What We Do

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International – Initiatives – Women in Literacy

Women, more often than men, live in poverty, suffer from disease, and deal with daily discrimination in their homes and in their communities. This often is due to cultural traditions and local laws that give men access to education, property, jobs, health care, and government participation that is denied to women.

ProLiteracy's Women in Literacy initiative gives women the reading, writing, and math skills they need to understand their rights and change their daily lives. Research shows that when women take these steps, the changes they make in their own lives extend into their families and communities with positive effects. For example:

• When low-income women increase their income, they use their new earnings to improve the education, health, and nutrition of their families. ^[1]
• As women become better readers and writers, they marry later and are more likely to use family planning, causing fertility rates to decline. ^[2]
• Attending school for even a few years helps women become better agricultural workers who generate more income ^[3] and take better care of their families.

Through the Women in Literacy: Critical Issues in Literacy series, ProLiteracy explores the health, human rights, and poverty challenges women face daily. The series shows how women's literacy initiatives help women gain new attitudes and skills, and the information they need to change their conditions:

• Literacy and Women's Health: Women play the central role in keeping their children and families healthy. (pdf)
• Literacy and Violence Against Women: Women in grassroots community programs and international forums confront gender-based violence. (pdf)
• Literacy and Self Sufficiency for Women: Women are becoming more responsible for supporting their families, even though they often are more isolated than men from the resources they need. (pdf)

¹ Chiefs of State and Cabinet Members of Foreign Governments, CIA Directorate of Intelligence, July 2002.

² Educating People: improving chances, expanding choices, 1995, UNESCO and UNICEF.

³ Adult Education in a Polarizing World, Education for All, UNESCO, 1997.