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Overview of Key Issues . Working Poor Families Project State Policy Academy on Adult Education Julie Strawn Center for Law and Social Policy jstrawn@clasp.org June 2007. What this academy is about.
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Overview of Key Issues Working Poor Families Project State Policy Academy on Adult Education Julie Strawn Center for Law and Social Policy jstrawn@clasp.org June 2007
What this academy is about • Introduce you to key state policy issues and ideas – emphasis here is on the people (adults with low skills/limited English), not on one program, and on job advancement • Scope is not limited to your state’s adult education/ESL program • Not going to be covering all the myriad goals and benefits of adult education /ESL—workforce focus • Provide a chance to hear about experiences of peers who are already working on these issues • Equip you with some resources for future work
Why should policymakers care? • Lesson from 2006 state min. wage campaigns-- “Start with shared value not with the problem” • Such as. . . “ Doors to opportunity should be open, help parents to help their children, college for all, compete for good jobs in knowledge economy, skill shortages, war for talent,” etc. • E.g. Philadelphia Workforce Board “Tale of Two Cities”
Why should policymakers care? • Themes related to shared values • Evidence that we can make a difference • Emphasis on solutions and benefits to individuals, to business, to state. • High expectations – because that’s what individuals need to support their families and what our community needs to get ahead
“Literacy in Everyday Life” (NCES 2007) • Median weekly earnings increased with each level of literacy. • At each higher level of Prose literacy, more adults were employed full time. • 1/2 of adults with Below Basic Document literacy said their job opportunities were limited a lot by lack of computer skills. • The % of parents who never helped their school-age child with homework declined at each higher Prose literacy level • 1/2 of US citizens with Below Basic Prose and Document literacy reported voting in 2000 compared with 84 percent of citizens with Proficient Prose and Document literacy.
Can we make a difference? • Go beyond correlations to outcomes related to shared values—i.e. if adults increase skills. . . • They will work more and earn more • Their children will do better in school • If they were in prison, less likely to return • All these things add up to benefits for community as a whole (helps employers grow, community to compete for knowledge jobs, increases tax revenues, etc.)
Can we make a difference? • Increasing parents’ skills helps their children succeed “Results from these recent rigorous studies have provided consistent and rigorous evidence that improvements in low-skilled parents’ education have positive payoffs for children. Moreover, these links are found across a range of potentially important outcomes, including birth outcomes, school readiness, academic achievement, grade retention, and educational attainment.” (Magnuson, 2007)
Can we make a difference? • Increasing ex-offenders’ skills means they’re less likely to return to prison “Various studies have found that raising education levels reduces recidivism. A Virginia study found that out of a sample of 3,000 inmates, 49 percent of those who did not participate in correctional education programs were re-incarcerated compared to 20 percent of those who did participate.” (Murphy 2006)
What is the urgency to addressing this? • Problem of low wage work—one in four families working but poor. Postsecondary a ticket up and out. • Employers now pay 75% more to college grads. than to those with high school only, used to be 40% back in the 1980’s. (Wall Street Journal, April 2007) • Looming skills shortage, at least for some sectors and regions. 24 of 30 fastest growing jobs require postsec. • Native workforce is aging—no new net growth expected through 2020 in prime age workers, immigrants becoming main source of workforce growth nationally • The rapid increase in skills of the workforce seen over the last 20 years is expected to slow dramatically (Aspen Institute 2002).
Share of Workforce Growth Due to Immigration Source: Sum, A., Fogg, N., Harrington, P. with Khatiwada, I., Trubb’sky, M., and Palma, S. (2002, August). Immigrant Workers and the Great American Job Machine: The Contributions Of New Foreign Immigration to National and Regional Labor Force Growth in the 1990s. Boston, MA: Northeastern University.
Workers with education beyond high school Source: Grow Faster Together. Or Grow Slowly Apart. (2002) Washington, DC: The Aspen Institute.
What is the urgency to addressing this? • School reform can’t fix this alone. • About two-thirds (65 percent) of our 2020 workforce is already beyond the reach of our elementary and secondary schools. (Aspen Institute 2007) • Trends in wrong direction—US only industrialized country where younger adults (25-34) are less educated than previous generation (45-54) (NCHEMS for CAAL 2007) • Current potential pool of skilled workers among prime-age adults—those nearly 50 million people aged 18 to 44 with a high school diploma or less—is equal to the next 16 years of high school graduating classes. • States need to “grow their own” skilled workforce from within the workforce they already have.
