A GOLDENOPPORT UNI T YStrategies to Focus Adult Education
on College and Career
Barbara Baran & Julie Strawn for LearningWorks

about this report

This report was prepared by Barbara Baran and Julie Strawn
for LearningWorks. Barbara Baran is a Senior Partner at
Workforce Learning Strategies and a founding member of the
California EDGE Coalition. Julie Strawn is a Senior Fellow
at the Center for Postsecondary and Economic Success of theCenter for Law and Social Policy (CLASP) .
A list of people who were interviewed for this report ispresented in the Acknowledgments section at the end of thereport. The authors worked with Linda Collins from LearningWorks and the Career Ladders Project in the developmentof this report.
This report is second in a series addressing the basic skills
system in California. The first report, Rethinking Basic Skills
Education in California: Principles for Policymakers, wasauthored by Barbara Baran and published in January 2012 byLearningWorks.
LearningWorks was founded by the Career Ladders Project(CLP) for California Community Colleges, the Research andPlanning (RP) Group for California Community Colleges, andthe California Community Colleges Success Network (3CSN)
to facilitate, disseminate and fund practitioner-informed recommendations for changes at the system and classroom levels,
infusing these strategies with statewide and national insights.
LearningWorks is supported by the Walter S. Johnson Foundation and the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation.

1

March 2013

A Golden Opportunity
Despite still high unemployment, over thelong run California may face a skills gap that
could threaten our future prosperity and competitiveness. By 2020, much of California’s prime age
workforce will be from population groups that areunderrepresented in higher education. As a result,the Public Policy Institute of California predicts
that California will face a shortage of collegeeducated labor. Other reports point to a shortageof “middle skilled” workers as well.1
Yet many Californians are not eligible to enterhigh quality postsecondary programs because
they lack the basic English or math skills to do so,and California’s education and training system is
ill-prepared to meet their needs. Adult Education
programs, which together with the community
colleges provide basic skills education (see box
next page), were severely cut back during thestate’s long fiscal crisis, and many of those thatremain were created for an era in which a highschool diploma or GED was sufficient for obtaining a good job. As a result, these programs are
not adequately focused on preparing students toenter and succeed in postsecondary education andtraining and, in fact, very few students in basic
skills programs in California make the transition.
Lack of integration across institutions and programs—particularly between Adult Education andthe community colleges—and outdated program
design and pedagogy mean that remedial andEnglish-as-a-Second Language courses are often
duplicative and disconnected from career tech-1

nical and academic programs, erecting serious
barriers to student success. Students in basic skills
programs waste time and money as a result of
these problems, and many simply drop out.
California institutions and policymakers havetaken some steps to address these concerns. The
California Department of Education’s (CDE)
Adult Education program developed and hopes
to implement a new strategic plan that makes
transition to college and career a central goal.
With legislative support, the California Community Colleges (CCCs) implemented a Basic Skills
Initiative to improve outcomes for students withweak basic English and math skills. Still, there isclear evidence that outcomes for students in basic
skills programs continue to be poor:•

Most students in basic skills programs
make minimal progress;•

An extremely small share of students inbasic skills programs enter postsecondary
education and attain a certificate, degree,
or transfer to a four-year college;•

The length of time it takes students tomove through the levels of the basic skills
programs is one principal reason for thesedisappointing outcomes. Most students
simply drop out. For those who do not,beginning at lower levels of remediation
can add up to two years to a student’s time
to completion.

Defined as workers with some postsecondary education or training but less than a bachelor’s degree.

2

There has been considerable documentation of these
problems over the past three years. The California Budget
Project published a series of studies documenting how
few students in California’s basic skills “system” makesignificant gains; the Research and Planning Group for
California Community Colleges analyzed potential strategies for improving basic skills outcomes in the CCCs.2 The
Little Hoover Commission pointed to duplication anddisappointing results in the overall basic skills system, andrecommended transferring governance of the Adult Education program from the CDE to the CCCs.3 Very recently,
the Legislative Analyst’s Office (LAO) released a report
arguing for dedicated funding and the restructuring of thestate’s Adult Education system.4 Governor Brown’s 201314 budget proposal has given real urgency to this policy
discussion by recommending reinstatement of dedicatedstate funding for Adult Education, while also directing the
new funding to the CCCs, rather than CDE. However, theGovernor’s proposal does not address broader concerns
about the design and delivery of basic skills education.

Other states have confronted the same challenges withwhich California is now wrestling. Some have made major strides in redesigning their education and workforce
systems to accelerate students’ acquisition of basic mathand English skills and improve students’ success in accessing and completing postsecondary programs connected tolabor market opportunities.
The purpose of this brief is to help inform the current debate by examining what California might learn from theseexperiences, using four policy levers utilized successfully
by other states to facilitate the change: governance structures, state strategic plans and funding guidelines, innovation
initiatives, and accountability systems. The seven states interviewed for this study were Illinois, Indiana, Minnesota,
North Carolina, Ohio, Washington, and Wisconsin. We
begin with governance structures since that issue is raisedby the Governor’s proposal.

B a si c Skill s E du cati on Ro admap
Nationally, two principal kinds of basic skills services are offered to adult learners:
Adult Education and developmental education.
Adult Education
Includes adult basic education (ABE), for those at
the lowest skill levels of math and/or English; adultsecondary education (ASE) and GED preparation,
for those at higher levels; and English-as-a-Second
Language (ESL) instruction. Adult Education isfunded by Title II of the federal Workforce Investment Act and usually by state monies as well.

Developmental Education
Offered by community colleges, largely serves highschool graduates who are not college-ready (including ESL students). Developmental education is often
offered for credit, although frequently that credit is
not applicable toward a degree or transfer.

In California, the Adult Education program is administered by the California Department of Education, and primarily
delivered by a network of adult schools. In some communities, the community college is the designated Adult Education
program provider, although some community-based and other organizations also offer Adult Education. In addition todevelopmental education, some California community colleges offer non-credit basic skills programs very similar in theirservices to the Adult Education program. Overall, there is poor coordination across California’s basic skills programs,
including different approaches to assessment and outcomes measurement.

