Poor literacy correlates to high crime

http://www.thebahamasweekly.com/publish/preventative-measure-gamal-newry/Poor_illiteracy_correlates_to_high_crime1266.shtml

This article first appeared in Jul 2007,

Further to the discussion stated in Mondays Tribune J. Barrie Farringtion and picked yesterday by Phillip Simon, concerning the educational dilemma facing the nation. It is my suggestion that the spree of violent crime that we now are experience is directly related to the poor academic achievement in our schools. That is to say that there exist a major correlation between poor education and crime. As if education wasn't important enough to our nation's future and ability to compete in the world, we seem to be ignoring the fact that in terms of dollars and "sense" we are spending millions on putting more and more people in prison while neglecting the very thing that could alleviate the problem.

Brian Nutt states in Tuesday Tribune that,

"We are see applications from persons who lack the necessary skills"

J Barrie Farrington sums it up appropriately when he says in the Tribune

"What we are looking at is a failure of immense consequences. It is a real nightmare, a horror movie..."

Having worked in law enforcement all of my life I have experienced this nightmare firsthand. On many occasions I have dealt with suspects and perpetrators of violent crime who could not even spell their name let alone read the statement that I had to write for them. To add insult to injury, but really this is an accompany symptom, the comprehension level was greatly diminished resulting from a limited vocabulary or one that which consistent with the mainstream.

So when Phillip Simon according to Tuesday's Tribune says "We operate in a service based economy which requires high level of interaction with person form all over the world'

Is he speaking to the inability of the poorly educated person to relate and reason out simple problems, basically because they cannot understand what is being said or written? Illiteracy is a major barrier to communications it is indeed how we communicate let aside form basing in the head a fellow human being because they just did not understand what was being said or the frustration of communicating my ideas.

It is this frustration I believe that cause persons to react violently and irrationally, the problem in their opinion seems so overwhelming that they resort to the basic of human instinct's 'kill or be killed'. This reaction is normal as all of us have it, however how quickly we arrive at this alternative means that we would have exhausted all others.

Is this concept unique to the Bahamas, a 1996 separate studies by Harvard and Berkeley examined this correlation, an according to Bruce Kennedy, the lead researcher of the Harvard study, "The size of the gap between the wealthy and less well-off, as distinct from the absolute standard of living enjoyed by the poor, appears to be related to mortality." accompanied by the following social problems:

• Higher rates of homicide.
• Higher rates of violent crime.
• Higher rates of incarceration.
• Higher rates of unemployment

The list is not complete and there were quite a few problems but what stood for me is the item on the list that said

• Poorer educational performance, including worse reading skills, worse math skills.

Sounds familiar, I wonder if we from a national perspective realize how all echelons of society affected each other. Earlier I mentioned my time as a police officer having ot deal with the various criminals. There were many attempts to reason and justify their deviance, one of which came vary regularly, that is; they see the banker, lawyer, politician and religious leader committing the same or similar offence. So the rational is if they can do it then why can't I.

What compounds this crisis is that education is usually equated with high salary, higher standards of living. I do not necessary agree with this concept. However this is what is being taught in the schools and our various formal social systems. So are we to say failure to succeed in academics, sentences a great number of our population to a life of crime.

Now for clarity I must interject that I am quite aware that most of the high dollar loss crime events occur in the financial and business sector and perpetrated by more educated and affluent individuals. However the more violent high loss of life crimes are committed by the less educated poorer members of our society.

Gamal Newry is the President of Preventative Measures, a Loss Prevention and Asset Protection Training and Consulting Company, specializing in Policy and Procedure Development, Business Security Reviews and Audits, & Emergency and Crisis Management. Comments can be sent to P.O. Box N-3154 Nassau, Bahamas or, email; info@ preventativemeasures.org or visit us atwww.preventativemeasures.org