2013 - Year in Review

Dear Colleagues, 

A very happy new year to you!

As we are all settling back into our work after the holidays, I wanted to take a moment and reflect on the year 2013. One of the biggest moments that has impacted and informed our practice was the release of the College and Career Readiness Standards for Adult Education. The Standards place emphasis on focus, rigor, complexity of texts, evidence, and knowledge. The Standards do raise the bar higher but work towards getting our students to be college and career ready as they will transition onto postsecondary education and/or training with higher skills. What do you think about the Standards and how have they changed your practice?

Another highlight of the year has been the anticipation and preparations around the Common Core-aligned high school equivalency tests - GED 2014, HiSET, TASC etc. Please share how your program has handled the new tests? How has this impacted you or your students?

Were there other highlights were you as you look back on 2013... 

Here is to a new year and new beginnings! I am looking forward to learning from you. 

Regards, 

Priyanka Sharma 

SME - Postsecondary Completion  

 

Comments

Hi, Priyanka,

Happy New Year to you, too! I've been thinking back over the past year also over the holidays and wanted to post some research resources. Research Allies for Lifelong Learning has assembled the best of our 2013 research presentations on the R-ALLY website (www.researchallies.org) at no cost. Please feel free to share these findings with colleagues and adult learners. A few topics are highlighted below. I'd really like to know how others might use these findings in their work.

What experiences do adult learners have when they transition to postsecondary education? What do they recommend to adult educators that would help them transition even more smoothly? Learn about the experiences of interviewees from seven states in their own words on our new Perceptions and Pathways research webpages: http://researchallies.org/Recommendations.html.

Want to use these research materials on transition experiences for professional development? http://researchallies.org/P_P_Prof_Development.html  offers more context, info on how adults value education, their triggers to enrolling in postsecondary education, and even more perceptions and recommendations.

Need state-by-state data on adults with GED® credentials transitioning to postsecondary education? Visit our Crossing the Bridge webpages at: http://researchallies.org/Crossing_the_Bridge.html and see data for your state. Where are the top 100 colleges and universities that transition GED passers after testing? Visit http://researchallies.org/Crossing_the_Bridge_9.html to see the listing by state.

(Kindly excuse cross postings.)

Thanks,

Margaret