The California Budget Project’s At a Crossroads series included: Basic skills education in California (updated April 2010); Financing basic skills education in
California (April 2010); Basic skills students: Who succeeds and why (May 2011); and Gateway to a better future: Creating a basic skills system for California(May 2011). For the report by the Center for Student Success and the Research and Planning Group of the California Community Colleges, see Borach, etal., (2007).
3
Little Hoover Commission, (2012) Serving students, serving California: Updating California community colleges to meet evolving demands.
4
Steenhausen, (2012) Restructuring California’s adult education system.
2

3

Integrating adult basic education and community college
governance to help more basic skills students transition into
postsecondary education

In California, the basic skills programs in the community colleges andthose of the Adult Education programof the California Department of Education (CDE) have historically been
under separate governance, though
in a few communities the community
colleges are the official Adult Education program provider. Governor
Brown has now raised the question ofwhether outcomes for Adult Education students would be improved byintegrating Adult Education and community college governance.
Looking across the country, the K-12
agency operates Adult Educationin the majority of states; although
recently, a number have made thedecision to move their Adult Education programs to the community
or technical college system, and at
least one has created an overarching policy coordination body. Whatdifference does combined governancemake? Shifting governance poses real
challenges and dangers; in doing so,states need to pay attention to how
all the populations served by Adult
Education will be affected. Most of
the reform strategies described insubsequent sections of this paper canbe implemented without a change ingovernance.5 Yet the experience ofsome of the interviewed states points
to advantages that can be gained bybringing the Adult Education andpostsecondary systems under a common umbrella. Integrated governancemay:

Increase the focus of Adult
Education programs on transition to postsecondary
education and training
In 1991, the state of Washington
transferred governance of the technical colleges and Adult Education to
the State Board for Community andTechnical Colleges (SBCTC). An
Adult Education Advisory Council, charged with viewing the Adult
Education system as a whole andmaking recommendations to the
SBCTC, was created at the same time.
Since then, Adult Education has been
increasingly tightly integrated into thestrategies of the college system, which
has launched a series of innovations
that are designed to move students asquickly as possible into career technical and academic courses.
Similarly, Illinois reported that moving governance of Adult Educationfrom K-12 to the community college
system was foundational in their efforts to develop programming that
effectively links remediation withacademic and career technical college
programs. The move led to a majorchange in their strategic plan, including focusing programs on the need tooffer basic skills “bridges” into career
pathways.
In North Carolina, Adult Education has been part of the community
college system from the beginningand is offered in all 58 colleges. Overthe past five years, there has been agrowing emphasis on transitioning
Adult Education students into college courses, which is affecting thelocation of Adult Education within
the colleges. Some colleges now are
moving Adult Education from noncredit continuing education departments, where most have been housed,
into for-credit academic departments
where remediation can be more effectively integrated into other courseofferings.
Facilitate implementation of instruction and delivery models
that reduce the amount of time
students spend in remediationand improve student success
The fact that Adult Education and career technical education are under thesame roof made it easier for Washington to develop its well-known I-BESTprogram that accelerates remediation and student progress overall byembedding remedial math, English,
and ESL within career technicaland academic courses. Similarly, in
Wisconsin, the integration of Adult
Education into the technical colleges
has eased the development of many
integrated basic skills-career technicaleducation (CTE) programs similar to
I-BEST, where Adult Education and
CTE teachers coordinate their curricula and instruction. In North Carolina, a new initiative—Basic Skills
Plus—has been launched that allows
up to 20 percent of Adult Education
monies to be used for a co-enrollment
program (contextualized basic skills

For example, although Minnesota’s Adult Education program remains housed within the Minnesota Department of Education, beginning in 2007, its Adult Education Office (AEO) joined with the Minnesota Department of Employment and Economic Development (DEED), the Minnesota State Colleges and Universities(MnSCU), and other state partners to develop the FastTRAC Adult Career Pathway Alliance. The colleges are now integral to the initiative and the latest FastTRAC model links a series of remedial and career technical training programs to allow students with low skills to advance over time to successively higher levelsof education and employment in a given sector.
54and CTE), including using those
funds to support CTE instructors.
Make possible the articulation
or integration of adult anddevelopmental education
The disconnect between Adult Education and the (usually) for-credit
developmental education offered bycommunity colleges often slows the
progress of students in basic skills
programs, sometimes significantly. In
Wisconsin, where Adult Education
has long been with the technical college system, the link to developmental
education is particularly advanced.
Adult basic education (ABE) andadult secondary education (ASE)
are clearly delineated with a certifiedstatewide curricula, but developmental education is also focused on
students assessed at the 9th to 12th
grade skill levels, is often taught by
Adult Education teachers, and has thesame content and same teacher certification. Adult basic education, adultsecondary education, ESL, and developmental education in Wisconsin all
prepare students to enter college-levelcourses.665

The governance change in Ohio
allowed them to launch a pilot
program in 2010 to link adult anddevelopmental education throughregional partnerships of community
colleges and Adult Education providers. Despite the state not having new
funding for the pilots, all 23 colleges
agreed to participate and are making progress in increasing student
transitions. In Washington, plans areunderway to integrate Adult Education and developmental education. To
date, programs for very low level ESL
students have been much less affected,
but the state is now also turning tolink those more effectively to college and careers. In North Carolina,
Adult Education is being increasingly
moved into academic departments;
adult basic education and developmental education programs are being
blended and teachers are being crosstrained.
Challenges and lessons learned
Bringing together institutions thatserve adult learners, particularly
Adult Education and community/
technical colleges, can be a foundational catalyst for change. There

are, however, substantial barriers tousing this policy lever. These include
the fact that changing governance ispolitically difficult and sometimes
impossible, and can be disruptive toprograms. In a tough funding environment, institutions may be too
beleaguered to take on major reform;
and, most importantly, states may
incorrectly assume that integrating
governance by itself will break down
program silos and lead to improved
performance. Other lessons learned
from the interviewed states include:•

A change in governance has toreflect a new vision for Adult
Education. Ohio shifted Adult
Education to the Ohio Boardof Regents as part of an overall
reform effort that also brought
together the community colleges and postsecondary vocational schools. Maybe partiallybecause Adult Education was
not the primary target of thereorganization, the change has
not yet had a substantial impact on the design and deliveryof Adult Education services.
In contrast, there was a clear
vision driving the governanceThat is, students are not sent to developmental education after completing ABE, as they often are in many states including California.

