is placed on what practitioners know about effective practice, about the complexities of adult literacy work and about the multiple barriers that adult learners face.
Tannis will provide insights into questions as to what conditions supported practitioner research, and why is it no longer valued? How is the field affected by the growing restriction on whose knowledge counts?

The daughter of a statistician and a water-colour painter, Tannis Atkinson got involved in adult literacy in 1981 after a man in a Toronto store asked for help reading labels on food. Because she had grown up in Ecuador, Ghana and India being told that literacy was proof of 'development' she became curious about what literacy meant in Canada.

During the 1980s she worked in community-based programs teaching small groups, training tutors and coordinating learner publishing projects. A plain language editor for many years, Tannis was the founding editor of Literacies, Canada's journal linking research and practice. Currently a PhD candidate at the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education at the University of Toronto, she is an avid birdwatcher and a dabbler in book arts.

Tannis is in Australia to attend Deakin University’s Faculty of Arts and Education Institute for Citizenship and Globalisation International Conference on Migration, Citizenship and Intercultural Relations.

Refreshments provided, purchase own drinks

Cost: Free but booking is essential

RSVP by November 13 to info@valbec.org.au

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