Twenty-sixth International Conference on Learning

Abstract

Over the past years, European countries have taken several reforms, aiming at promoting literacy among school population and improving countries’ position in the PISA ranking. The problematic results of the population on this International literacy assessment substantiated the feeling of a “literacy crisis in Europe” (High Level Group of Experts on Literacy [HLG], 2012, p. 31) spread by ‘literacy sponsors’, such as UNESCO, OECD, and European Union (EU). In this sense, the HLG (2012), with the EU support, defined three key intervention policy areas for member states to “address the literacy needs of all their citizens” (p. 38): i) creating a more literate environment; ii) improving the quality of teaching; and iii) increasing the participation and inclusion. Within this analytical framework, this text seeks at characterizing 126 cases of adolescents’ literacy initiatives, programs and policy measures from Portugal, Spain, Greece, Romania, and Ireland. The corpus of collected documents regarding this cases was analysed according to six categories: goals; contexts; actors involved; planned activities; resources; and impact. The content analysis allows us to examine the extent to which the literacy policies and practices are meeting the recommendations and guidelines of the HLG. Ultimately, it allows the discussion of what might be the main effects of such initiatives on the adolescents’ school lives.