change in Illinois: that Adult
Education serve as the “foundation of a career pathways
system that prepares adultlearners for economic self-sufficiency.” Today, the Adult Education program is completely
embedded in a career pathway
context and Adult Education isbuilt into the colleges’ performance measures. Likewise, Indiana moved Adult Educationfrom its state Department of
Education to the Department
of Workforce Development(DWD). As part of the paradigm shift, DWD emphasized
the alignment of Adult Education with workforce and postsecondary training. Moreover,
DWD made Adult Education
funds competitively available
to consortia of partners acrossits economic growth regions.
These partners included Adult
Education, workforce, postsecondary education, and community service organizations.
•

Shifting governance can be along and complicated process
and stakeholder buy-in is crucial. For example, after Illinois
moved Adult Education under
the authority of the Illinois
Community College Board(ICCB), ICCB consciously
maintained a diverse delivery
system composed of about
equal numbers of colleges,
community-based organizations, and local educational
authorities, as well as the Department of Corrections. Thechange had the desired effectof greater emphasis on getting
Adult Education students into
and through college programs.
But the transition had significant challenges, including theneed to establish credibility
with Adult Education providers. The process took three tofour years and included meetings held throughout the state
and the creation of a multistakeholder advisory committee.
•

If shared governance is notpossible or desirable within thecontext of a given state, many of
its advantages can be achieved
by developing close partnerships
among key education and workforce programs and institutions.

Possible implications for
California
As California considers its current
governance structure, the experienceof other states would suggest that thebigger question is our vision for a
21st century Adult Education system.
There is growing evidence that the
principles of an effective program
include:7•

Integration: Whether under
combined governance or not,the Adult Education program,community college noncredit
basic skills programs, andcommunity college credit basic
skills programs must be tightly
integrated so that students are
not forced to take duplicative,

disconnected courses.
•

Opportunity: Basic skills offerings should link students tocareer technical and academic
pathways that provide themthe opportunity to continue
their education.

•

Flexibility: Rigidly defining students by “levels” slows
progress and wastes time andmoney; instead, interventions
should be flexibly tailored to
the needs of students.

•

Student support: Students inbasic skills programs are more
likely to be successful if theyreceive adequate counseling,peer group support, and financial aid.

Effective programs also require
adequate and dedicated funding, andmust take into account the differing needs of the diverse populations
they serve. Finally, it is important todistinguish between the governanceand delivery systems. Combining
governance does not mean limiting the range of providers of Adult
Education services, which can include
K-12 providers, community-basedorganizations, community colleges,
and others. In fact, there is evidence
that diversity, especially in the formof partnerships among these kinds ofproviders, strengthens programs andextends their reach.

For example, see: Foster, Strawn, & Duke-Benfield, (2011) Beyond basic skills: State strategies to connect low-skilled students to an employer-valued postsecondary
education; Duke & Strawn, (2008) Overcoming obstacles, optimizing opportunities: State policies to increase postsecondary attainment for low-skilled adults; Mwase,(2008) Better together: Realigning pre-college skills development programs to achieve greater academic success for adult learners; Spangenber, Feist, & Heitner, (2005)
To ensure Americas’ future: Building a national opportunity system for adults – strengthening links between adult education and community colleges; Strawn, (2011)
Farther, faster: Six promising programs show how career pathway bridges help basic skill students earn credentials that matter; Bailey, Jeong, & Cho, (2010) Referral,
enrollment, and completion in developmental education sequences in community colleges; Hern, (2010) Exponential attrition and the promise of acceleration in developmental English and math; Wiseley, (2011) Effective basic skills instruction: The case for contextualized developmental math; Jenkins, (2011) Get with the program:Accelerating community college students’ entry into and completion of programs of study; Baran & Lovell, (2011) Gateway to a better future: creating a basic skills
system for California.
7

6

Using strategic plans and Adult Education funding
guidelines to signal a new focus on college and careers
Regardless of their governancestructure, states are using strategicplans and other vision statements for
Adult Education (and the systems thatgovern or partner with Adult Education) to create a new paradigm for basic
skills services focused on college andcareer success. These goals are thenimplemented through the criteria set
by states when they fund local Adult
Education providers. A competitive
process for selecting and funding Adult
Education providers is required ofstates by the federal Workforce Investment Act (WIA) Title II, which is theprimary source of federal funds for
Adult Education. The state’s Request
for Applications (RFA) or Request for
Proposals (RFP) for Adult Education
funding translates the vision in the
Adult Education strategic plan and therequirements in WIA Title II into concrete expectations for providers aboutprogram content, outcomes, delivery
methods, and partners. Overall, strategic state plans/vision statements andAdult Education RFA/RFP guidelines
can:Set college and career goals for
Adult Education in its strategicplanStates can send a clear signal about anew direction for Adult Education.
In 2005, for example, the Washington State Board for Community andTechnical Colleges became one of thefirst Adult Education systems nationally to position adult basic education as
key to the state’s economic future, withthe potential for meeting pressing state
economic development and workforce
needs and for increasing economic
mobility for individuals. The five-year
strategic plan, Creating Opportunities

In 2009, the Illinois Community College Board adopted a new strategic
vision for Adult Education, Creating
Pathways for Adult Learners,9 after
extensive discussions with the field andother stakeholders. This strategic planframes Adult Education as an integral
part of Illinois’ economic development
efforts and makes six recommendations and associated priority actions
for implementing this vision. These
include: adopting “aligned assessment,
curricula, and instructional practices
that prepare adults for family-sustaining jobs and career advancement;”
working in partnership with workforce development and other partners;
providing support services to increase
student retention and success; andcreating pathways to employment or
further education for all adult learners,
regardless of their skill level on entering the program.
Build college and career goals
for adults with lower skills
into the strategic visions forbroader systems, such as community colleges and workforce
development
States can broaden ownership of college
and career goals for the Adult Education population by making sure that
other education and training partners

Washington State Board for Community and Technical Colleges, ( n.d.).
http://www.iccb.org/accelerating.opportunity.html
10
Minnesota Governor’s Workforce Development, (2012)11
http://www.mnfasttrac.org/
12
Washington State Workforce Training and Education Coordinating Board, (2009).
13
http://www.sbctc.ctc.edu/docs/sbctc_system_direction_final.pdf
14
http://www.in.gov/dwd/files/DWD_Policy_2010-13Ch1.pdf
15
http://www.successnc.org/initiatives
8
9

7

for Washington’s Emerging Workforce,8
made postsecondary transition andsuccess key indicators of the effectiveness of the Adult Education system.
Because other agency partners (such associal services and workforce development) helped to write the plan, thosepartners began to see how Adult Education could help their clients become
more successful.

