Members' Introductions

If you haven't yet, please introduce yourself by replying with a comment to this post. You can do that in any way you like, but here are some possible things to mention:

  • Your name
  • Your role(s) in adult basic skills education, and/or in other types of education
  • Your program and agency/organization/institution and state
  • Your interests in program management-- what you would like to learn, what you would like to share with colleagues here
  • What you are hoping to get from being a member of this CoP

Thanks. We look forward to seeing your introduction.

David J. Rosen

Program Management CoP Moderator

djrosen123@gmail.com

Comments

Hi,  My name is Morgan Winston.  I am the director of the Ozark Foothills Literacy Project.  We serve Fulton, Sharp, Izard, and Independence counties in Arkansas.  I'm hoping to learn best practices here from other members.  While I have some experience, I'm fairly new to the nonprofit director game. 

Good afternoon,

My name is Amy Denney, and I have been in the adult education field since 2004. I began as a part-time instructor where I taught ABE/ASE classes and one ESL class. I learned so much from my students and quickly found that teaching adults was my passion. I had worked in special education for a few years prior, but my undergraduate degree is in business. That is where I spent most of my "younger" career. After teaching part-time for one year, there was an opening for a full-time teacher. I interviewed and got the job. It was so exciting to be responsible for a center. I taught classes at all levels and in all subjects, including ESL. Since we were in a rural area, I had to learn to teach a multi-level classroom. There have been many changes to state policies and GED testing, but one thing remains the same. The students are incredible.

After teaching for 13 years, I left my college and became the Education Manager at a workforce development center for youth. Even though my time with them was brief (5 months), I learned a great deal about WIOA. I interviewed and received a position at my former college as the Associate Director of Adult Education. It has been an amazing journey. I hope to learn how to lead a program without being in charge. I want to keep all the part-time faculty and staff motivated, and I want to find innovative and creative ways to engage the learners. I have a great deal of experience in my community because I have served on many boards, including the chamber of commerce.

I look forward to our discussions.

Sincerely,

Amy Denney

Hi Everyone,

I am a Dyslexia Practitioner by trade.  I began volunteering at my local literacy council and am now the ABE Coordinator and Accommodations Coordinator for our Students with Disabilities HiSET students.

I am looking forward to learning more about running an adult education program from the more experienced people on this list!

Thank you in advance for answering my million questions, LOL.

Pam

 

 

Hi, my name is Alison Barker. I just met David at COABE 2019 here in New Orleans, and was motivated to join this group! I am Manager of Instruction and Academic Partnerships for Earn and Learn Career Pathways program, a direct service program housed in the Cowen Institute at Tulane University. I am part administrator part teacher/coach. I run weekly soft skills training for 18-24 year olds who are participants in one of our 3 programs, all of which place 18-24 year olds in PT or FT entry level positions in high demand fields in NOLA. A former English and history teacher (middle school, after school, college and alternative settings) I have been greatly helped by YPQ improvement and assessment tool out of the Weikert Center as well as Leslie Beller's MHA framework for soft skills program design.

I'll finish my bio according to David's suggested bullet points:

  • New Orleans, La
  • I would like to gain more know-how and confidence with project and program management, esp when it comes to working in highly collaborative settings where responsibilities and roles can become a little fuzzy. (Ie, our technical and career staff have expertise in those elements of curriculum, yet I write curriculum, etc). I would like to integrate technology more, and I would like to find streamlined ways to diagnose numeracy and literacy skills outside of TABE. This year I am writing our first curriculum playbook, which will be the boilerplate frame for our program offerings regardless of our employer partnership activities, and I'd love to learn from people in this group about curriculum design when you are trying to amass your "greatest hits" from the past 4 years instead of reinventing the wheel.
  • Because we serve 18-24 year olds only, we frequently straddle workforce ed and youth work--I need to always keep in mind the factors that make our population more youth leaning than adult ed leaning, and this affects my PD and collaborations.
  • What you are hoping to get from being a member of this CoP: Everything above, plus strengthening networks to folks outside of my city. 

Glad to be here!

I am relatively new to this game. Education has been in my blood for 40+ years, but the ABE/GED route is fairly new.  I taught public school, elementary grades for 39 years in NJ. I retired in 2015. However, my house was the victim of Hurricane Sandy in 2012, so we still had bills to pay, and I was not going to sit home all day. I applied for a GED INSTRUCTOR position through  my local community college and I have been LOVING it since then. The program in my location is staffed by me, myself and I,  which can be frustrating and liberating at the same time. I have developed wonderful friendships with my students and I am just as upset as they are when they do not pass their exams.

