SENATE MEMORIAL 6

50th legislature - STATE OF NEW MEXICO - second session, 2012

INTRODUCED BY

Howie Morales

A MEMORIAL

PROCLAIMING JANUARY 18, 2012 AS "ADULT BASIC EDUCATION AND LITERACY DAY" IN THE SENATE.

     WHEREAS, in a future in which the work force is expected to be increasingly dependent on technology, New Mexico needs a highly literate population; and

     WHEREAS, more than forty percent of the adult population in New Mexico is reported to have literacy problems that severely affect their lives and families, their ability to work productively and their full participation as residents of the state; and

     WHEREAS, between 2010 and 2011, New Mexico's community colleges and universities and its volunteer community-based organizations provided basic skills and literacy services to more than twenty-six thousand individuals enrolled in post-secondary education or training, amounting to one million six hundred ninety thousand hours of instruction; and

     WHEREAS, during the same period, two thousand three hundred forty-eight individuals received their general educational development diplomas, more than one thousand individuals enrolled in post-secondary educational or training institutions and two thousand thirty-five individuals entered or retained employment; and

     WHEREAS, the higher education department, the New Mexico coalition for literacy and numerous adult basic education programs and community-based and nonprofit literacy organizations are jointly committed to eradicating illiteracy in the state; and

     WHEREAS, without this array of adult basic education and literacy programs, adult New Mexicans would find it difficult to access the services and benefits to which they are entitled;

     NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED BY THE SENATE OF THE STATE OF NEW MEXICO that January 18, 2012 be proclaimed as "Adult Basic Education and Literacy Day" in the senate; and

     BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that copies of this memorial be transmitted to the secretary of higher education and the executive director of the New Mexico coalition for literacy.

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