each include them in their own strategic visions. The Minnesota Governor’s
Workforce Development Council, forexample, has issued a blueprint forstrengthening the state’s workforce andclosing critical skill gaps, All Hands
on Deck;10 which recommends policychanges in K-12 education, Adult
Education, workforce development,
and postsecondary education. Among
those recommendations are that thesepartners set a joint goal for increasing
the number of adults with low skills
earning postsecondary credentials
that lead to family-sustaining wages,
create plans for reaching that goal, andtrack progress over time. The plan also
recommends expansion of the state’s
career pathway initiative for Adult Education students, Minnesota FastTRAC,11
to all 25 Minnesota State Colleges.
A diverse group of stakeholders led by
Washington’s State Workforce Training and Education Coordinating Board(WTECB) also regularly develops a
strategic workforce plan that includes
ambitious goals for Adult Education
students and programs. For example,
the most recent plan, High Skills, HighWages: 2008-2018,12 calls for the majority of ABE programs at community andtechnical colleges to become integrated
with occupational skills training. In
addition, the ten-year strategic plan13
for the Washington State Board ofCommunity and Technical Colleges
also supports Adult Education’s new
direction. In Indiana, the Department
of Workforce Development established
the Customer Flow Policy,14 aligningclient services to meet needs among
Adult Education, post-secondary training, and workforce preparation. North
Carolina Community Colleges’ SuccessNC initiative15 seeks to increase ac-cess, program quality, and student success by sharing best practices, changing
state policy to support success, anddeveloping new performance-based
student success measures. The Student
Success Framework for SuccessNC
highlights Basic Skills Plus,16 the state’s
career pathway initiative for Adult
Education students, as one of five core
strategies for improving college accessin the state.
Rewrite state Adult Education
funding guidelines to operationalize a new vision for Adult
Education that focuses oncollege and career goals
In 2005, Washington followed up its
new strategic plan with an updated
RFP17 that introduced concepts to thefield such as contextualization, integration of academic and occupationalcourse content and instruction, andtransition to college and careers. The
new RFP centered on ways to implement the strategic plan’s goals, suchas the Integrated Basic Education and
Skills Training (I-BEST)18 model. In
February 2012, the Illinois Community
College Board issued another competitive RFP that incorporated the recommendations in its 2009 strategic plan.
This RFP required all Adult Education
providers in Illinois, by the end of Year
Two of the grant period, to offer career
pathway bridge and/or integrated models, such as those the state pioneered
in its Shifting Gears19 work and the
newly developed Integrated Career andAcademic Pathway System (I-CAPS)20
model, drawn from the I-BEST experience in Washington.
After the Indiana Department ofWorkforce Development assumed stateadministration of Adult Educationin 2011, it issued a new competitive
grant process, which led to a revised
RFA21 in 2012 focusing on academic
and occupational skill attainment
along career pathways and alignmentof Adult Education and workforce
development policies and funding. The
RFA required programs to adopt new
curricular and instructional strategies
such as contextualization, accelerated
learning, and concurrent enrollment in
adult basic education and postsecondary education or training. One important change was that the RFA requiredthat Adult Education in each region bedelivered by a consortium of workforce
development and Adult Education entities, and encouraged other public andprivate partnerships. The geographicalboundaries of Adult Education regions
also were aligned with those of economic development regions. The RFA
required all regional Adult Education
consortia to develop adult career pathways in priority sectors, and to createa plan for implementing at least five
career certifications each year.
Challenges and lessons learned
Strategic plans, other vision statements,
and Adult Education grant guidelines can be effective tools for leadingchange.22 At the same time, states emphasized how important it is to reinforce the new directions embedded instrategic plans and in grant guidelines
with other actions. These include working with local program administrators
to ensure that Adult Education providers are hearing consistent messages
from the state and local level; ensuringthat other partners in workforce development, postsecondary education, andhuman services are also hearing thesemessages from their state and local administrators; conducting professional

development activities that enable
Adult Education providers to learn new
curricular and instructional strategies;
and offering new funding through state
discretionary grants to help programswith the start-up costs of adopting new
goals and new strategies.23
Possible implications for
California
California’s Adult Education program
took the important step of crafting a
new vision for Adult Education thatpivots around college and career success and calls for close partnerships
with, among others, community colleges, the workforce investment boards,
and community-based organizations.
The process of implementing this new
vision was slowed and made moredifficult by the Legislature’s decision to“flex” state Adult Education monies;that is, to allow these funds to be used
for both K-12 and Adult Education at
the discretion of local school boards.
As a result, funding for Adult Education has shrunk dramatically, excellent
programs have been eliminated, andremaining programs have been throwninto confusion.
Governor Brown’s proposal for dedicated funding for Adult Education
provides a critical anchor for these
programs. However, as suggested earlier, neither stable funding nor a new
governance structure is sufficient toaddress the barriers faced by students
in basic skills programs in California inaccessing and completing postsecondary education and training. Guidelines
and incentives for new partnerships,
new program design, and more effective pedagogical approaches need to be
implemented.

http://www.successnc.org/initiatives/basic-skills-plus-accelerating-opportunity
http://www.successnc.org/initiatives
18
http://www.sbctc.edu/college/e_integratedbasiceducationandskillstraining.aspx
19
http://www.iccb.org/shifting_gears.html
20
http://www.elgin.edu/students.aspx?id=18467
21
http://www.in.gov/dwd/abe/files/PY_12_Adult_Education_Grant_Continuation.pdf
22
Several states, including Illinois, Indiana, and Washington, have used Adult Education strategic plans and major revisions to grant guidelines (RFAs or RFPs)
to refocus Adult Education services on postsecondary access and success in career pathways. Two others (North Carolina and Ohio) plan to take similar actions in the near future.
23
One complicating factor in using these tools is the long federal delay in reauthorizing WIA, and the resulting uncertainty over the future direction of federal
Adult Education policy. However, given that the federal government has increasingly highlighted adult career pathways and basic skills bridge and integrated
models in new federal grant opportunities, and has issued program guidance from the Departments of Labor, Health and Human Services, and Educationencouraging these strategies, more states are feeling comfortable in moving Adult Education in that direction even in the absence of reauthorization.
16
17