What does the primary system look like? • Adult Education and Family Literacy Act (AEFLA):Primary federal/state adult ed. program • Adult Basic Education (ABE):instruction in basic skills designed for adults at the lower literacy levels to just below the secondary level (40% 02-03) • Adult Secondary Education (ASE):instruction for adults whose literacy skills are at approx high school level and who are seeking to pass the GED test or obtain an adult high school credential (18% 02-03) • English Literacy (EL):instruction for adults who lack proficiency in English and who seek to improve their literacy & competency in English (43% 02-03)
AEFLA governance & administration • Federal level: Department of Education, Office of Vocational and Adult Education • State level: Adult education increasingly being administered by state departments other than the state K-12 agency • Administered by various departments at state level • Department of Education (in 2004, 62% of states ↓) • Department of Higher Ed (3) • Department of Community or Technical Colleges (8 ) • Within workforce agencies (8, Labor or Workforce Dev.)
Demographics of participants • In ‘04-’05, 2.6 million participants, most (83%) ages 16-44 but age varies across instruction area • 66% of ASE participants between 16-24 • ESL participants tend to be older (57% between 25-44, 20% over 45) • Ethnicity varies but largest group is Hispanic • 43% Hispanic, 27% White, 20% African-American, 7% Asian-Pacific Islander • Participants increasingly younger (possible effect of school reform?) • 39% between ages 16-24. In 2005 one third of GEDs awarded to those 18 or younger.
What is the capacity of the system? • Serves only tiny fraction of eligible population • Needs more resources—median funding per student is $645, state averages range from $312 to $2356 • Current adult education services do not help most participants to increase basic and English lang. skills in ways that increase earnings • Not intensive enough—often only 4 to 6 hours a week, 70% of instructors part-time. Majority do not stay long enough to even move up one grade level, most do not get GED. • Not connected to postsecondary education and training—primary program goal remains getting a GED, despite modest economic payoff and failure of most to reach that goal.
2002 Welfare Reform Adult Education Study • Participants received three times as many hours of instruction as typical adult education student—244 hours vs. 68 hours. • Generally thought to need about 100-150 hours of instruction to move up one grade level. • Gains in reading skills linked to how long students stay in adult education programs • Stays shorter than a year did not improve reading skills measurably, whereas longer stays were associated with substantial gains, comparable to those associated with regular high school attendance (one year of hs = 800 hours of instr.).
2002 Welfare Reform Adult Education Study • Participants earned GEDs within the first six months of adult ed. or not at all (within two years of follow up). Ditto for improving math scores. • Those most likely to get GED certificates and go on to postsecondary were those who had higher initial reading and math skills when they entered. • There was no clear link between hours of participation and GED receipt or average test scores. • Students increased reading and math skills more when their teachers were more experienced and better educated.
2002 Welfare Reform Adult Education Study • Earning GEDs, increasing basic skills, or subsequently participating in postsecondary programs all paid off in terms of employment, earnings, and self-sufficiency. • Few adult education participants achieved these milestones, though. E.g. 11% earned a GED or high school diploma over a two year period. • Those who got a GED were more likely to go on to postsecondary—but only 15% of all adult ed. participants did go on.
Community College Adult Basic Skills Education Outcomes (Prince and Jenkins, 2005) Source: Prince & Jenkins (forthcoming).
Diverse population of learners • Some have skills in the high school range • Just need a little refresher in specific areas (often math) to get GED quickly—e.g. those who’ve recently left high school. Models: Fast track GED, integrated adult ed/postsec., college prep. adult education. • Some have skills in roughly the middle school range (5th-8th grade) • May take a long time to get GED, more targeted remediation for entering job training may be better. Models: Bridge programs, integrated adult ed./postsec.
Diverse population of learners • Some have very low skills (below 5th grade) and may have learning disabilities. Models: Transitional jobs programs, specialized LD interventions, bridge pgms. designed for low skills • Bridges to Practice federal learning disability initiative and statewide action around this, e.g. http://www.floridatechnet.org/bridges/
Diverse population of learners • Some are well-educated immigrants who just need to learn more English, transfer existing skills. • E.g. Eastern European, Nigerian. Models: Integrated English and occupational training and/or college courses. • Some are immigrants who lack both English skills and formal education in their native countries • E.g. Somali, Hmong, some Hispanic groups. Models: Transitional jobs, bilingual job training followed by post-employment continued English classes.
Key state policy tasks • To help low skilled/LEP adults gain marketable skills, state has to be able to do four things: • Define and document what success is for low skilled adults, who’s getting there, who’s not—set high but realistic expectations and shorten the timeline • Connect adult education and ESL to postsecondary credentials for in-demand, family-supporting jobs • Connect these adult ed/ESL/occupational training programs to employers in direct ways • Support success in tangible ways—case managers, support services, paid release time, work-study jobs