Although it was watered down, AB 189 was signed by Governor Jerry Brown and should be counted as a success. Congratulations and thank you to Assembly Member Mike Eng for championing this legislation and seeing it through. It’s a small step, but an important one. Here is his press release:

SACRAMENTO, CA – This past weekend, Governor Brown signed Assembly Bill (AB) 189 by Assemblymember Mike Eng (D – Monterey Park), which will empower parents and community members to advocate for the protection of education programs important to them, as local boards consider making deeper cuts or closing entire programs. The bill also permits school districts to gain revenue to help fund programs like Adult Education.

Specifically, AB 189 requires Local Educational Agencies (LEAs) to hold independent meetings that are separate from the meeting to adopt a budget prior to the transfer of funds from categorical programs in Tier 3 flexibility. If a governing board intends to shut down a program, it will be required to notice a proposed elimination of a program at the meeting to discuss proposed transfer of Tier 3 funds or another meeting that is not the meeting to adopt the budget. In addition, it provides the ability to offer English as a Second Language and citizenship classes with modest fees as a means of keeping programs open and ensuring these services during flexibility.

The Fiscal Year (FY) 2009-10 budget had an important impact on categorical programs. The budget agreement imposed a 20% reduction on 39 programs and gave LEAs that received those funds in FY 2007-08 the flexibility to use the funds for any educational purposes from FY 2008-09 through FY 2012-13. The Governor recently enacted legislation to extend flexibility through the FY 2014–15.

“I am thrilled that the Governor heard the thousands of voices throughout the state that have advocated so strongly for this very important legislation, especially those in the Adult Education community,” said Assemblymember Eng. “Now, these same voices will have an opportunity to weigh in and advocate for the programs that are important to them before school districts take drastic steps in reducing or eliminating categorical programs.”

Categorical programs like Adult Education and Regional Occupational Centers & Programs (ROCP) provide valuable educational and post-educational services to a broad cross section of California’s population and prepares both adults and high school students for the workforce.

“For many members in our communities, these programs help fulfill their dreams of obtaining a better job, buying their own home, starting their own business and becoming more involved in their children’s education,” said Assemblymember Mike Eng.

Happy Labor Day

We have registered thousands of students and classes are in full session. Many classes are open enrollment, and registration continues through the year.

Berkeley Adult School serves students in specified and targeted instruction with measurable outcomes. In addition to our District’s broad support, we thank our collaborative educational partners. The Bread Project, a culinary and food service class on our campus is underway and the Café is open, with delicious baked goods, coffee, tea and full course lunches, all very affordable. San Francisco Paramedic Association teaches an EMT class, Boston Reed College teaches Clinical Medical Assistant and Pharmacy Technician classes. Offsite, Inter-City Services hosts a GED and Office Automation class for us and we offer diverse programs for older adults and adults with disabilities at locations throughout Berkeley, including our campus, J-Sei, Jewish Community Center of the East Bay, Strawberry Creek Lodge, Redwood Gardens, North Berkeley Senior Center, South Berkeley Senior Center, Ashby Care, Berkeley Pines, Chaparral House, Kyakameena, Berkeley Adult Day Health Center, BORP, Creative Wellness Center, and East Bay Center for the Blind.

Check out our on-line registration, come to the office or call 510-644-6130 for more information about enrollment.

We’re on Facebook, and if you are too, look for a “25% off” coupon for computer classes.

We have mentioned our accreditation in this blog, and we have been diligently preparing for the process. Berkeley Adult School has drafted a Self Study Report and rolled it out for our staff and faculty to provide input, edit, and add new content. This report will be our focus throughout the fall and winter, and will include an Action Plan addressing key area for our school. Part of the process is involving community members, so if you’re interested in participating, please contact Burr Guthrie or LaRanda Marr. A Visiting Committee, comprised of Adult Educators from across the state has been selected to spend three days at our school in April. At that time, the Visiting Committee will validate our Self Study Report and make recommendations on our Action Plan and our next accreditation term. Stay tuned for updates.

On October 24, 7:00 P.M. we will host the next Neighborhood Community Meeting, room TBA. Please rsvp with Principal Burr Guthrie if you plan to attend. Call (510) 644-6130 or send email.  

