Seattle is the USA's most literate city

[Xstatic1]

Seattle is the USA's most literate city for the second year in a row, according to an annual ranking called America's Most Literate Cities.

The rankings, now in their fourth year, aim to rate the 70 largest U.S. cities not on whether their residents can read, but whether they do.

It considers several measures in six categories: newspaper circulation, number of bookstores, library resources, periodical publishing resources, educational attainment and Internet resources.

Rankings have remained stable despite some minor reshuffling from year to year. Nine of the top 10 are in the top 10 again this year. Boston fell from seventh to 11th place. Stockton, Calif., and El Paso again come in last and next-to-last, respectively.

"The top stayed at the top and the bottom stayed at the bottom," says researcher John Miller, president of Central Connecticut State University in New Britain, who developed the ranking system.

The Top Ten:
1) Seattle, WA
2) Minneapolis, MN
3.5) Atlanta, GA
3.5) Washington, DC
5) St. Paul, MN
6) Pittsburgh, PA
7) Cincinnati, OH
8) Denver, CO
9) San Francisco, CA
10) Portland, OR

Full article: http://www.usatoday.com/news/education/2006-12-11-seattle-reading_x.htm

 

[LongCoolMother]

*waits for inevitable flame-war when someone trips the wire by bringing up the 'correlation' between liberalness and literacy....*

 

[sthaznpride17]

Yay! for Seattle. I love this city.

 

[BrokenVisage]

who cares, I wanna know the most illiterate!

 

[wetcat007]

Yay for Minneapolis being number 2! Just got catch up to those people in Seattle now...

 

[Jinru]

Woot Seattle!!

 

[chrisms]

It's because we're all busy hiding away from the rain inside a Starbucks, drinking $15 cups of coffee while brushing the $10 muffin crumbs off of our North Face fleece pullovers while reading the latest opinion articles from the Seattle Times on our PDAs that we powered up in our giant H2s double parked in the traffic-filled street outside.

 

[KillerCharlie]

I live in Seattle now and used to live near Minneapolis. They may both be about the same as far as literacy goes. However, people in Minneapolis are much nicer and are way better drivers. I don't know why, but people in the midwest are just plain nicer.

I like living in Seattle as a young single guy because of all the outdoor activities (though greater Minnesota has ton). However, if I had to raise a family I'd pick MN hands down.

 

[Vertimus]

woot for minneapolis!

 

[lyssword]

I'm in WA state, been to seattle. They may be the most literate, but they are probably the worst/ manical drivers I've seen

 

[wazzledoozle]

Seattle ftw.

 

[Xstatic1]

Originally posted by: chrisms
It's because we're all busy hiding away from the rain inside a Starbucks, drinking $15 cups of coffee while brushing the $10 muffin crumbs off of our North Face fleece pullovers while reading the latest opinion articles from the Seattle Times on our PDAs that we powered up in our giant H2s double parked in the traffic-filled street outside.

this cracked me up! :laugh:

 

[Auryg]

Minnesota gets stuck with being associated with Iowa and the dakotas...We're basically a costal state in terms of intelligence, with the niceness of the midwest. "Minnesota nice."

 

[zephyrprime]

And here's what you all really wanted: The bottom 10

61. Santa Ana, CA
San Antonio, TX
Long Beach, CA
Anaheim, CA
Arlington, TX
Bakersfield, CA
Aurora, CO
Corpus Christi, TX
El Paso, TX
70. Stockton, CA

Whoah. CA is over representing! Why you peeps in CA no reeding?

 

[Jinru]

Originally posted by: Xstatic1

Originally posted by: chrisms
It's because we're all busy hiding away from the rain inside a Starbucks, drinking $15 cups of coffee while brushing the $10 muffin crumbs off of our North Face fleece pullovers while reading the latest opinion articles from the Seattle Times on our PDAs that we powered up in our giant H2s double parked in the traffic-filled street outside.

this cracked me up! :laugh:

lmao, couldn't have said it any better :laugh:.

 

[AreaCode707]

Must be the library system - I've never SEEN a place with so many libraries. Seems like anywhere between 1-3 per town.

 

[AreaCode707]

Originally posted by: zephyrprime
And here's what you all really wanted: The bottom 10

61. Santa Ana, CA
San Antonio, TX
Long Beach, CA
Anaheim, CA
Arlington, TX
Bakersfield, CA
Aurora, CO
Corpus Christi, TX
El Paso, TX
70. Stockton, CA

Whoah. CA is over representing! Why you peeps in CA no reeding?

Having lived in CA, there are NO dollars for community resources like libraries and such. I lived in a county with one library... that served for two counties.

 

[Cdubneeddeal]

Originally posted by: HotChic
Must be the library system - I've never SEEN a place with so many libraries. Seems like anywhere between 1-3 per town.

No doubt. My GF lives for libraries, B&N, and Borders. Moving all the books she owns is so much fun :disgust:

 

[Syringer]

Originally posted by: zephyrprime
And here's what you all really wanted: The bottom 10

61. Santa Ana, CA
San Antonio, TX
Long Beach, CA
Anaheim, CA
Arlington, TX
Bakersfield, CA
Aurora, CO
Corpus Christi, TX
El Paso, TX
70. Stockton, CA

Whoah. CA is over representing! Why you peeps in CA no reeding?

Too many immigrants..this is literacy in English right? Explains why Texas is highly represented there as well.

And to the people who say it's the libraries, I would think it's the other way around. Lots of literate people create demand for libraries, having a library does little to encourage people to read.

 

[bleeb]

Hey Portland is within the top ten! Nice.

 

[Matt2]

Seattle is also home to the largest population of college graduates in the United States.

 

[Matt2]

Rankings have remained stable despite some minor reshuffling from year to year. Nine of the top 10 are in the top 10 again this year. Boston fell from seventh to 11th place. Stockton, Calif., and El Paso again come in last and next-to-last, respectively.

LOL

My hometown is 15 minutes driving distance from Stockton, California.

I attend San Diego State University and I assure you, I can read and so can my family!

 

[mundane]

The rankings, now in their fourth year, aim to rate the 70 largest U.S. cities not on whether their residents can read, but whether they do.

Some people seem to be misunderstanding the study. It is not literacy rate, but more of a metric trying to define how much the population reads. BTW, I live in Long Beach, but would move to MSP in a heartbeat if it were possible.

 

[darianandre]

We rock. We do suck at driving(Not me of course). We don't drive H2's, don't know where you got that idea. There are a lot of libraries, I'm within walking distance of three. The levels of kindness vary depending on where you are. If you go to the U district, people there are pretty friendly compared to downtown. Laurelhurst people, right next door to UW, are stuck up snobs. There's lots of variety within this area.

 

[Ricemarine]

Who would've known...
Course, that still does not mean that we're one of the best cities to live in.
The hobos know how to write signs...
Except for those near the ghettos at downtown Seattle...