Overcoming Illiteracy in Guatemala
Guatemala has the lowest literacy rate in all of Latin America. The country also rates lower on the United Nations’ Human Development Index than any other country in the region. At the root of these sad statistics is an educational system that fails to keep poor children in school or to offer the basic skills they need to improve their lives. Schools lack funds to buy books, train teachers, provide financial assistance or implement effective reading programs.
Libraries in rural Guatemala – in the few communities that have them – are severely underfunded and are open to the public intermittently at best. Book lending programs are practically nonexistent, and children rarely have easy access to books in libraries that do exist. The books themselves are often outdated, and many are irrelevant to children’s interests and needs. The result of all these factors is widespread illiteracy and a severe lack of educational opportunity.
- More than 50% of the region’s indigenous children never make it through primary school and only 24% finish middle school.
- In some indigenous areas, as many as 75% of the women cannot read or write.
- Most teachers and librarians have only the equivalent of a high school diploma and almost none have had specific training in reading promotion or literacy education.
