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1. Definition of Functional Illiteracy
2. Extent of the Problem
3. Why We Do Not See the Extent of the Problem
4. Seriousness of the Problem
5. English Spelling Confuses Everyone
6. the Solution in a Nutshell
7. The Obvious Solution Never Tried
8. Characteristics of NuEnglish
9. Spelling Reform is the Only Proven, Easy Solution to English Illiteracy
10. Learn to Read Now!
11. All Reasonable Objections to Spelling Reform Have Been Debunked
12. Twelve Serious Linguistic Problems With English Spelling
ABOUT US/CONTACT INFO
Amazon.com reviews
Celebrities Who Support Literacy
Home (in NuEnglish)
The Good News of John (in NuEnglish)
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ABOUT US/CONTACT INFO
The author of this website is Bob Cleckler, a retired Chemical Engineer who worked as an Aerospace, Product, or Safety Engineer for Hercules Inc. for 29 years. In 1985 he read Jonathan Kozol’s shocking 1985 book, Illiterate America. Kozol’s book describes the serious physical, mental, emotional, medical, and financial problems that functional illiterates must constantly endure. In Cleckler’s last position as a Safety Engineer in a $400 million solid-propellant rocket motor manufacturing plant, he had to pay meticulous attention to every detail of rocket motor manufacturing in order to prevent an explosion which could kill several workers and cause millions of dollars in damage. This position was an excellent preparation for the research he decided to do in order to find a solution to English functional illiteracy. Cleckler read every book available in the large Marriott Research Library at the University of Utah and in the Salt Lake City main library on the subject of his research. After more than a year of such research, he used his engineering experience of writing numerous engineering reports to write a book titled Instant Literacy for Everyone, published and totally financed by Northwest Publishing in 1993.
After reading the report of the most extensive study of U.S. adult literacy ever commissioned by the U.S. government, titled Adult Literacy in America, Cleckler was shocked at how widespread the problem of functional illiteracy is in America. He became more passionately devoted to his humanitarian project of ending English functional illiteracy. He formed a non-profit educational corporation, Literacy Research Associates, Inc. in 2001. He did additional research and wrote a much-improved book titled Let’s End Our Literacy Crisis. This book was published and totally financed by American University & Colleges Press, an imprint of American Book Publishing, in early 2005.
Let’s End Our Literacy Crisis won Finalist Awards in two book competitions for books published in 2005. It was one of six finalists out of 49 entrants in the Education/Academics category of the USABookNews.com Best Books Award competition with 1000 to 2,000 total entrants and was one of eight finalists in the education category of the Foreword magazine Book-of-the-Year Award competition with 1540 total entrants.
Dr. Michael Shaughnessy, Professor of Special Education at Eastern New Mexico University, requested and received an internet interview with Cleckler about Let’s End Our Literacy, which he published on the EducationNews.org website. When asked where he had read the book, he replied by email, “I have read the book from the local public library, and I agree with you 100%.”
Gary Sprunk purchased and read Let’s End Our Literacy Crisis in 2005 from Amazon.com. Sprunk has a Bachelors Degree in Engineering, a Masters Degree in English Linguistics, and a genius mentality. After talking with Cleckler about the solution to English functional illiteracy, he decided – without Cleckler’s request or even his suggestion – to form an educational corporation to promote Cleckler’s solution to ending English functional illiteracy. His corporation, NuEnglish, Inc. is a non-profit educational corporation and a 501(c)3 public charity, incorporated in Arizona in April 2007.
After additional research and writing, Cleckler revised and updated his book. A much-improved version, Let’s End Our Literacy Crisis, Revised Edition, was published and totally financed by American University & Colleges Press on May 1, 2009. The Amazon.com detail page for the book provides a description of the book, information on how the book evolved (see "More About the Author"), an editorial review and ten customer reviews, some of them by Amazon's top reviewers. Amazon.com detail page
Gary Sprunk hired a professional web designer to prepare our website home page, http://nuenglish.org and http://nuenglish.net for additional information about problems of English literacy, and http://nuenglish.com for more information about our books and our humanitarian project. Sprunk developed a computer program which will quickly convert up to about 25 pages of traditional English material into NuEnglish, our proposed spelling system. This program, titled “Respeller,” is free for all to use on our home page, nuenglish.org. Respeller now has a database of 578,000 English words and more English words are being added. Sprunk also wrote a book, Beginner’s NuEnglish Workbook, published in 2008 based upon his experience of teaching English to young children in South Korea and university students in Thailand.