It's time to contact your local legislators and Governor Jerry Brown and advocate for including immigrant integration as part of AEBG - the Adult Ed Block Grant. The challenges that the Trump administration have brought upon us have also brought a deeper understanding of the value of immigrants in California and the importance of supporting immigrant integration through Adult Education.
Both the California Immigrant Policy Center and CCAE - the California Council of Adult Education - are advocating for this important change to happen.
Contact your local legislators and Governor Jerry Brown. Explain to them why immigrant integration matters.
Here is information from the California Immigrant Policy Center and from CCAE about advocating for including immigrant integration into AEBG.
California Immigrant Policy Center
Workforce Development & Adult Education
Administrative Advocacy & Budget Advocacy
CIPC is continuing our advocacy for equity within California’s adult education and workforce development programs and funding at a local and statewide level. In 2018, we are weighing in on budget proposals from adult education and workforce development stakeholders for increased employment training and services. These include adding “immigrant integration” metrics to the Adult Education Block Grant and funding the Breaking Barriers to Employment Act (AB 1111, 2017).
California Immigrant Policy Center March 13th, 2018 Update
Update: Governor Brown's 2018 Budget & New Proposals -
Update: Governor Brown's 2018 Budget & New Proposals -
Adult Education & Workforce Development
Adult Education Block Grant -
The Adult Education Block Grant (AEBG) is an important source of state funding to programs and services that provide adults with the knowledge needed to be prepared for the workforce, such as English language courses, GED attainment, and vocational skills. These programs also support integration and inclusion outcomes for immigrants not seeking employment training but adult education services that support their engagement in community and civic life. This year’s budget continues to sustain the $500 million funding.
- Budget Proposal: A proposal from adult education stakeholders, the California Council for Adult Education and the California Adult Education Administrators Association, provides a two prong approach to advancing how AEBG funding reaches immigrant communities. The proposal would establish performance based funding that incentives the needs of communities with multiple barriers including limited English proficiency, poverty, and lack of high school completion, and include “immigrant integration” as a reported outcome for state funding. CIPC will be working with stakeholders and the Legislature
Note: CCAE - California Council for Adult Education - is recommending that Immigrant Integration metrics are incorporated into AEBG - the Adult Ed Block Grant.
Here is information from CCAE's FY 2018-19 Adult Ed Framework Priorities:
INCORPORATE IMMIGRANT INTEGRATION METRICS
Even as collaboration between the systems expands through regional consortium-building and AEBG, the K-12 community-based adult schools still have as their core mission to serve those low basic skills adults who oftentimes get caught in the remediation of post-secondary education. Additionally, the structural and cultural differences between the two systems have become more evident through this planning process and it is critical that the strengths of each be leveraged in ways that support student learning outcomes and appropriate levels of support services. The adult learners that are best served by K12 adult schools must not be left out.
- AEBG defines the specific outcomes sought – literacy and career progress.
- Serving immigrant adults in need of English language skills have been at the core of the K12 adult education mission since its inception. They come to adult schools to develop literacy, and in doing so, gain cultural competency and literacy more broadly defined as health, financial, digital literacy, parenting and family literacy, and civic engagement, all also critical to successful transition to college and careers.
- Unfortunately, the statute and overall AEBG framework does not explicitly provide for these types of immigrant integration metrics relative to demonstrating outcomes and accountability for student success.
- We are concerned that immigrant students who may not yet have the skills to demonstrate outcomes on the current statutory spectrum that focuses solely on literacy and career progress will be left behind as AEBG entities seek to focus on programming for those students for which clear outcomes and progress can be measured and for which funding may eventually be prioritized.
- The Alliance for Language Learners’ Integration, Education and Success (ALLIES) is an alliance serving the two-county Silicon Valley region of San Mateo and Santa Clara counties. Launched by a grant of the Silicon Valley Community Foundation in 2010, mission of ALLIES is to advance regional economic and social health through high-impact alliances for immigrant educational and career success. Through this work, ALLIES developed an Immigrant Integration Pathway offering an innovative way to identify and measure the critical factors for successful immigrant integration. The pathway includes eight high-level goal areas that are then further broken down into approaches and supporting objectives. The goals are intended to be: o Used by individuals as well as service providers via common metrics that can help assess if an individual is progressing and/or practices are effective;
o Measurable qualitatively and quantitatively;
o Achievable with milestones under reasonable timeframes; and
o A tool for the immigrant to have ownership of their progress, with the ability to see how incremental gains are related to longer-term goals.1
Using the ALLIES Framework, amend the AEBG statute to explicitly reference and include "immigrant integration metrics" under AEBG.
Amend Education Code Section 84920, as follows:
(1) Define the specific data each consortium shall collect.
(2) Establish a menu of common assessments and policies regarding placement of adults seeking education and workforce services into adult education programs to be used by each consortium to measure educational needs of adults and the effectiveness of providers in addressing those needs.
(b) No later than August 1, 20178, the chancellor and the Superintendent shall report to the Director of Finance, the State Board of Education, and the appropriate policy and fiscal committees of the Legislature on options for integrating the assessments described in subdivision (a) into the common assessment system developed pursuant to Section 78219. The report shall address compliance of the assessments with federal and state funding requirements for adult education programs, identify estimated costs
(c) It is the intent of the Legislature that both of the following occur:
(1) That the educational needs of adults in the state be better identified and understood through better sharing of data across state agencies.
(2) That, at a minimum, the chancellor and the Superintendent shall enter into agreements to share data related to effectiveness of the consortia between their agencies and with other state agencies, including, but not necessarily limited to, the Employment Development Department and the California Workforce Investment Board.
(d) The chancellor and the Superintendent shall identify, no later than January 1, 2016 August 1, 2018, the measures for assessing the effectiveness of consortia that will be used in the report that is required pursuant to Section 84917. These measures shall include, but not necessarily be limited to, all of the following:
(1) How many adults are served by members of the consortium.
(2) How many adults served by members of the consortium have demonstrated the following, as applicable:
(A) Immigrant integration.
(B) Improved literacy skills.
(BC) Completion of high school diplomas or their recognized equivalents.
(CD) Completion of postsecondary certificates, degrees, or training programs.
(DE) Placement into jobs.
(EF) Improved wages.
(e) The chancellor and the Superintendent shall apportion the funds appropriated for purposes of this section in the Budget Act of 2015 in accordance with both of the following:
(1) Eighty-five percent of these funds shall be used for grants to consortia to establish systems or obtain data necessary to submit any reports or data required pursuant to subdivision (b) of Section 84917.
(2) Fifteen percent of these funds shall be used for grants for development of statewide policies and procedures related to data collection or reporting or for technical assistance to consortia, or both.
(f) The chancellor and the Superintendent shall provide any guidance to the consortia necessary to support the sharing of data included in systems established by consortia pursuant to this section across consortia.
Here's an example of a very successful program which cultivates immigrant integration.
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