8

Innovation initiatives to increase college andcareer success for adults with lower skills
Even as California signals a new
focus on college and career success, many
local Adult Education programs—both incommunity colleges and adult schools—
will lack the resources and knowledge toadopt successful new models. Innovation
initiatives can close this gap.
In some cases, innovation monies end up
funding pilot programs that fail to moveto scale. On the other hand, even modest
funding when combined behind a common purpose can create an echo chamberwhere the continual reinforcement of thesame message and program strategies
allows innovation to take root locally.
Some states have implemented innovation
initiatives without any dedicated fundingby allowing existing state Adult Educationand career technical education funding
to be used in new ways. According to thestates interviewed, innovation initiatives
play a critical role in driving change andcan:Spur adoption of new strategies
for increasing college and career
success through initiatives thatspan Adult Education, community
colleges, and workforce development
Illinois’ Community College Boardand its Department of Commerce andEconomic Opportunity began partnering in the mid-2000’s to fund pilots ofcareer pathway bridge programs for
adults with lower skills and/or limited
English proficiency using WIA Title I
and Title II performance incentive andstate discretionary funds. Subsequently,
Illinois received a Shifting Gears grantfrom the Joyce Foundation24 to develop
state policy changes that could scale up
bridge programs and sustain them. The
state also continued to invest federal andstate funds in developing and replicat-

Also part of the Shifting Gears initiative,
in 2008 the Minnesota Department of
Education/Adult Basic Education, theMinnesota State Colleges and Universities (MnSCU), and the Department of
Employment and Economic Development
launched the FastTRAC initiative. FastTRAC offers a spectrum of contextualized, college and career-focused services
to all levels of adult learners. Minnesota
has expanded FastTRAC, braiding together multiple funding sources.
After piloting different ways to increase
the number of students in basic skills
programs who earned postsecondary
credentials, the Washington State Board
for Community and Technical Colleges(SBCTC) chose to scale up the mostpromising approach: the Integrated Basic
Education and Skills Training (I-BEST)model. In I-BEST, basic skills and career
technical education faculty team-teachcourses that combine basic skills andoccupational content in order to help students succeed. With legislative support,
SBCTC created an enhanced FTE (1.75)
funding to support the I-BEST model.
As of 2011, there were more than 140
approved I-BEST programs statewide; aquasi-experimental evaluation of I-BESTfound that I-BEST students made larger
gains on basic skills tests than similar
students not in I-BEST, earned more college credits, and were more likely to earnoccupational certificates.26
The Wisconsin Technical College System(WTCS) began replicating the I-BESTmodel in the mid-2000’s and createdseveral versions, such as a model thatpairs basic skills and occupational courses
but is not team-taught. In 2007, a Shifting
Gears grant brought together WTCS withthe state’s Department of Workforce Development (DWD) to jointly develop an
initiative called Regional Industry Skills
Education (RISE).27 That grant, together
with strategic use of state and federal
discretionary funding, enabled local technical colleges, workforce agencies, andindustry to work together to implementcareer pathways, bridge programs, and integrated education and training programming. As of 2011, 14 of 16 technical colleges in the state offered RISE programs,
for a total of 44 programs. According to
WTCS, the technical colleges involved in
career pathway bridges consistently reporthigh postsecondary certificate completion rates and good employment and/or
postsecondary continuation outcomes forstudents. The final evaluation report for
Shifting Gears shows a completion rate of
68% for programs that were operating inthe 2010-11 academic year.28
North Carolina’s legislature created the
Basic Skills Plus program in 2010 to allow
local Adult Education providers to use
up to 20 percent of their existing Adult
Education grant to offer certificate programs that concurrently enroll students
in job training and linked, contextualized
GED preparation. By November 2012, 43
colleges had been approved by the State
Board of Community Colleges to offer at
least one Basic Skills Plus program.29
In 2011, the Indiana Department ofWorkforce Development (DWD) createdthe WorkINdiana initiative, which concurrently enrolls students in GED or highschool diploma classes and occupational
training that leads to one of more than 20

http://www.shifting-gears.org/illinois/61-state-progress-illinois-.html
Illinois Community College Board and Illinois Department of Commerce and Economic Opportunity, (2011) The early impact of bridge programs in Illinois.
http://www.shifting-gears.org/images/PDF/ProjectResources2/illinoisearlyimpactofbridgeprograms.pdf.
26
Zeidenberg, Cho & Jenkins, (2010) Washington State’s Integrated Basic Education and Skills Training Program (I-BEST): New evidence of effectiveness http://
ccrc.tc.columbia.edu/publications/i-best-new-evidence.html.
27
http://risepartnership.org/
28
Roberts & Price, (2012). For more on Wisconsin’s career pathway bridges, see http://www.shifting-gears.org/state-progress-wisconsin/66-state-progresswisconsin.html and http://risepartnership.org/
29
For current program data and more information on Basic Skills Plus, see http://www.successnc.org/initiatives/basic-skills-plus-accelerating-opportunity.
24
25

9

ing bridge programs. When the state
reviewed outcomes of adults enrolled infive career pathway bridges (there are
currently more than 50 such programs), it
found that 93 percent of students completed these programs and that 85 percentof those went on to higher education or a
new job.25

industry-recognized certifications. The
training is pre-college level and noncredit,
and articulates to for-credit occupational
programs at Ivy Tech, the statewide community college. DWD initially used WIA
state performance incentive funds for
WorkINdiana, and also gave Adult Education regions mini-grants for program
development and administrative overhead. As of spring 2012, 62 WorkINdiana
programs had been developed.30

development of partnerships. WTCS also
created an expedited process for colleges
to submit career pathways certificate
programs to the state for approval. Prior
to that, only one-year technical diploma
and two-year associate degree programs
were recognized statewide. Wisconsin isincorporating into its accountability datasystem and ABE scorecard additional
measures of Adult Education to postsecondary transition and success.

Institutionalize innovation
through state policy changes thatallow existing funding streams to
support the new service model

To institutionalize its career pathway
innovation, Indiana is working with thestate legislature to secure permanent
funding while requiring in the state’s
Adult Education RFA that regional Adult
Education consortia develop at least five
WorkINdiana certification programs eachyear. Indiana also launched an innovation
fund for 2012 using WIA Title II Adult
Education state leadership funds.

