ATLANTA — The Southern Regional Education Board’s Electronic Campus and other adult education efforts are helping more adults earn a college degree and could become national models for improvement, according to a National Commission on Adult Literacy report released at a public event in Washington, D.C. yesterday.
Reach Higher, America documents the adult education crisis facing American workers and proposes increasing programs to raise the education levels of adults already in the work force, along with campaigns to boost adult learner interest and public support.
Cited in the national report for its success, SREB’s Electronic Campus gives adults access to 20,000 online courses from colleges and universities in all 16 SREB member states. Faced with work, family and time constraints, adults can apply online and work toward more than 700 degree programs at their own convenience.
Another new initiative for adults is the CALL program in Louisiana (www.yourcallla.org). "This is a promising model that can increase adult education on a national level," said Bruce Chaloux, director of Student Access Programs and Services at SREB. A joint project of SREB and the Louisiana Board of Regents, the Continuum for All Louisiana Learners (CALL) targets working adults with some college credit but no degree. Adults take online courses in an accelerated, "fast track" mode and can earn credit for documented knowledge they have gained on the job and elsewhere, so they can more quickly complete an associate’s or bachelor’s degree.
"Public awareness and media campaigns are increasing enrollments" in adult education as well, the report notes. Nearly all SREB states now participate in the Go Alliance, a regional cooperative effort that helps states develop and share media campaigns to encourage students to finish high school and go to college. As a partner in the Pathways to College Network, Go Alliance also manages the national College Access Marketing Web site, which helps state education agencies and other groups conduct campaigns to increase high school completion and college participation.
SREB’s Challenge to Lead Goals for Education call for adults who are not high school graduates to participate in literacy and job-skills training and further education, and for the percentage of adults in SREB states who earn postsecondary degrees or technical certificates to exceed national averages. Most SREB states have not met these goals. More than 4.3 million working-age adults (25 to 44 years old) did not have high school credentials in SREB states in 2005. In the SREB median states, only 10 percent of these adults were enrolled in adult education courses that year.
For more information about SREB’s adult learning activities, contact SREB Communications or see www.sreb.org. For a copy of Reach Higher, America, go to www:nationalcommissiononadultliteracy.org.
SREB, a nonprofit and nonpartisan organization based in Atlanta, Georgia, advises state education leaders on ways to improve education. SREB was created in 1948 by Southern governors and legislatures to help leaders in education and government work cooperatively to advance education and improve the social and economic life of the region. SREB has 16 member states: Alabama, Arkansas, Delaware, Florida, Georgia, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maryland, Mississippi, North Carolina, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, Virginia and West Virginia. Each is represented by its governor and four gubernatorial appointees.
