bodner085

What happens when funding is threatened, reduced, removed, and destabilized for programs paid by the public and designed to serve it? Click on the "read more" link to find out. That's what we can learn from what happened to Adult Schools and Adult Education these last six years, and stretching back further than that, from the last one hundred and fifty. Acalanes, as did so many Adult Schools since funding was flexed by Governor Schwarzenegger in 2009, went through tremendous turmoil and at one point, was slated for closure .    The LaMorinda Weekly story, " Adult Students Wanted at Del Valle, " provided in full below, tells one version of the story. George Porter, in his Perspective piece on Acalanes' Older Adult Program , tells another. Putting those two pieces together, the question comes to mind, "Which adults are wanted at Del Valle - and why?" Adult Schools and Adult Education have gone through many changes in the past 150 years, as we can lea...

George Porter, a fourteen year veteran teacher of Older Adults classes at Berkeley Adult School, two term chair of the City of Berkeley's Aging Commission, and member of CCAE (California Council of Adult Education) and CFT (California Federation of Teachers), wrote this perspective piece in response to the news about Acalanes Adult School's survival and their Older Adult program.  ( You can read the news report here .) A PERSPECTIVE ON ACALANES ADULT SCHOOL'S "OLDER ADULT PROGRAM": Congrats to Acalanes Older Adult Ed. for surviving, but at what cost and should they be viewed as a model? Click on the "read more" link to learn more. First off, please bear in mind that Acalanes Adult Ed. is immediately adjacent to Rossmoor, a close to 10,000 strong, gated, 55+, "active senior" community. This is a highly regarded, award winning development that in years past provided an affordable option for middle-class retirees to relocate. That, though (to my ...

Much talk can be heard in the halls of schools and capitols about the value of being college and career ready. These things are important. But as we saw this week in the tragedy of Charleston and as we see everywhere in our state, our nation, and our world, there is a need for other skills, as well. The skills of empathy, social intelligence, self-awareness, kindness, generosity, forgiveness, gentleness, patience, community-building, compromise, compassion. Hit the link to read more. Without these things, we may win the deal, the race, or the war - but lose ourselves, our people, our planet. For life is much more than a race, a business, a battle just as the elk species is more than two stags tangling antlers in the Fall or the United States of America is more than Wall Street. To my mind, Adult Education and Adult Schools, more than any other branch of public education, embody the understanding that life is complex, difficult, and at times overwhelming, an...

From left to right, Bruce Neuberger, George & Kristen Pursley Cynthia Eagleton At the 2015 Network for Public Education Conference in Chicago , Kristen Pursley, Bruce Neuberger, and I presented a panel entitled, "The Battle for Adult Education." The Conference was deep and powerful. An AEM post on the conference is coming soon.  Cuts and reform in California Adult Education are part of a larger puzzle affecting every piece of Public Education in the US.  To understand what is happening in Adult Education in California - and to influence it in a positive direction - we need to understand what is happening elsewhere - and we need historical context. Historical context is what Kristen provided at our panel discussion.  Kristen is a lead ESL teacher at West Contra Costa Adult School.  She is a founding member of COSAS - Communities Organized to Support Adult Schools, a group that formed in response to the cuts six years ago and has met w...

From left to right: Bruce Neuberger, George & Kristen Pursley, Cynthia Eagleton At the 2015 Network for Public Education Conference in Chicago , Kristen Pursley, Bruce Neuberger, and I presented a panel entitled, "The Battle for Adult Education." The Conference was deep and powerful.  The keynote speeches and several workshops are available to view online  - and I highly recommend that you do so.  Cuts and reform in California Adult Education are part of a larger puzzle affecting every piece of Public Education in the US.  To understand what is happening in Adult Education in California - and to influence it in a positive direction - we need to understand what is happening elsewhere. Understandably, that can be overwhelming.  But taking the time to watch a few videos, read an article, or follow grassroots organization like K12 News Network  or bloggers like Edushyster or  The Jose Vilson  or Cloaking Inequality on s...