Washington’s policy actions to institutionalize I-BEST include the enhanced FTE
reimbursement rate and the emphasison postsecondary transition and progress along career pathways in the state’s
renewal application for current Adult
Education providers.31 In addition, thestate has adopted complementary policies, such as Opportunity Grants32 and theStudent Achievement Initiative.33
Illinois has made a number of state policychanges to sustain its basic skills bridges:
including creating a common statewide
definition of bridge programming for use
in Adult Education, developmental education, and WIA Title I services; requiring that, in WIA Title I, 40 percent of all
local adult and dislocated worker training
funds be spent on training such as bridge
programming; creating new course classifications for bridges; and making bridge
programming a core element in the Adult
Education strategic plan and new competitive RFP.
Wisconsin’s steps to institutionalize its
innovations include statewide definitions of operational elements for career
pathways and career pathway bridges thatdefine expectations for industry engagement, provision of support services, andChallenges and lessons learned
States have learned much about how to
use innovation initiatives well. The lessons offered by their experiences include:•

Allow for a period of early experimentation but then move to createclear parameters for the model before scaling up. Those parameters
can allow local flexibility but needto include program features thatare essential for success.

•

Extend funding and apply state
guidelines for new innovative models to all the partners in the initiative, rather than limiting them to
the Adult Education programs.

•

Take inventory of how supportive
current state policies are to the newmodels for transitioning Adult
Education students to college andcareers.

•

Think about the whole college andcareer pathway. States have chosen
to build out different sections ofadult college and career pathways;
but in order to avoid dead-ends,
a state must have the vision forcomplete career and educational
pathways in mind from the outset.
•

Create the capacity to collect theright outcome data. Solid data on
outcomes is critical for winningsupport for sustaining innovativemodels and for improving themover time.

•

Anticipate at the outset how tosustain the innovation. Private andpublic special grants can jumpstart innovation, but new models
are likely to be abandoned when
the grants end unless thought isgiven in advance to ongoing funding streams to sustain them.34

Possible implications for
California
California has implemented importantinnovation initiatives in the area of basic
skills. These include the California Community Colleges’ Basic Skills Initiative(BSI)35 and its Career Advancement
Academies (CAAs).36 The BSI both allocated supplemental funding to colleges
to address basic skills needs and provided
professional development to faculty andstaff. The CAAs are designed to improvestudents’ foundational skills in reading,writing, and mathematics in the context
of career technical programs that leadto jobs or continued education. Morerecently, California’s Adult Education
program launched the Policy to Performance Initiative as part of a federal effort
to focus the Adult Education program oncollege and career. As important as these
efforts have been, to be transformative,
innovative programs such as these must
be extended.

For more information on WorkINdiana, see http://www.in.gov/dwd/adultedadmin/workin.htm.
The enhanced FTE reimbursement rate is based on based on the additional costs of having two instructors co-teach.
32
Opportunity grants provide financial aid and support services for nontraditional students to reach the “tipping point,” defined as taking at least one year’s
worth of college credits and receiving a technical certificate or other occupational credential over five years; benchmarks that led to higher wage gains. http://
www.sbctc.ctc.edu/college/s_opportunitygrants.aspx
33
http://www.sbctc.ctc.edu/college/e_studentachievement.aspx
34
For examples of how states and communities have tackled these funding challenges, see Conway, (2011) The price of persistence: How nonprofit-community
college partnerships manage and blend diverse funding streams, & CLASP, (2010) Funding Career Pathways and Career Pathway Bridges, http://www.clasp.org/
postsecondary/pages?id=0003
35
Illowsky, (2008).
36
http://www.careerladdersproject.org/initiatives-programs/career-advancement-academies/
30
31

10

Using goals, metrics, and data to refocus programs:
state accountability policies
Nationally there is a growing
emphasis at both the state and federal
levels on accountability for public dollars spent on education and workforce
programs. One result is that somestates are using data to drive change
in Adult Education. To effectively use
data as an accountability tool, states arebringing the data systems of the many
relevant programs together including
K-12, Adult Education, postsecondary
public institutions, and workforce programs.37 Another accountability leverstates are using is pay-for-performancesystems, although these efforts have met
with mixed success. By refashioning
their accountability systems, states can:Use data to make the case forrefocusing Adult Education oncollege and careers
The story of Washington’s “tipping
point” study38 is one of the most dramatic examples of the strategic use ofdata. That study found that students
who took at least one year’s worth ofcollege credits and received a technicalcertificate or other occupational credential over five years earned substantiallymore than students who did not reachthat threshold. Publication of the reportunleashed a cascade of policy innovations beginning with the developmentof the I-BEST program, and then leading to Opportunity Grants designed tohelp students reach the “tipping point,”
and a system of financial incentives(the Student Achievement Initiative)
designed to reward colleges for moving students toward the tipping point.
Washington is similarly serious about
monitoring its programs. The State
Board for Community and Technical Colleges (SBCTC), the Workforce
Training and Education Coordinating

11

Board, and the Higher Education Coordinating Board produce a biennial joint
report39 used by policymakers to determine how well Washington’s educationand training system meets employers’
needs. The SBCTC also has developed apartnership with Columbia University’s
Community College Research Center to
conduct in-depth evaluations of someof the state’s innovative programs.
Wisconsin has been using data to influence policy in a more modest way. As
part of their RISE Career Pathway andBridge Program, the Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction, together
with the Center on Wisconsin Strategy
at the University of Wisconsin, haspublished “pipeline” data40 examining how effectively the state’s technicalcolleges are moving students (including students in basic skills programs)
toward the achievement of key educational milestones. One finding of thepipeline report was that if ABE students
make it into college programs, they are
as successful as other students. The data
have been used to increase support forbridge programs.
Similarly, as part of its LiftEd initiative41
to improve student transitions between
Adult Education, developmental education, noncredit workforce education,and college programs, the Ohio Boardof Regents defined a set of transition
metrics, gathered and linked data fromeach education sector, and created a
student transitions report.42 The reportis intended to support the work ofregional consortia that bring together
the different education sectors in orderto help more adults earn marketablepostsecondary credentials.