My biggest frustration is the passing score of 150 as compared to the other states. I am currently writing letters to the Department of Education requesting a reduction.

I like this online group as it is keeping me abreast of the legalities of my situation and what I can do when I win the lottery and can fully staff my location.

I thought I was pretty informed. I am an elected member of my local board of Education and have also been elected to administrative positions of my teacher's union, but being funded by the Dept of Labor is a whole new ball game.

 

Keep the communications coming!!!!

Hello Laura,

Welcome to the LINCS CoP Program Management group. Thanks for posting a great introduction. You may already know that New Jersey has a long-time adult basic skills education professional development association, New Jersey Association of Lifelong Learning (NJALL), and that they have a conference coming up soon on Friday, May 10th. If you'll be there I look forward to seeing you. I'll be presenting at a couple of sessions.

As a point of reference for others who have read your introduction and who may be confused by your reference to the state's department of labor as a funder of adult basic skills education, although in many states the Governor's designated agency to receive federal WIOA Title II (Adult Education) funds is the state's Department of Elementary and Secondary Education, in some states it is instead the Department of Labor or Labor and Workforce Development, and in a few states it is the Department of Higher Education. I might add that most -- but not yet all -- states also have a line item in their state budget, sometimes that adds considerably more adult basic skills funding; these include New York, California, Massachusetts and others.

I hope you will share discoveries and questions with us here, and that we all can have a lively practitioner-to-practitioner discussion.

David J. Rosen, Moderator

LINCS CoP Program Management and Intergrating Technology groups

Hello Alison,

Thanks, you have done a great introduction, and we're glad you have joined us!  I encourage all Program Managerment group members who haven't yet done so to also introduce themselves.

I am intrigued by this sentence you wrote, "I have been greatly helped by YPQ improvement and assessment tool out of the Weikert Center as well as Leslie Beller's MHA framework for soft skills program design." In a new post to this group (not a reply to this introductions thread) could you tell us what YPQ  means, and describe this assessment tool, and also describe Leslie Beller's MHA framework for soft skills program design? These both sound like they would be of interest to some others in this group.

You wrote, "I would like to gain more know-how and confidence with project and program management, esp when it comes to working in highly collaborative settings where responsibilities and roles can become a little fuzzy. (Ie, our technical and career staff have expertise in those elements of curriculum, yet I write curriculum, etc)" I wonder if others here might offer suggestions on program or project management in highly collaborative settings. Alison, could you also post this as a separate question in the Program Management group? I, for one, would be glad to respond, and I hope we have lots of responses from others.

You wrote, "I would like to integrate technology more".  I see that you have also just joined the LINCS Integrating Technology group. Terrific. I hope you have lots of questions to post there!

You wrote, "I would like to find streamlined ways to diagnose numeracy and literacy skills outside of TABE". There are three LINCS groups that might be particularly helpful in addressing this: Math and Numeracy, Reading and Writing, and the Assessment Micro-group.

I am looking forward to seeing more of your questions and comments.

David J. Rosen, Moderator

LINCS CoP Program Management  and Integrating Technology groups

 

Hello!

I am the Director of Research and Impact for the Office of Adult Education in Georgia. I manage our office's data quality and other research initiatives. I am relatively new to this role, but am looking forward to hearing about what others are doing across the nation in adult ed. Thanks!

Best,

Rosaline

Hello Program Management colleagues,

Please post or update your introduction by replying to this message. You can do that in any way you like, but here are some possible things to mention:

  • Your name
  • Your role(s) in adult basic skills education, and/or in other types of education
  • Your program and agency/organization/institution and state
  • Your interests in program management-- what you would like to learn, what you would like to share with colleagues here
  • What you are hoping to get from being a member of this group

Thanks. We look forward to learning more about you and your interests.

David J. Rosen, Moderator

LINCS CoP Program Management group

Dear LINCS members:

I am an Associate Director of Adult Education at a grant funded program in Georgia, and I have been active in adult education since 2004. Even though we closed for a period of time in March and April, we have been teaching F2F classes since July. It has been very challenging to keep our program fully staffed, but we have managed. Because of the challenges we are facing in personnel, I have been teaching an ESL class. I love getting back in the classroom, especially in an ESL course. Part of my lesson plans for this unit is to help our students explore their national, state, and local representatives in order to write a letter to one of them. In the state of Georgia, our immigrant students have to provide documentation that they are lawfully present in the United States. According to our state training, this is a law specific to Georgia. Do your states require your immigrant students to provide verification of eligibility for public benefit to take the free adult education/ESL classes? I would love to know how many of your states do not require this but still receive federal WIOA Title II funding.