Registration for Fall classes is open! Classes begin August 30. Call (510) 644-6130 for information or visit our website to register online, http://bas.berkeley.net/

This week, Administrators Burr Guthrie and LaRanda Marr host a Retreat for the Leadership Team, followed by our annual Staff Development Day. Teachers return to work en mass on Friday, and continue the planning and preparation for classes beginning August 30.

Our focus this year is kaizen (Japanese for "improvement", or "change for the better"; refers to philosophy or practices that focus upon continuous improvement of processes) and we will be asking our staff, faculty, students and community to participate in the Self Study Report which has been drafted.

This Self Study Report is submitted for the purpose of assisting in the determination of the institution’s accreditation status, which is up for review this year. We will ensure that there is broad participation by the school’s community, and that the Self Study Report accurately reflects the nature and substance of the institution. If you want to be involved in our accreditation process, please contact Burr or LaRanda.

Berkeley Adult School is on Facebook!

In July, the Berkeley Unified School District Board of Education appointed LaRanda Marr as Vice-Principal, Berkeley Adult School.

This past school year, Ms. Marr served as the Acting Vice Principal for the Berkeley Adult School. We are pleased to announce that Ms. Marr has now been officially recommended for this position by a diverse interview panel. Ms. Marr has been serving in Adult Education programs since 1985.  She began as an ESL and ABE instructor.  Prior to coming to our district, she was an adult education administrator on special assignment in Oakland.  During her tenure in Oakland she not only developed ESL standards and guides, but also increased student participation and retention. Her former supervisor describes her as “a thoroughly pleasant, kind and thoughtful colleague and a consummate professional whose greatest asset is her ability to build a sense of team.” Please join us in wishing Ms. Marr continued success in our district.

Midsummer’s legislative report; here’s an update on AB18, from the 7/13/11 Santa Monica Daily Press Brownleys school financing reform bill stalls in Senate

A bill to reform K-12 school financing, championed by Assemblywoman Julia Brownley (D-Santa Monica), has stalled in its progress through the state Senate after winning near-unanimous support in the Assembly. The bill, known as AB18, would simplify school financing by reducing the number of categorical funds — funds that hold money that can only be spent on one purpose — to four large umbrella categories.

These larger categories would give local school districts the flexibility to choose where their state funding would best be spent, and would, supposedly, get rid of earmarks or unnecessary spending. Although the bill passed the Assembly with only two "no" votes, it became clear that the state Senate would be a harder hurdle to jump, Brownley said. Instead, she chose to convert the legislation into a two-year bill and use the extra time to try to address concerns brought during its debut in the Senate.

"I made the decision to make it what we call a two-year bill because it's a big, aggressive bill," Brownley said. "Trying to simplify a very complicated system takes time … We wanted to try to get the bill really right."

So far, AB18 has taken some heat from the California Teachers' Association and groups that advocate for adult education. Adult education supporters feared that by lumping money specifically earmarked for programs aimed at older students in with other categories in a block called "Base Funding" could lead to school districts axing the program in order to pay for other things.

Adult education has already taken major hits under so-called "flexibility" measures, which have allowed school districts to take money from the programs, or close them altogether, to support K-12 education, said Teri Burns, a legislative advocate for the California Association of Adult Education Administrators.

"Generally, the public's perception is that schools should serve K-12 education," Burns said. "When funding is tight, the pressure is on where to direct those dollars. You're pitting the cute little first grader against someone who's a young adult, or an older adult who doesn't have great work or English language skills, and is a less sympathetic character."

These concerns prompted Brownley to remove adult education from the "Base Funding" category, and preserve it as its own category for the time being. By removing it from one of the four main block funds envisioned in the bill, adult education will be safe from having its funding absorbed into other uses. Part of the decision to hold off on the bill is to invite opinions and concerns so that the bill won't have any unintended consequences, Brownley said. "There's clearly lots of concern about adult education," she said.

Still, Brownley holds that the basic architecture of the bill is sound, and this process will help fill in some of the details that need to be addressed. "All of the stakeholders have a fundamental agreement. The system is broken and needs to be changed," she said. "Now we need to get all the details nailed down."

Brownley carried a similar bill earlier in her term which got through both the Assembly and the Senate only to be vetoed by former Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger.The previous version created a working group that would be used to hash out the details and special interests.

This time, Brownley intended to cut out the middle man and make a working group out of the legislative process. She still hopes to pass the bill before the end of her term in 2012. "I've been working on this since I've been in the legislature," she said.