Use data as an accountability
tool, if states develop
integrated data systems
To support its culture of evidence,
Washington has been developing an increasingly comprehensive data system.
Similarly, as Indiana moved to implement a new vision and strategy, they
developed a new data system that began
in 2007 with a data-sharing agreement
between the Department of Workforce
Development, the Commission forHigher Education, the Department of
Education, and the Indiana BusinessResearch Center at Indiana University.
Indiana used the new system to produce its own “tipping point” study thatwas developed by the Indiana Chamber of Commerce and began a serious
process of analyzing student pathways,
key milestones, and barriers to success. North Carolina partnered withDuke University on the North Carolina
Education Research Data Center (a data
warehouse designed to facilitate theexchange of data among the Department of Public Instruction, the North
Carolina Community College System,and the University of North Carolina),
to do longitudinal studies of student
progress from K-12 through postsecondary education.
Some states also have implemented payfor-performance systems. Washington
has one of the most nationally watchedperformance-based funding systems.
The Student Achievement Initiative(SAI)43 was designed to support thestate’s goals for underprepared students and to avoid the pitfalls of otherperformance-based funding systems byadding new funding for performance
incentives rather than making existingfunding performance-based. Through37
These efforts have gained momentum in recent years, fueled by federal funding and several multi-state collaborations (such as the Data Quality Campaign),
supporting data system integration.
38
http://www.sbctc.ctc.edu/docs/data/research_reports/resh_06-2_tipping_point.pdf
39
http://www.wsac.wa.gov/sites/default/files/SkilledEducatedWorkforce2011.pdf
40
Chung, Cociña, & Dresser, (2012) Toward college success for working adults: The pipeline to credentials in the Wisconsin Technical College System.
41
http://ohiolifted.ning.com/page/key-strategies42
http://api.ning.com/files/2KkqvqBBejFWxFMCZnh0O2BHJs6DD63hg0OwEIFmbtw*8xQ1q7JQK8OeWt257Lva6X39UGecP0VPtkWBBPnYYDnM097vPYev/
USOTransitionMetricsSystemFocustextformatv2.pdf
43
http://www.sbctc.ctc.edu/college/e_studentachievement.aspx

the SAI, colleges receive performancefunding for increasing student attainment of critical academic milestones,or “momentum points,” and are judged
against their own baseline performance,
rather than the performance of othercolleges.44 Evaluations of SAI foundgains in student achievement and noevidence of disincentives for colleges
to serve disadvantaged populations.
Since 2010, budget cuts have seriously
undermined the effectiveness of SAI,
although the approach continues toenjoy support and the metrics are now
being revised.

in basic skills programs from remediation through postsecondary educationand training and into the labor market;
and building a multi-agency, longitudinal data system is complex and expensive, with tricky legal, technical, andpolitical stumbling blocks; 2) an equallyvexing challenge is ensuring that thedata are used to inform policymaking; and 3) the recent swell of interestin pay-for-performance is controversial. The experiences of the states weinterviewed offered some useful lessons
in implementing new approaches toaccountability:

Even more than Washington, Indianasees performance-based funding as a
key policy lever. Beginning in 2011,
the state implemented outcomes-based
funding for Adult Education to encourage best practices in enrollment,
fast-track curriculum delivery, GED
or high school diploma attainment,
and postsecondary transition. The
reimbursement schedule calls for differential funding based on how long it
takes a participant to reach one of eightoutcomes.

•

Illinois’ recent integration of Adult
Education under the authority of theIllinois Community College Board led
the state to integrate Adult Education
metrics into performance measurement
and a new college performance incentive system.45 While Adult Educationin Illinois has long had performancefunding, the new system-wide college
metrics are designed to support thestate’s growing emphasis on the creationof bridge programs and their Accelerating Opportunity46 project. As in Washington, Illinois intends for performancefunding to inform the allocation of new
incentive dollars, rather than redistributing existing base funding.
Challenges and lessons learned
States face serious challenges in trying
to implement effective accountability systems: 1) many states, including
California, do not have the data systems
needed to track the progress of students

A commitment to accountability
and evidence-based policymaking fuels political support for highquality data systems. In severalof the states, good data is one
component of a widely sharedcommitment to accountability
and evidence-based policymaking that in turn fuels politicalsupport for the data systemitself.

•States that are serious aboutaccountability set meaningful,measurable goals and have inplace an established approach toreviewing progress toward thosegoals. This can be the result of alegislative mandate that requires
the development of cross-institutional strategic plans and/or
requires regular accountability
reports that provide data in aform that is designed to answer
key policy questions.

•

Setting goals and monitoring
performance matter only if policy
and practice change as a result.
Administrators in Washington pointed to a close working
partnership with the legislature
as essential to their iterative
approach to innovation. Other
states talked about administrators and faculty using data to
advocate for changes in programand instructional design.

•

There are serious questions about
the effectiveness of performancebased funding. Several states
were positive about the extent
to which pay-for-performancefunding could provide useful incentives for program providers.
However, other states reported
that performance-based funding
systems have been ineffective
because they represented such asmall share of total funding, because the systems were “gamed”
by the programs, or because themetrics were not useful. Academic reviews of performancebased systems raise similar
concerns and, more importantly,
warn that they could have theunintended consequence of
discouraging providers from enrolling students with the greatest
barriers to success.

Possible implications for
California
Efforts to develop a comprehensive
integrated data system in California
have long been stymied, but informal
attempts to more effectively track community college and workforce program
participants have gained ground andare beginning to produce useful results.
For example, the CCCs and workforce
system (through the Employment Development Department), along with the
University of California and California
State University systems, have forged adraft “federated” database design thatallows for segmental management ofdata while also promoting ease of data
sharing. The CCC Chancellor’s Officealso has developed a “scorecard” that,among other measures, tracks progressof students in basic skills programs.
These are important steps but, to date,have not included Adult Education. It
would be useful for the current debate
about redesigning Adult Education to
include the question of how California
will track students in basic skills programs and their educational outcomes
across institutions and programs.

The momentum points were: increasing basic skills; completing developmental courses in math or writing; earning the first 15 and 30 college credits;earning the first five math college credits; and earning a first certificate or degree.
45
http://www.ibhe.org/PerformanceFunding/Materials/111024/ICCB_presentation.pdf
46
http://www.iccb.org/accelerating.opportunity.html
4412

Conclusion
There is no state in which basic skills education looms
larger in importance than California. California’s ability to
expand the share of students from low-income or underrepresented communities who successfully complete
postsecondary education and/or who are able to secure jobs
with real career opportunity may well hold the key to our
future. For many students, weak English and math skills areamong the principal barriers to success and so the current
spotlight on Adult Education is long overdue. Hopefully,
the renewed attention will lead to serious policy discussion
on the goals California should establish for its basic skills
programs and the changes we need to make, both to Adult
Education and within the community colleges, to achievethat vision. The stakes could not be higher.

