[NLA] Policy regarding the use of AELS

[mev@litwomen.org]

Tom,

Everyone belongs to GAELS?

Maybe I have misread, but your recognition of the fallacy of your 
thinking seems less than sincere to me. I guess flippant anger works 
for you. Do you feel better now after your temper tantrum?

Personally, I find that sometimes I do learn something from the NLA 
list (for example, the exclusionary nature of the term  AELS & the 
surrounding AELS conversation).  But more often than not, it's the same 
voices over and over with long posts that I often don't have the time 
to read, carefully. (Sometimes I wonder how posters have so much time 
on their hands!) Sometimes I find it hard to know where to enter the 
conversations, but I do find this sort of dismissive post you made very 
hostile and disrespectful to civil discourse....

If people want something to mean a specific group(s) or type(s) of 
organization, then it seems appropriate to name it accordingly 
(regardless who does the naming) and not to pretend it includes those 
who it doesn't. If it means to name a particular group, then be 
specific. If a name is intended to be an umbrella, then everyone better 
fit under the umbrella. At the risk of opening another can of word 
worms, I have heard/learned from my minority friends that often the 
term "we" (as in, "we americans," or "we have rights" or "We in this 
room") is often used by liberal privileged white people in a mixed 
group when clearly there is no "we" who has access to the same rights, 
benefits or privileges. This seems parallel to the AELS conversation.

Though I must say, Tom, your list of various sorts of educational 
experiences is comprehensive and interesting -- and exciting to finally 
have acknowledged the many ways literacies and educations function. 
(David Barton' s work on literacy events comes to mind.)

So, yeah, maybe I too am a happy member of GAELS (rhymes with sails!)

Mev

PS - and readers, please let Tom speak for himself. The last time Tom 
dropped such a bomb and people reacted, many other posters went to his 
defense trying to describe what he meant. Could people please say what 
THEY feel/think and not be "protective" of Tom? Thanks.

On Wednesday, January 1, 2003, at 08:06 PM, Thomas Sticht wrote:

