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    Free community classes

    Free community classes: Reading, English, cooking and moving together, free for every adult.

    28% of American adults read at the lowest level measured, up from 19% in 2017. In a randomized trial, a free English class raised earnings by $2,400 a year.

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    Ryan K. Hertel · heyitskenton

    The problem

    What we're up against.

    • Reading skills are slipping.

      The share of adults reading at the lowest level rose from 19% in 2017 to 28% in 2023, and 34% are at the lowest level in math.

    • Millions of adults.

      That's about 58.9 million working-age adults at the lowest level in reading.

    • Too little movement, too little good food.

      Only 24.2% of adults meet both federal guidelines for aerobic and strength exercise, and the average American diet scores 58 out of a hundred on the federal index.

    • Lonely, together.

      About one in two American adults report feeling lonely.

    What works

    Proven, and ready to grow.

    • English classes that pay.

      In Massachusetts, adults given a seat in free English classes at random earned $2,400 more a year, a 56% gain, and the extra taxes they paid covered the classes with a 6% return.

    • Cooking classes change habits.

      Across studies, cooking classes improved people's confidence in the kitchen and how healthily they ate.

    • Skills that stretch a budget.

      Six months after a free Cooking Matters course, people managed food money better and worried less about running out, compared with similar families.

    • Moving lifts mood.

      Across randomized trials, exercise like walking, yoga and strength training worked as a treatment for depression.

    • Groups ease loneliness.

      Group programs reduced loneliness among older adults, with moderate-certainty evidence.

    What a family could fund

    Where the money goes furthest.

    • A proven class, for a year.

      The English program in that trial cost about $2,788 a seat a year.

    • Grow the free system.

      Federally funded adult education enrolled 1.3 million learners in a year, spending about $750 each.

    • People are waiting.

      35.6% of adult education providers kept a waiting list.

    Honest limits

    What money can't promise.

    • Not every program pays off.

      A randomized trial of Washington's well-regarded job-training program found no gain in earnings after six years.

    • Cooking classes, not weight loss.

      Cooking classes didn't change body weight, and many studies had no comparison group or follow-up.

    • The group itself adds little.

      For physical activity, group programs did only slightly better than solo ones, and not significantly.

    • Weaker studies look better.

      Loneliness programs look more effective in weaker studies than in randomized ones, and doctors referring patients to community activities raised activity only slightly.

    Hard questions

    Asked and answered.

    1. You might ask

      Don't free classes just attract people who'd do fine anyway?

      Ryan

      That's why the randomized trial matters: among people who applied, those given a seat at random out-earned those turned away. It can't speak for adults who never apply.

    2. You might ask

      Do cooking classes make people healthier?

      Ryan

      They improve skills and what people say they eat, but they haven't been shown to change weight.

    3. You might ask

      Is the exercise evidence solid?

      Ryan

      It points one way, but most of the trials carry a risk of bias: only one met Cochrane's bar for low risk.

    In the slider

    See what your fortune could do here.

    Free community classes

    The slider prices this cause with these numbers:

    • About $2,788 pays for an adult's seat for a year in the free English program a randomized trial found raised earnings.
    • The whole need is the 58.9 million American adults reading at the lowest level.
    • A ceiling, not a waiting list: the national system serves about 1.3 million a year, for about $750 each, and many adults would never enroll.
    Try it in the sliderTalk to Ryan

    More of the Blueprint

    Keep reading.

    Back to Keep 100

    Sources

    Every number in this chapter, and where it came from.

    1. Source 1: U.S. Adults Score on Par with International Average in Literacy Skills, Below International Average in Numeracy and Problem-Solving Skills in Survey of Adult Skills (opens in a new tab)

      National Center for Education Statistics, 10 December 2024. Checked 16 October 2026.

      The US results of the international Survey of Adult Skills.

    2. Source 2: Immigrant Integration in the United States: The Role of Adult English Language Training (Heller and Slungaard Mumma) (opens in a new tab)

      American Economic Journal: Economic Policy, August 2023. Checked 16 October 2026.

