Today, family literacy is recognized as an effective approach to raising the literacy and language levels of children, adults and families. This national movement, with its unique focus on the educational needs of parents as well as children, started as a statewide initiative with a groundbreaking vision.

In the early 1980s, national concern about declining student achievement prompted educators and legislators to call upon community, policy and parental support in order to reach higher academic standards.

While many states were struggling with decreased literacy and increased poverty rates, Kentucky education leaders recognized the critical connection between parents with low skills and their children’s failure in school. In 1985, Sharon Darling, then Adult Education Director for Kentucky, and other state staff created the Parent and Child Education (PACE) program. The intense intervention, which ultimately provided services in 36 counties across the state, prepared adults for the GED while also providing interactive literacy activities for parents and their preschool children.

The PACE program soon gained national attention and, in 1988, was selected by the Ford Foundation and Harvard University’s Kennedy School of Government as one of 10 outstanding innovations in state and local government.

That same year, the William R. Kenan, Jr. Charitable Trust provided a major grant to develop three inner-city family literacy programs in Louisville, Kentucky, and four programs in rural North Carolina. The Kenan Trust wanted to adapt the PACE model so that it could be duplicated in any setting in the country.

More than 300 families participated in the Kenan program and both parents and children demonstrated significant literacy gains. A follow-up study found that after two years, none of the children participating in the program had been held back in school, and more than 75% of the children were rated by their current teachers as average or above average in both academic and social areas.

Based on this initial success, the Kenan Trust provided start-up funds in 1989 to establish the National Center for Family Literacy, with Darling as its president.

As private support for family literacy grew, Representative William Goodling, then Chairman of the House Committee on Education and the Workforce, sponsored legislation that would become the first federally funded family literacy program. With the support of Darling, Representative Goodling championed the Even Start Family Literacy Program, which began as a small demonstration program with 76 projects in 1989 and grew to more than 1,000 local projects that served an estimated 50,000 individuals in 2002-2003.

Since its inception, the National Center for Family Literacy has impacted more than one million families and trained 150,000 teachers, practitioners and advocates. Ongoing support from major corporations and foundations including Toyota, Verizon Communications, UPS, and the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation, as well as support from officials in the public arena, has enabled NCFL to propel family literacy to the forefront of educational reform.

Family literacy continues to increase economic and social opportunities for parents and children, their communities and the nation.