Promoting Health Literacy Among Adult ELLs Virtually During COVID-19

Abstract

The adult English language learner (ELL) population is often overlooked in health literacy discussions, which can result in perpetuating low health literacy and unfamiliarity with and low access to community resources. Health literacy interventions can reduce the impacts of social determinants of health. We examine the experience of a virtual health literacy educational course, Health in the English Language, for ELLs at Alaska Literacy Program (ALP), an Anchorage nonprofit. Our class was designed to help students navigate interactions with health care services, including medical care, pharmacy, health insurance, and nutrition resources. After 2 years of in-person teaching by university undergraduates, COVID-19 required a pivot to virtual instruction in Zoom in the summer of 2020. Instructors describe lessons learned and adjusting to student needs, community-building and personal connections, and the complexities of the topic of health literacy. ALP collaboration with university students continues to be a successful partnership to build health literacy capacity. Adoption of virtual instruction during COVID demonstrated the role that partnerships between nonprofits and university students can play to benefit all partners in the collaboration.

Keywords

health literacy health education college / community partnerships university / college health community intervention health promotion

Get full access to this article

View all access options for this article.

References

Abel

McQueen

(2020). Critical health literacy and the COVID-19 crisis. Health Promotion International, 35(6), 1612–1613. https://doi.org/10.1093/heapro/daaa040

Center for Applied Linguistics. (2019a). BEST literacy. https://www.cal.org/aea/bl/

Center for Applied Linguistics. (2019b). BEST plus 2.0. https://www.cal.org/aea/bp/

Han

H. R.

Kim

Cudjoe

Kim

M. T.

(2019). Familiarity, navigation, and comprehension: Key dimensions of health literacy in Pap test use among Korean American women. Journal of Health Communication, 24(6), 585–591. https://doi.org/10.1080/10810730.2019.1607955

Johnson

R. M.

Shepard

Van Den Berg

Ward-Waller

Smith

Weiss

B. D.

(2019). A novel approach to improve health literacy in immigrant communities. HLRP: Health Literacy Research and Practice, 3(3), S15–S24. https://doi.org/10.3928/24748307-20190408-01

Nutbeam

Lloyd

J. E.

(2021). Understanding and responding to health literacy as a social determinant of health. Annual Review of Public Health, 42. https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev-publhealth-090419-102529

Santos

M. G.

Handley

M. A.

Omark

Schillinger

(2014). ESL participation as a mechanism for advancing health literacy in immigrant communities. Journal of Health Communication, 19(Suppl. 2), 89–105. https://doi.org/10.1080/10810730.2014.934935