13References
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Conway, M. (2011, February). The price of persistence: How nonprofitcommunity college partnerships manage and blend diverse funding
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Lovell, V. & Baran, B. (2011, May). At a crossroads: California basic skills
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Foster, M., Strawn, J. & Duke-Benfield, A-E. (2011, March). Beyond basic
skills: State strategies to connect low-skilled students to an employer- valued postsecondary education. Washington, DC: CLASP. Retrieved fromhttp://www.clasp.org/admin/site/publications/files/Beyond-Basic-SkillsMarch-2011.pdf

Minnesota Governor’s Workforce Development. (2012, reissued). All
hands on deck: Fifteen ideas for strengthening Minnesota’s workforce. SaintPaul, MN: Governor’s Workforce Development. Retrieved from http://
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Mwase, G. C. (2008, November). Better together: Realigning pre-college
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publications/workforce/better-together-realigning-pre-college-s/176

Hern, K. (2010, June). Exponential attrition and the promise of acceleration in developmental English and math. Retrieved from http://facultyinquiry.net/wp-content/uploads/2010/07/Hern-Exponential-Attrition.pdf

Roberts, B. & Price, D. (2012, December). Strengthening state systems
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org/pdf/adulted/Adult_Education_Strategic_Plan_11-12-09_Final.pdf

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14

Washington Higher Education Coordinating Board (HECB), State
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docs/sbctc_system_direction_final.pdf
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State’s Integrated Basic Education and Skills Training Program (I-BEST):New evidence of effectiveness. Columbia University: Community College
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tc.columbia.edu/publications/i-best-new-evidence.html

Additional Links and Resources
Basic Skills Plus, North Carolina Community Colleges
http://www.successnc.org/initiatives/basic-skills-plus-acceleratingopportunity
Career Advancement Academies (CAAs), Career Ladders Project
http://www.careerladdersproject.org/initiatives-programs/career-advancement-academies
I-CAPS Program, Integrated Career & Academic Preparation System.
Elgin Community College.
http://www.elgin.edu/students.aspx?id=18467
Funding Career Pathways and Career Pathway Bridges: A Federal Policy
Toolkit for States
http://www.clasp.org/postsecondary/pages?id=0003
Illinois Community College Board, Accelerating Opportunity (formerly
ABE to Credentials)
http://www.iccb.org/accelerating.opportunity.html
Illinois Community College System, Performance Based Funding Principles
and Metrics
http://www.ibhe.org/PerformanceFunding/Materials/111024/ICCB_presentation.pdf
Integrated Basic Education and Skills Training (I-BEST) Model, Washington State Board for Community and Technical Colleges (SBCTC)
http://www.sbctc.ctc.edu/college/e_integratedbasiceducationandskillstraining.aspx

g0OwEIFmbtw*8xQ1q7JQK8OeWt257Lva6X39UGecP0VPtkWBBPnY
YDnM097vPYev/USOTransitionMetricsSystemFocustextformatv2.pdf
Ohio LiftEd: Elevating Individual and System Success
http://ohiolifted.ning.com/page/key-strategies
Opportunity Grants, Washington State Board for Community & TechnicalColleges
http://www.sbctc.ctc.edu/college/s_opportunitygrants.aspx
Policy to Performance: California’s Project Transitioning Adults to Opportunity
http://www.otan.us/cap2p/
Policy to Performance: Transitioning Adults to Opportunity, State ABETransition Systems Report
http://lincs.ed.gov/lincs/resourcecollections/careerpathways/profile_51
Regional Industry Skills Education (RISE), Wisconsin Department ofWorkforce Development
http://risepartnership.org/
SuccessNC, Student Success Framework
http://www.successnc.org/initiatives
Washington State Board for Community and Technical Colleges, Student
Achievement Initiatives
http://www.sbctc.ctc.edu/college/e_studentachievement.aspx

Minnesota FastTRAC
http://www.mnfasttrac.org/

WorkINdiana Initiative, Indiana Department of Workforce Development.
http://www.in.gov/dwd/adultedadmin/workin.htm.

Ohio Higher Ed, University System of Ohio Transition Metrics: Statewide
Summary
http://api.ning.com/files/2KkqvqBBejFWxFMCZnh0O2BHJs6DD63h-

WorkOne Customer Flow Policy, Indiana Department of Workforce Development
http://www.in.gov/dwd/files/DWD_Policy_2010-13Ch1.pdf

15

Acknowledgments
The insights in this report are largely drawn from the thoughtful observations of senior administrators and educators in all seven of our selected states. These included:

Jennifer Foster
Senior Director for Adult Education
Illinois Community College Board
Karen Hunter Anderson
Vice President for Adult Education and Institutional Support
Illinois Community College Board
Jackie Dowd
Senior Director of Education and Training Programs
Indiana Department of Workforce Development
Marie Mackintosh
Director of Occupational Education
Indiana Department of Workforce Development
Barry Schaffer(Former) Adult Education Supervisor
Minnesota Department of Education

Brett Visger
Deputy Chancellor, Institutional Collaboration
Ohio Board of RegentsMark Johnson
Education Director, Adult High School and Developmental
Studies
Wisconsin Technical College System
Randy Whitfield
Associate Vice President College and Career ReadinessNorth Carolina Community Colleges
Jon Kerr
Director of Adult Basic Education
Washington State Board for Community and TechnicalColleges
Kathy Cooper
Policy Associate, Basic Skills
Washington State Board for Community and TechnicalColleges

Credits

March 2013|

Photography

Dan Figueroa

DesignDonna Choiw w w. l e a r n i n g w o r k s c a . o r g

16LearningWorks works to facilitate, disseminate and fund practitioner-informed
recommendations for changes at the system and classroom levels, infusing
these strategies with statewide and national insights. LearningWorks seeks tostrengthen the relationships that offer the greatest potential for accelerating action, including those between policy makers and practitioners, among overlapping initiatives, and across the 112 colleges. LearningWorks founding partners
include the Career Ladders Project for the California Community Colleges, theResearch and Planning Group for the California Community Colleges, and theCalifornia Community Colleges Student Success Network.
address 678 13th Street, Suite 103 | Oakland, CA 94612
web www.LearningWorksCA.org