News about the Regional Consortia from CCAE

Important News from CCAE about the new Regional Consortia

This is a special announcement regarding AB 86, the law that is now in place to provide planning grants for Regional Consortiums for Adult Education. Please read this letter from Superintendent Torlakson and Chancellor Harris launching AB 86 and the Adult Education Consortium Program. Also, the California Department of Education (CDE) and the California Community Colleges (CCC) have developed a website that will provide future updates on regional consortiums http://ab86.cccco.edu/.

As CCAE's representative for the regional consortium effort, I will be giving you updates as I receive them from the CDE and the CCC. Also, if you wish to send me your ideas and thoughts on developing regional consortiums, please send them to me at christian.nelson@ousd.k12.ca.us. I will have more on the regional consortium effort in the October issue of the CCAE Communicator out in two weeks.


Chris Nelson
CCAE Past President

Restore protected funding for K-12 Adult Education in California

Add Adult Education to the list of non-flexible categoricals within the Local Control Funding Formula

Adult Education has been serving California for over 150 years, but in the last five years it's been cut to the bone. The Local Control Funding Formula puts Adult Schools at risk for further school closures because it does not provide designated funding for Adult Education. Adult Education empowers marginalized communities and creates a ripple effect that includes better community health, greater school success for children, stronger families, and reduced recidivism. It provides job training to put Californians back to work. The new Local Control Funding Formula for K-12 Public Education can safeguard Adult Education if it includes Adult Ed as one of the non-flexible categoricals - and then Adult Education can safeguard our state. Your signature supports this effort and tells our elected officials that Adult Education Matters!

Click the link to sign the petition:
http://petitions.moveon.org/sign/restore-protected-funding?source=c.url&r_by=7245183

PLEASE SHARE THIS PETITION WITH FAMILY & FRIENDS!  EMAIL YOUR CONTACTS & SHARE ON FACEBOOK!

The AEM Update Series: Working Together to Rebuild Adult Ed

http://adulteducationmatters.blogspot.com/2013/09/the-update-series-working-together-to.html
Adult Education Matters blog
by Cynthia Eagleton

Sunday, September 1, 2013

The Update Series: Working Together to Rebuild Adult Ed

Around the state, thanks to Prop 30, the Governor's May Revise, and MOEs (Maintenance of Effort Clauses that say that if an Adult School was open in 2012, it has to remain open and at the same funding level until 2014 when the new Regional Consortia programs kicks in)...

Adult Schools are hanging on, hanging in, and working hard for a brighter future.

What that brighter future looks like depends on current planning and future budgets. 

We can be part of both processes by sharing information with each other, the Legislature, and the Governor.

I want to run an Update Series that showcases what's happening in Adult Ed around the state, at K12 Adult Schools, in Community College Non-Credit Adult Ed Programs, in Family Literacy Programs, in Jails & Prisons, anywhere Adult Education is happening.  (An example about Oakland is here.)

What are our triumphs, challenges, needs, hopes and plans for the future?

What are we doing now that's working great to serve the needs of our communities?

What did we do in the past that worked great but may have been cut during the Budget Crisis?

By sharing information about present and our past with each other, we can move together into a better future for all California.

This, in fact, is the idea behind the Regional Consortia.  Region by region, providers of Adult Ed must work together to decide what will be taught to whom in their areas. 

We'll have the reward of local control if we can work cooperatively with each other.

Cooperation begins with sharing information then proceeds to choosing shared goals.

As they say, it's a process.

And to accomplish our goal of rebuilding Adult Education to fully meet the needs of our people, that process must begin now.

Interested in sharing some information about your school or program here?

Leave a comment here on the blog or email me at cyn period eagleton and the little sign for at and then gee and then mail.  Or message me on Facebook at cyn and then eagleton.

Photo Credit:  synchronicity.ca

Higher Education Committee Hearing on SB173; Bill to Be Re-examined in January

from Save Your Adult School blog

http://saveouradultschool.wordpress.com/2013/09/01/higher-education-committee-hearing-on-sb-173-bill-to-be-re-examined-in-january/

Posted on September 1, 2013 by kpursley

On August 14, SB 173 (Liu) was heard by the Assembly Committee on Higher Education.  After hearing arguments for and against the legislation, including a long line of opponents who had come to speak against the bill, many members of the committee expressed opposition or said they were not ready to vote for the bill as written.  The bill was converted into a two-year bill, and will be heard again in January.

If passed, SB 173 would, among other things, eliminate state funding for Older Adult, Parent Education, Health and Safety and Home Economics programs in both adult schools and community colleges. During the Assembly Education Committee hearing on the bill back in June, the organizations formally opposing the bill barely mentioned this feature of the bill as a reason to oppose it, though some members of the public who came to oppose the bill cited this reason.  At the August 14 hearing, the elimination of the designated programs was vigorously discussed, with many, including committee members, citing it as a reason to oppose or call for amendment of the bill.

In their discussion, several Higher Education Committee members pointed out that cutting programs now may be seen as a betrayal by Californians, who voted for Proposition 30 in hopes that there would be no further cuts to the state’s education system.  Others pointed out that, in the spirit of the Local Control Funding Formula, local communities should be able to work out what services best serve them through the new consortia.

Some individual committee members made statements that were highly supportive of adult schools. Assembly Member Steve Fox, (D) Palmdale, who has taught adult education classes, said that merging the community college and adult school systems was a big mistake, and that we should keep the current system, which “isn’t broken”.

Assembly Member Jose Medina, (D) Riverside, also a former adult education teacher, commented that education should be life long, and that, even with reduced resources, he does not think the program should be reduced.  As a former English as a Second Language teacher, he was wary of another feature of SB 173, its provision that funding for adult education programs be performance based. He pointed out that the progress of a new immigrant struggling to learn English at the age of 40 or 50 might be hard to measure accurately.

Reginald Jones-Sawyer, (D) Los Angeles, pointed out that Parent Education and even Home Economics classes could be a crucial resource for released prisoners reentering their communities, as many have been incarcerated since adolescence and have never developed those skills.

You can view the entire hearing here:

http://www.calchannel.com/recent-archive/

Here is a link to an article about the hearing in Edsource, by Susan Frey. The comments are well worth reading, as arguments for and against eliminating state funding for Parent Education and Older Adult programs are laid out in detail.

http://www.edsource.org/today/2013/bill-to-limit-focus-of-adult-education-is-temporarily-derailed/37376#.Ug4sjJKTh9I