Day Five: Impact of Adult Basic Skills Program Participation - Getting to 100+hrs

Dear Colleagues:

First of all, I want to thank Steve Reder for sharing the results of the Longitudinal Study of Adult Learning in Monday's webinar and throughout the week as we've discussed the research briefs.  I'm sure we will be thinking about and discussing this research for some time.  When the webinar is uploaded on the LINCS YouTube channel, we will let everyone know.  Creating the transcript and preparing the video takes a couple of weeks.  You are welcome to keep posting to this discussion over the upcoming weeks.

GETTING TO 100+ HOURS

While not all benefits from participating in adult basic skills programs require 100 hours or more of participation, many benefits do and participants reap the best results with higher intensity of study rather than study spread out over years.  There are many ways to reach 100+ hours, each having a set of "other supports" and resources that make them possible.  In fact, considering the average wage premium that is associated with this level of instruction, the return on investment is pretty substantial for adult learners, their families, and communities.

  • Does your program have an option to go full-time (100+ hours in about three weeks) or half-time (100+ hours in five weeks)?  How is that arranged for adult learners?  What other supports and resources are needed?
  • Does online learning provide important avenues to increase intensity?
  • If you have a career pathways, apprentice or pre-apprentice program, do adult learners reach that 100+ hour mark?  What does it take?

Reaching 100+ hours:  What do you think?  What do you suggest?

Cynthia Zafft

Postsecondary Completion Moderator

Comments

Steve,

I believe I recall from reading the original LSAL study, or perhaps from a presentation by or conversation with you, that those in the study on the whole (not specifically the 100 plus hour participants) who participated in programs did not necessarily do better than those who did only self study, and that those who did both self study and who participated in programs, not necessarily simultaneously, performed significantly better. Did I remember that correctly? If so, I wonder if you could comment on that. Is there any evidence that those who did both self study and participated were more, or differently, motivated? I also wonder what you think the implications of that finding might be for programs that offer blended learning, where the online component might in some cases be a kind of simultaneous self study, and might help to increase he intensity (number of hours) of learning.

David J. Rosen

Moderator, Program Management CoP

djrosen123@gmail.com

 

 

Thanks for the good question, David.  We looked systematically at self-study and program participation as alternative modes of preparation for the GED Tests, where the outcome of interest was GED attainment.  Those results are detailed in Brief #3.  Your memory is correct: both GED and self-study are associated with enhanced GED attainment rates, with the largest and most successful group being those who did both (though not necessarily at the same time). For both those who self-studied and those who did not, program participation had a significant impact on GED attainment rates when examined with our comparison group methods.  We also looked at adults' short-term (wave-to-wave) *perceptions* of changes in their reading, writing and math skills as outcomes, and these also showed apparent advantages for both self-study and program participation.  Those data on self-perceived changes are not reported in the Briefs, but are available in other publications on the LSAL project website.