adult literacy

Adult Charter School Proposed for Nashville County

/ The Old Crank

The Tennessean reports today that Goodwill Industries of Middle Tennessee is pursuing a  charter for an adult charter school, taking advantage of the opportunity created by recent changes to the state’s charter school law. Here are the details (note the critical caveat in the last sentence):

A Goodwill vice president said Tuesday she pursued a charter after being approached by a former employee in Nashville Mayor Karl Dean’s office to help some of the county’s 60,000 adults without a high school diploma.

Excel Academy, proposed by Goodwill Industries of Middle Tennessee, hopes to serve adult dropouts.

“The barrier to getting a job is that they don’t have a high school diploma,” said Goodwill of Middle Tennessee Vice President Betty Johnson. “There is a huge unmet need.”

Goodwill will give $100,000 in startup money for the program, fashioned after one in Indiana that has a waiting list of more than 2,000 adults. However, school district officials say it’s unclear whether state K-12 funding will cover adults who dropped out years earlier. (my emphasis)

New Wrinkle in Alexandria Adult Education Controversy

/ The Old Crank

(Updated Below)

Sharon McLoone reports for the Old Town Alexandria Patch that Alexandria Virginia City Public Schools Superintendent Morton Sherman announced last Friday evening that ACPS has placed an employee on administrative leave pending the outcome of an investigation into “possible testing irregularities” in the ACPS Adult Education Program.

According to an ACPS statement, this incident provides evidence as to why restructuring ACPS Adult Education is so critical. “[N]ow is the right time to restructure this program with licensed, experienced staff to ensure proper management, reporting, and instruction is taking place for the sake of our students. ”

As McLoone notes in her story, Sherman and the School Board’s efforts to restructure the program have been the subject of considerable controversy.

In an odd coincidence, “Sherman and the School Board” was also the name of that really terrible band that played at your prom in 1966.

You can read the entire ACPS statement here.

Questions concerning assessment data collection are not unheard of in adult education. It would be interesting to know what warranted placing an employee on leave in this particular case.

UPDATE 4/6/12: Michael Lee Pope of Connection Newspapers has provided details on the specific issues cited by the Division of Technology, Career and Adult Education and Literacy Services in the memorandum they sent to ACPS. According to the article, the memorandum “documented an inordinate number of adult education students received the same score on a basic skills test. It also pointed out that a total of 95 students supposedly took a speaking and comprehension test on the same day.”

UPDATE 4/11/12: More details from Lisa Gartner of The Washington Examiner.

House Republicans Introduce Their Workforce Investment Act Reauthorization Bill

/ The Old Crank

Yesterday House Republicans introduced their Workforce Investment Act (WIA) reauthorization bill, H.R. 4297, The Workforce Investment Improvement Act of 2012. This bill more or less pulls together the three separate WIA bills introduced earlier this year by Reps. Virginia Foxx (NC), Rep. Buck McKeon (CA), and Rep. Joe Heck (NV). I learned this morning at a meeting that there is one significant change in this bill from Rep. Foxx’s earlier bill, the Streamlining Workforce Development Programs Act. In the older bill, the provision that allowed states to consolidate different job training programs into one unified plan included Perkins grant funds as one of the programs that could be consolidated. In the new bill, language was added that removes Perkins as a candidate for consolidation. (h/t NASDCTEc)

House Democrats Workforce Investment Act Reauthorization Bill – What’s in it for Adult Literacy?

/ The Old Crank

Here is what they say it will do, anyway:

Developing a 21st Century Delivery System for Adult Education Literacy and Workplace Skills Services:

  • Expands access to adult education, literacy services, and workplace skills training.
  • Expands access to postsecondary education and credentials to achieve and maintain economic self-sufficiency for adult learners.
  • Supports integrated adult education and training.
  • Provides support for English-literacy services and integrated English-literacy and civics education programs for adult learners.
  • Authorizes increased investments in technology (such as online education) and digital literacy, providing needed training and education resources to rural and urban areas.
  • Enhances support for research on innovative methods and policies that help accelerate progress for basic skills students, improving the likelihood that they will receive postsecondary credentials.

The full text of the bill, announced by House Democrats and released today, is available here, via the National Skills Coalition.