More than 1.6 million people have gained basic skills qualifications through the government’s Skills for Life strategy, official figures have revealed.
Skills for Life provides free literacy, language and numeracy tuition for adults in England who have skills below Level 2 (broadly equivalent to a GCSE grades A-C.)
Since the 2001 launch of the strategy, 1,619,000 learners have achieved a Skills for Life qualification in literacy, language or numeracy. This figure includes achievements by about 138,000 offenders.
The government has hits its public service agreement interim target of 1.5 million by 2007 and is well on the way to achieving its aim of 2.25 million adults by 2010.
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Phil Hope, minister for skills, said: “The recent Leitch Report on skills highlighted how good literacy and numeracy skills are essential for life and work. Improving your skills can help you earn more and will enable you to progress to further learning, as well as making you more confident and more able at home.”
The publicity campaign – featuring Gremlin characters – has raised awareness of the basic skills issue, tackled the stigma around admitting problems in literacy and numeracy and encouraged thousands of adults to improve their skills, Hope said.
