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Letter: Literacy essential for lifelong learning

Editor, Gazette-Journal:

Adult Literacy on the Middle Peninsula, Inc., recognizes that Sept. 8 is the 50th anniversary of International Literacy Day. The day was the idea of UNESCO, the United Nations Education, Scientific and Cultural Organization, with the purpose that literacy (the ability to read and write and develop writing proficiency) is a human right which is essential for lifelong learning and social change.

The word “literacy” may be an unfamiliar word to many, but the word is synonymous to “reading” and literacy means the ability to read, write, spell, to use language, numbers, images, computer and other basic means to understand and to communicate and gain useful knowledge and use a symbol system of a culture; all according to Merriam-Webster.

With 36 million U.S. adults with low literacy skills, that fact explains the reason for community based literacy organizations such as Adult Literacy on the Middle Peninsula, Inc., whose mission is to provi...

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