MOVED to adopt the following statement concerning Corporation literacy goals:
1. General Goals
Literacy programs in which our members are involved should wherever possible be planned in cooperation with, and be acceptable to, the appropriate national and local authorities. Our normal goal is to promote literateness as a value for the community in general, to the point that the practice of reading and writing will continue without further assistance from us. When it is unrealistic or sociologically inappropriate to expect this from the community as a whole, our basic minimum goal is to bring about sufficient literateness to sustain the ongoing use of the vernacular Scriptures by some part of the community, plus whatever literateness is possible among the community in general.
2. Objectives for Specific Situations
It is the responsibility of our local administration, in consultation with the members assigned to the languages, to establish specific objectives for each situation. The extent to which activities in each of the following areas are appropriate, and necessary for the attainment of our overall goals, needs to be defined individually for each language group for which we work.
3. Activities
The scope of a particular literacy program should be determined with reference to the following: a. Attitude to literateness, i.e., the community in general and its leaders in particular have a positive attitude toward literateness in the vernacular. b. Orthography, i.e., a writing system that is sociologically acceptable to the local people and the national authorities, and as far as possible also pedagogically efficient. c. Literate persons, i.e., fluent readers and writers among the segments of the community which are important for ongoing literateness. d. Literature, i.e., a quantity and variety of published literature available and the capability of continuing authorship, publication and distribution of vernacular literature. e. Literacy instruction, i.e., pedagogical materials available and provision for the training of teachers and the offering of literacy instruction for both adults and children. f. Bilingual-bicultural opportunity, i.e., provision to facilitate the transfer of literacy skills between the vernacular and the trade or national language(s), and opportunity for individuals to enter the national life and education system. g. Distribution and use of vernacular Scriptures, i.e., provision for distribution of the Scriptures and cooperation with local people in encouraging their use. (The use of other media such as cassette recordings as an adjunct to the printed page may be included here.) In addition to the above activities consideration should be given to evaluating the effectiveness of the particular literacy program and providing reports and documentation concerning it for interested third parties. Recognizing the importance of providing assistance to our members in setting and regularly reviewing appropriate objectives, in designing and implementing programs, and in evaluating and documenting literacy activities:
MOVED that we urge branches not currently providing such assistance to select, train and appoint suitable people to meet this need. We also request divisions to emphasize our need for literacy personnel qualified to assist translation teams in the above way. (This supersedes the legislation of Corporation Conference 1971 entitled "Literacy Goals."). (1979)