I would be remiss if I didn’t offer a reflection the 2010-11 school year. The year ended on June 30, and we are in a position to increase our services to adult learners in the Berkeley community. Specifically, we’ll be targeting transitions for secondary students to community college, employment for CTE students, completion for language learners and increased support to Berkeley Unified School district in the areas of credit recovery and CTE coordination for grades 7-Adult.

The path to June 30 held challenges, and with the support of our Board of Education and Superintendent Bill Huyett, our budget is in good shape. Director Josh Daniels posted this letter recently, regarding our budget: http://bas.berkeley.net/letter.html

Our district Block Entitlement grant (former ADA apportionment) is just below $3,000,000 and we have secured several grants that are restricted to specific programs, to supplement our targeted programming and mission statement.

Some highlights of the year are the 150 adult students who earned a High School Diploma, 22 who earned a GED, 300 + who completed a CTE certificate program, thousands who acquired language skills in ESL classes and the hundreds of students we are able to serve in our Offsite and Community Interest classes.

I take pride in our staff's efforts in securing a new secondary education grant (Policy to Performance, sponsored by CA Dept of Ed). We also made improvements in our WIA federal grant, which reflects learning gains in ESL, ABE and ASE programs. Our federal grant supporting Dept of Rehab clients received high ratings in a review by DOR and will continue to supplement our goals. We made strides in our efforts to align CTE curricula to industry standards and we increased our ability to support District goals.

Getting to know the BUSD community, BAS staff and students has been a great opportunity, and I am energized to continue the work. As our Superintendent says, “Berkeley is the place to be!” I am grateful for all the support through the year from everyone. Looking ahead, there is much on the horizon for BAS.

BAS Leadership Planning will focus on accreditation and preparation for the Visiting Committee from WASC in March. To that end, we have the following scheduled meetings:

Leadership Retreat, August 24 (tentative)

Staff Development, August 26 & 29, October 10 and January 30

In addition to these dates, monthly leadership, coordination and department meetings will focus on accreditation and completion of our Self Study report.

We are eager to begin implementation of the state sponsored Policy to Performance grant and facilitate the transition of a cohort of secondary students to community college. We have made gains in our federal Workforce Investment Act literacy grant and will implement eTesting for further improvement. We completed a favorable review with our federal Department of Rehabilitation grant and will continue to transition Workability II clients to employment. We will persist in fostering collaborative partnerships to provide necessary services to our community.

I will continue to post adult education legislation and advocacy efforts here. The following link has updates on AB 18, AB 189 and other state and federal legislation of interest http://www.caeaa.org/pdfs/060711_state_leg_update.pdf

Classes begin August 30. Until then, good summer!

Berkeley Unified School District

Press Release

June 18, 2011

BUSD Will Not Pursue Community Day Classroom at BAS

Berkeley Unified School District administration has decided not to bring forward the placement of a County Community Day School Classroom at Berkeley Adult School, or any other location on District property. Superintendent Bill Huyett has expressed that the District has other more pressing issues and needs that require staff time.

The District will continue to encourage the Alameda County Office of Education to locate services for expelled students in the northern part of the county.

That’s the official word from the district. Berkeley City Councilmember Linda Maio sent this note to our neighbors:  “I learned that the School District has decided not to locate the Community School at the BAS.  I have no information as to why.  I recently raised concerns about the quality of the proposed space, and we know that there are strong concerns in the neighborhood about potential safety impacts and how they would be addressed.  I expect there will be public discussion at an upcoming School Board meeting about the decision and I will also see what more I can learn.”

And local blogs picked it up too:

Berkeleyside

Berkeley adult school neighbors

While the idea of a Community School classroom in an Adult School may be new, we serve at the pleasure of the BUSD Board of Education and the Superintendent, and we are prepared help transition adults, young and old. Berkeley Adult School supports the District’s goals.

 

We are into our last week of classes for this school year, and we want to say “Thank You” to our students, faculty, staff, community, district administration and the BUSD Board of Education. This Wednesday, June 15 at 7 p.m. Berkeley Adult School (established 1881) hosts our annual High School Diploma and General Educational Development (GED) Commencement Ceremony. This year, BAS graduates 149 High School Diploma students and 22 GED students, ranging in age from 18 to 52. We are very proud of our adult graduates and wish them the very best on their next journey in life.

