[NLA] NIFL Board Make-Up & Related Matters

[Gail Spangenberg]

Friends,
CAAL sent out a letter about the make-up of the NIFL board and the 
need for a strong and continuing Department of Education presence in 
adult literacy last September.  It went to some 24 members of 
Congress (heads of all relevant committees), the White House domestic 
affairs advisor, and key officials at the US Department of Education. 
Since most of us have double-duty work loads these days, anyone who 
wants to use any of the language of that letter for their own 
write-ins is most welcome to do so.  To this end, I am pasting in a 
copy of the letter below (with apologies for any formatting problems 
that may appear.)  Gail S

Gail Spangenberg
President
Council for Advancement of Adult Literacy
1221 Avenue of the Americas - 50th Floor
New York, NY 10020
212-512-2362, fax 212-512-2610
http://www.caalusa.org

Letter of September 22, 2001 to:
Senators Byrd, Stevens, Harkin, Specter, Clinton, Gregg, Kennedy, 
Murray, Schumer Representatives Young, Obey, Boehner, Miller, McKeon, 
Mink, Regula, Kennedy, Sawyer The Honorable Rod Paige (with copies to 
Bryan, Hansen, D'Amico, Hartman, Pugsley) White House Domestic Policy 
Advisor Margaret LaMontagne
Dear _____________:

Despite the staggering events of last week, I firmly believe in the 
core strength of our nation and am confident about the future of 
America. In this spirit, I write to you about my concerns and hopes 
for adult literacy. I do so as the head of the new Council for the 
Advancement of Adult Literacy, and as the former operating head of 
the Business Council for Effective Literacy (BCEL), an organization 
that through the mid-90s provided national leadership in adult 
literacy -- with the support of corporations, government, and 
professionals throughout the field.

My basic message is simple. Even as the President's effort to advance 
literacy in the schools goes forward, it is vitally important for the 
Administration to keep a strong, visible commitment to adult literacy 
-- especially at the Department of Education and the National 
Institute for Literacy. Dedicated professionals across this land -- 
including governors and Republican and Democratic members of 
Congress, during several administrations -- have toiled mightily for 
years to develop understanding about the nature of the adult literacy 
challenge as well as a framework and resources for delivering 
services on a level commensurate with the need.

In the months to come there will be many pressing demands on the 
federal budget. Urgent as they are, support for adult literacy is 
also essential to our future stability and progress.

We have made substantial gains in the adult literacy field to date. 
The skills and hopes of hundreds of thousands of Americans have been 
lifted, enhancing their job prospects and enabling their 
participation as citizens and family and community members. The 
beneficiaries of the collective effort are adult learners of every 
age, 16 to 80, of every racial and ethnic background. They are 
parents with improved skills who have become positive forces for 
their children's learning. They are a large population of immigrants 
with English-As-A-Second-Language (ESL) needs, and of Americans born 
to poverty, who are handicapped by some form of educational 
disadvantage, or whose skills are simply not adequate to meet the 
changing demands of jobs.

Anyone who has ever been privileged to sit in a tutoring session or 
workshop in any program in the country -- especially those offered by 
libraries and the voluntary groups, which serve persons at the lowest 
skills levels -- has been moved by watching the "enabling" process at 
work. They know that adult literacy services directly affect the way 
lives are lived, and they know why. Moreover, they have been touched 
to see enrolled adults learn tolerance for their brothers and sisters 
even as they gain in self-confidence and higher-level basic skills.

Despite the progress, however, our work has just begun. For lack of 
adequate resources, there are long waiting lists in programs across 
the country. And there remains a vast number of young and older 
adults in need of skills upgrading that we haven't reached at all or 
that we have reached only minimally -- many, many millions, no matter 
how the results of the National Adult Literacy survey are interpreted.
The modern adult literacy movement had its roots in Lyndon Johnson's 
War on Poverty. The Reagan, Bush, and Clinton years lifted the 
movement to new heights. But even as people across this country 
struggle to increase resources for adult literacy, to implement major 
goals from last year's National Literacy Summit, and in other ways to 
move adult literacy from "the margins to the mainstream," they are 
fearful that they will no longer get the support they need from 
federal and state government. This is not a time to retreat from 
adult literacy. It is a time to take stock of needs and to pursue and 
support opportunities for further development.

The case for adult literacy has come to be made in terms of family 
literacy and workplace/ workforce literacy, a shift that resulted 
from the Workforce Investment Act. Yet there is also a compelling 
need to expand ESL services for newly-legalized immigrants -- and 
issues of poverty, social equity, and participation are re-emerging 
as important "driving" forces for adult literacy.

For all of these reasons, I urge your support for the following 
federal actions:

1) Increase funding for adult literacy activities across the board, 
including national leadership activities and the National Institute 
for Literacy. If financing the current "relief effort" makes that 
impossible, temporarily maintain last year's funding levels while 
expressing intent to move toward higher levels as soon as feasible. 
(It is worth noting that while we are not in competition with the 
U.K. and Canada, it would be read as an enormous negative for the 
U.S. to retreat in the area of adult literacy just as those countries 
have dramatically increased their commitments and funding.)
2) Maintain a strong, visible focus within the Division of Adult 
Education & Literacy on adult literacy programming, making certain 
that the agenda of the Assistant Secretary for Vocational and Adult 
Education firmly includes adult literacy.
3) Assure that the National Institute for Literacy retains a strong 
and clear adult literacy focus. I would urge that NIFL's funding -- 
which has always been well below that originally intended by the 
National Literacy Act -- be increased for adult literacy programs 
even as new funds are made available for the new school-based 
activities planned. NIFL provides vital national leadership for the 
entire literacy field. A bipartisan Congress created it. Indeed, it 
was the centerpiece of the National Literacy Act and it has worked 
hard for adult literacy during the past decade. The field needs NIFL. 
If NIFL's adult literacy activities were cut back, no other 
organizations, not mine, not the Coalition for Literacy, could fill 
their unique and still-developing role. Could NIFL do its job better? 
Certainly, as every young organization could. But, it is extremely 
important that they have the tools to do so and that the decade of 
groundwork they have laid -- links to other government agencies, to 
business and industry, to the international community, and to 
practitioners, planners, and students -- be strengthened.

4) In appointing the NIFL board, I recommend that every effort be 
made to maintain bipartisan membership, as well as a balance of 
professionals representing both school literacy and adult literacy. I 
urge that the new director, whom I understand the NIFL board will 
recommend, be someone with broad perspective, someone able to think 
and plan systemically and strategically, a person with solid 
organizational and political skills, and dedication, vision, and 
flair. I believe these qualities are more important than being 
steeped in the specifics of literacy. For the substance, I would urge 
that NIFL be equipped with two deeply-experienced deputy directors, 
one responsible for school literacy, the other for adult literacy. 
This would enable the more orderly functioning of NIFL and produce a 
more coherent interaction with the outside world.

One question often asked of BCEL was which was more important, reform 
in the schools or adult literacy skills upgrading? Our answer was 
that it is not a matter of either/or, but of complementary 
educational goals that should be pursued as twin challenges, on 
parallel tracks, each having its own points of interventions, goals, 
and programs. Among the many stellar Americans who helped advance 
that message were two early champions of adult literacy, First Lady 
Barbara Bush and McGraw-Hill's Chairman Emeritus, Harold W. McGraw, 
Jr., who founded the BCEL.

I sincerely hope that this can be the guiding principle in federal 
actions taken on literacy.

Gail Spangenberg
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