[NLA] professionalization, etc.

[RoyceSJ@netscape.net]

The ideas of an adult education teachers' union is not far fetched. It's history! In 1921 the NEA's Department of Education set up an independent voluntary association with its own program, constitution, officers, dues housed rent free in the NEA headquarters and offered access to NEA services ranging from mail handling to publications consultation. 
It was the NEA's way of giving support to aspects of public education that appeared to need some subsidization.  LR Alderman, the Departments' first presidnet was the pricipal adult education specialist of the US Office of Education. 

In the 1950s public school adult education was a big business. Without a federal subsidy, over 79 million dollars were spend by schools for adult programs in 1952-53 alone.  At that time adult education was run by public school administrators. In some states such as Louisiana, California, New York and Pennsylvania, it received per pupil tax bases and focused on vocational training, general education and the evening high school. 

It was not until 1969 that NAPSAE, the descendent of the old NEA Department of Adult Education separated from the NEA. 




"Eileen Eckert" <eileeneckert at hotmail.com> wrote:

>From Debbie: I'm curious--would you favor associating
>adult ed in some way with the teacher unions?  Or some other form of
>collective organizing?
>
>I don't know. I do believe collective action is needed, but I'm leery of the 
>rush to consensus and groupthink. I've worked in unionized and non-union 
>environments, and there are advantages and disadvantages to both. Also, I 
>instinctively believe that piggybacking on K-12 or college-oriented unions 
>is not going to serve the adult and family literacy field in the long run, 
>either with our developing identity or with practical matters of academic 
>freedom, workload, pay, and benefits. But if we're not going to do it 
>ourselves, then would we be better off with a K-12 or higher ed teachers' 
>union, or nothing? The UAW tried to organize university teaching assistants, 
>right? Maybe they'd take us on--just kidding, sort of. The whole issue makes 
>me wonder how other jobs came to be professions and what's gained and lost 
>in the process. I'd love to hear from labor historians.
>
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