A study was conducted to (1) identify continuing education needs and barriers to adult participation in New York State (excluding New York City); (2) collect information about adult education services and staff development priorities in programs sponsored by public schools, Boards of Cooperative Educational Services, and two-year state colleges;…

This paper describes and evaluates a political skills course for college students. Course objectives include teaching students to do the following: organize and run a meeting; bargain effectively; communicate within and between groups; manage a crisis; organize a political coalition; be aware of personal stress and some of the ways to reduce it;…

Mathematics achievement test scores of high school students in the Austin Independent School District who graduated before implementation of minimum competency testing were compared to the scores of students who were more recently enrolled in mathematics tutorial classes in order to meet minimum competency requirements. The percentages of…

Examples of innovations in college and adult reading reading programs in five states are described. At Maricopa Technical College (Arizona) adult students have access to a special reading program emphasizing the language experience approach, capitalizing on students' life experiences and oral language facility. Otero Junior College (Colorado)…

Four important changes for the community colleges of California are proposed. First, legislation should be developed that establishes the basic framework for enabling community colleges to restore a level of access to community college education and training for more citizens. This would provide economic and social opportunity for more citizens,…

Adult illiteracy is a worldwide problem. Illiterate adults are the most difficult to teach and to reach because illiteracy is characterized by embarrassment and low self-esteem. Given that radio is heavily used by lower income and less educated people, literacy projects utilizing radio were attempted in 40 countries between 1960 and 1974. The main…

This paper describes the development and use of language training procedures, referred to as cues-pause-point procedures, that rely on behavioral principles and simple and natural teaching procedures and that are exhibited in many normal parent-child or teacher-student verbal interactions. The procedures have been effective in teaching severely…

Greater knowledge about the practical application of Rasch technology can help in avoiding misapplications and confusions in testing programs. Equal interval curriculum-based scaling makes possible the following improvements in measuring basic skills achievement by enabling testing programs to: (1) individualize the difficulty level of…

Both the literature on adult learning and the literature on the composing process focus on students and their behaviors rather than on teachers and their methods or on curricular content and structure. The most productive teaching of nontraditional students and the most useful educational research about them begins with the students themselves,…

After discussing the conclusions of a Congressional Budget Office study, which recommended that federal aid be redirected from colleges to secondary programs more directly related to job training, this paper examines the need to plan general and technical education within the framework of national productivity. The decreasing productivity rate of…

This paper presents an educational program for seriously emotionally disturbed students at the Yellowstone Ranch, a residential treatment facility and school focusing on the enhancement of each student's self esteem. Located in Montana, which in 1965 created a special school district to serve the needs of special needs children, the school has as…

School board members can assist the change process in curriculum development by helping annually to set instructional goals through a variety of methods that could include management by objectives and community involvement. Board members can also help obtain community resources for career education, arts, and cultural programs. Another proper…

First-year outcomes are reported for Success for All--a program designed to bring all children to grade level in basic skills by the third grade. The program uses one-to-one tutoring, reading methods, frequent assessment, enhanced preschool and kindergarten programs, family support, and other interventions to prevent learning problems from…

A study was conducted in spring 1991, spring 1993, and summer 1993 to determine the effect on the writing process of various types of word processing software used by developmental and second-level composition students. Analyses were conducted of developmental students (novice writers) and of composition students (above novice writers) at a Texas…

A study of biliteracy focuses on discourse as the unit of analysis needed to understand the task facing bilingual students. It investigated the way in which 22 high school students representing six different language groups in a bilingual basic skills course struggled with scientific language in an experiment on the community's drinking water.…