BAS will be closed for the summer (with the exception of a 5 week program for BUSD Middle Schools) and the fall semester begins on August 30 for Academic and ESL classes. Most other classes begin after Labor Day, on September 6. Check our main website here for updated information on classes and registration, and look for our fall 2011 catalog in mid August.

Noteworthy: The popular local blog, Berkeleyside recently published an article about the Alameda County Office of Education proposal to open a Community School classroom on our campus. You can view it here. I will post any significant news over the summer on this blog.

On the legislative front, here is a perspective from CCAE President, Mike Wada:

Regarding Assembly Bill (AB) 189 - Politically, if a committee chair authors a bill, the members of that house usually go along in order not to have their bills squashed by that chair in the future. Adjustments to the bill are made when the bill reaches the opposite house. This is just life in politics. Our Legislative Analyst, Jeff Frost, also had this to say: In a perfect world, it would have been nice to be able to move a bill that protected a significant percentage of adult education funds from being subject to redirection to K-12 programs. However, given the Governor’s desire to extend flexibility for 2 years (language to do this is contained in the budget bill now on the floors of each house) and the support for this from a vast majority of legislators of both parties, it would not have been possible to move the bill in its original form out of its first committee. In fact, the author and I met with Julia Brownley, the Education Committee chair, and she indicated that it would be very difficult for her to support a bill that “tied the hands of local board” in how they used categorical flexibility given that program cuts are still being made due to budget reductions by the state.

While the amended version of the bill does not provide the type of protection for adult education that CCAE wanted to achieve, it does make a strong statement about the need to ensure that local boards cannot close adult programs. In fact, the bill makes two very strong statements: 1) the bill states that categorical flexibility is for the purpose of addressing the current fiscal emergency and is intended to last only for the duration of this fiscal emergency, and 2) it states legislative intent that in making its determination about staffing for adult education, and the other programs designated in the bill, a district must ensure that there are an adequate number of administrative and credentialed teaching staff to provide a baseline level of core courses during the period that funding flexibility is authorized. These are important points and will help community members and adult programs staff advocate for protecting adult education programs as local boards are considering making deeper cuts or closing entire program

AB 18, which CCAE opposes unless amended, is authored by a committee chair. When the vote was taken, only two Assembly members registered a "No" vote: Tony Mendoza and Sandre Swanson, who are both co-authors on our AB 189. They stick out like sore thumbs.

They could have chosen the customary and accepted path, yet, they stood up for adult education. This is a remarkable display of a "portrait in courage."

CCAE Bay Section members (Swanson) and South Coast Section (Mendoza) should contact them to offer their thanks and appreciation. I have already done so.

Tony Mendoza
assemblymember.mendoza@assembly.ca.gov
916-319-2056 begin_of_the_skype_highlighting            916-319-2056      end_of_the_skype_highlighting

Sandre Swanson
assemblymember.swanson@assembly.ca.gov
916-319-2016 begin_of_the_skype_highlighting            916-319-2016      end_of_the_skype_highlighting

In addition to our state Adult Education advocacy from CCAE, nationally the Commission on Adult Basic Education (COABE) has active lobbying efforts going on. If you care about adult education, support these organizations by becoming a member.

There’s some interesting follow-up press about the RAND report that came out recently. Here are two examples: Governing blog and Look Out news. And locally, the East Bay Express ran a story about Oakland Adult & Career Education with poignant comments. Even Senate pro Tem Darrell Steinberg’s recent plea to the public at least mentioned Adult Education.

Message from Jeff Frost, CCAE Lobbyist:

On June 1, AB 18 passed the Assembly Floor. There were no votes in opposition. However, I have spoken with the staff from both Mr. Mendoza and Mr. Eng. Both of these members will be speaking with Ms. Brownley about the need to protect adult education. We now need to redirect our attention to the Senate Education Committee and actively lobby the members of this committee. The hearing on this bill will probably be in late June. I will be back in touch on efforts to contact Senators.

Message from Mike Wada, CCAE President:

AB 189 passed out of the Assembly and now moves to the Senate Ed committee on a 48-7 vote, with a number of abstentions (There are 80 Assembly members). Major kudos to Assemblymember Mike Eng and CCAE lobbyist Craig Brown.

More details regarding field action will be shared as the Senate scenario unfolds.

888-54-CCAE-1

membership@ccaestate.org