Our mission is to support the delivery of high quality literacy and related services to adults and families in Knox County who are inadequately educated for the changes of daily life.

Description:
Friends provides year-round basic education classes and life skills training to adults and families in Knox County that are functionally illiterate.

For the last three years the programs supported by Friends of Literacy have served more than 1,000 adult students each year with a significant portion of that number initially testing at the sixth grade level or below. The results of these programs are quite impressive.

History:
Since 1991 Friends of Literacy has been the voice of the illiterate. No other independent agency is actively involved in promoting and supporting academically based, state funded adult literacy programs within our county.

Friends of Literacy is:
Private (not government operated)
Independent (not part of a school system)
Not-for-Profit
Local (Serving only Knox County)
Governed by a volunteer board of local corporate and community leaders.
Membership based (individual and corporate donations)
Supported by local, regional, state, and national foundations and granting agencies.

We support programs that offer year-round daytime and evening adult education classes. Historically we have concentrated our efforts on support of programs that provide service to the lowest literacy levels. In 2004 we raised our criteria to include National Reporting System Level IV. In effect, we provide support to adult students from non-readers to those who function at the equivalent of the eighth-grade.

Contact people:

Melissa Nance, Executive Director, (phone), (email) Charlie Morgan, (phone), (email)

Address:

101 East Fifth Avenue, Room 217 Knoxville, TN 37917 (See a map)

Web Site: http://www.friendsofliteracy.org