      A randomized lottery for seats in free English classes in Framingham, Massachusetts.

    3. Source 3: US Adults Need Stronger Skills to Thrive in a Changing World (opens in a new tab)

      ProLiteracy, 11 December 2024. Checked 16 October 2026.

      A literacy nonprofit's conversion of the federal survey's shares into numbers of adults aged sixteen to sixty-five.

    4. Source 4: Participation in Leisure-time Aerobic and Muscle-strengthening Activities Among Adults: United States, 2020 (opens in a new tab)

      National Center for Health Statistics, August 2022. Checked 16 October 2026.

      The CDC's site refuses automated reads.

    5. Source 5: Average Healthy Eating Index-2020 Scores for Americans (opens in a new tab)

      US Department of Agriculture, Food and Nutrition Service, 21 April 2025. Checked 16 October 2026.

    6. Source 6: Our Epidemic of Loneliness and Isolation: The U.S. Surgeon General's Advisory on the Healing Effects of Social Connection and Community (opens in a new tab)

      Office of the US Surgeon General, 3 May 2023. Checked 16 October 2026.

    7. Source 7: The effect of culinary interventions (cooking classes) on dietary intake and behavioral change: a systematic review and evidence map (Hasan and others) (opens in a new tab)

      BMC Nutrition, 10 May 2019. Checked 16 October 2026.

    8. Source 8: Cooking Matters for Adults Improves Food Resource Management Skills and Self-confidence Among Low-Income Participants (Pooler and others) (opens in a new tab)

      Journal of Nutrition Education and Behavior, 1 July 2017. Checked 16 October 2026.

    9. Source 9: Effect of exercise for depression: systematic review and network meta-analysis of randomised controlled trials (Noetel and others) (opens in a new tab)

      BMJ, 14 February 2024. Checked 16 October 2026.

    10. Source 10: Interventions to Reduce Loneliness in Community-Living Older Adults: a Systematic Review and Meta-analysis (Shekelle and others) (opens in a new tab)

      Journal of General Internal Medicine, 10 January 2024. Checked 16 October 2026.

    11. Source 11: Immigrant Integration in the United States: The Role of Adult English Language Training (public access copy) (opens in a new tab)

      American Economic Journal: Economic Policy, August 2023. Checked 16 October 2026.

      The paper's cost section, in that program's dollars.

    12. Source 12: Adult Education Pays for Itself (Goetz) (opens in a new tab)

      New America, 7 May 2025. Checked 16 October 2026.

      A think tank's analysis of federal adult education data.

    13. Source 13: National Study of the Implementation of Adult Education: Compendium of Survey Results From 2018-19 (opens in a new tab)

      Institute of Education Sciences, March 2023. Checked 16 October 2026.

      A table row: providers with at least one waiting list, and their share.

    14. Source 14: Washington State's Integrated Basic Education and Skills Training (I-BEST) Program: Six-Year Impact Report (opens in a new tab)

      Abt Global, 31 March 2022. Checked 16 October 2026.

      A randomized trial, for the federal government.

    15. Source 15: Impact of Cooking and Home Food Preparation Interventions Among Adults: A Systematic Review (2011-2016) (Reicks, Kocher and Reeder) (opens in a new tab)

      Journal of Nutrition Education and Behavior, 25 September 2017. Checked 16 October 2026.

    16. Source 16: Individual versus group-based interventions: a systematic review and meta-analysis of physical activity, functional, psychosocial and health outcomes (Kritz and others) (opens in a new tab)

      Nature Human Behaviour, 15 April 2026. Checked 16 October 2026.

    17. Source 17: A meta-analysis of interventions to reduce loneliness (Masi and others) (opens in a new tab)

      Personality and Social Psychology Review, 17 August 2010. Checked 16 October 2026.

    18. Source 18: Effectiveness of social prescribing for chronic disease prevention in adults: a systematic review and meta-analysis of randomised controlled trials (Htun and others) (opens in a new tab)

      Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health, 22 February 2023. Checked 16 October 2026.