> Everyone Belongs in the GAELS!
>
> Responses to my messages about the name and acronym Adult Education and
> Literacy System (AELS) as I had earlier defined it have chastised me 
> for
> using the name/acronym in such a narrow manner. According to Catherine
> King the reason why people have reacted this way is because the name
> "infers" a much broader application and so people cannot be satisfied 
> with
> such a focussed use of the name. Some have thought I have been too
> exclusive and have argued for a use of the name/acronym to include a 
> wider
> range of programs and educators.
>
> Now I have seen the light and have come to recognize the fallacy of my
> thinking. I have thought about the meaning of adult education and 
> literacy
> and have come to the enlightened view that ALL education is about adult
> education and literacy development and ALL educational experiences 
> belong
> in the AELS.
>
> 1. Early Head Start, Head Start, Even Start and the entire K-12 system
> belong in the AELS because as everyone knows, though in my earlier 
> narrow
> perspective I had ignored this, the purpose of pre-school, 
> kindergarten,
> and the 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th, 5th, 6th, 7th,8th,9th,10th,11th, and 12th
> grades of elementary and secondary school is to prepare children to 
> grow
> up to be educated, literate adults. So all of these programs for 
> children
> are actually programs of adult education and literacy development and 
> are
> hence appropriately referred to as members of what I will call the 
> Greater
> Adult Education and Literacy System (GAELS) of the United States.
>
> 2. My earlier mental myopia caused me to fail to recognize that 
> community
> colleges, four year colleges, and universities, serving both
> undergraduates and graduate students,  are obviously educating adults 
> and
> developing their literacy so they, too, should be included as members 
> of
> the Greater Adult Education and Literacy System (GAELS) of the United
> States.
>
> 3. Shamefully, in my narrow minded attempt to define the AELS as a 
> third
> system of publicly funded education I left out the funds from TANF, the
> programs of the Job Corps, numerous job training programs, and all the
> proprietary vocational training schools which obviously improve adult’s
> education and literacy in numerous vocational fields and hence should 
> be
> included as part of the Greater Adult Education and Literacy System
> (GAELS) of the United States.
>
> 4. Of course programs run by labor unions such as the AFL/CIO, UFW, 
> etc.,
> business programs such as those run by the Motorola University, and
> numerous other corporate-sponsored education programs for employees 
> were
> excluded by me and yet they clearly provide programs of education for
> adults which qualify them as members of the Greater Adult Education and
> Literacy System (GAELS) of the United States.
>
> 5. I am guilty also of leaving out thousands of programs for senior
> citizens operated by such groups as OASIS, the AARP,  Elder Hostel, and
> numerous programs in hospitals,  rest homes, hospices, and other 
> venues.
> These organizations and venues are obviously engaged in adult education
> and hence they, too, should be included in the Greater Adult Education 
> and
> Literacy System (GAELS) of the United States.
>
> 6. Of course, thousands of Community Based Organizations such as the 
> Cub
> Scouts, Boy Scouts, Girl Scouts, Boys and Girls Clubs, the YMCA, YWCA,
> Salvation Army, Goodwill Industries, 4H Clubs, ProLiteracy America, 
> and on
> and on provide education for both children-who- will-become-adults and
> adults and hence should not be excluded from the Greater Adult 
> Education
> and Literacy System (GAELS) of the United States.
>
> 7. As the present Bush administration has recognized, tens of 
> thousands of
> religious organizations, including churches, synagogues, mosques, 
> temples,
> cult headquarters,  and so forth offer educational and literacy
> development opportunities for both children-who-will-become-adults and
> adults across the life span and I regretfully excluded them from the
> Greater Adult Education and Literacy System (GAELS) of the United 
> States.
>
> 8. In a serious omission, I left out thousands of movie theatres, 
> hundreds
> of TV channels, thousands of newspapers, thousands of magazines, 
> thousands
> of book stores and books, and other media that inform, educate, and 
> make
> more literate millions of adults each year.  All these deserve a place 
> at
> the table of the Greater Adult Education and Literacy System (GAELS) of
> the United States.
>
> 9. Of course, total institutions such as jails, prisons, military
> organizations such as the Army, Navy, Marine Corps, and Air Force offer
> numerous opportunities, both formal and informal, for adult learning 
> and
> it was a serious oversight for my not having specifically included all
> these institutions, their students, and programs in the Greater Adult
> Education and Literacy System (AELS) of the United States.
>
> 10. Finally, showing an egregious lack of sensitivity to the 
> educational
> and literacy development power of everyday conversations and dialogues 
> I
> omitted family discussions in millions of homes, dialogue and 
> conversation
> in hundreds of thousands of coffee houses,  restaurants, bars, subways,
> airplanes, trains, cars, and numerous other places, as integral to the
> education and literacy development of the nation. I now recognize that 
> all
> talk, interaction, experience in the world, and so forth deserve a 
> place
> in the Greater Adult Education and Literacy System (GAELS) of the 
> United
> States.
>
> To partially atone for these sins of commission and omission , I offer 
> the
> foregoing list so that anyone wanting to refer to the inclusive 
> education
> system of the GAELS may do so, and, if they want to refer to one of the
> specific categories they can use the simple approach of designating the
> particular sub-system by using the acronym GAEL and a designating 
> number,
> such as GAELS-1 (pre-school etc.), GAELS-5 (senior citizen programs),
> GAELS-10 (conversations etc.). Using this simple approach, others may 
> add
> categories such as GAELS-11, GAELS-12, and so on until no one can 
> think of
> anyone or anything else that should be added and a state of complete
> inclusiveness is attained.
>
> Happy New Year!
> Tom Sticht
> A proud member of the GAELS (rhymes with jails)!
>
> PS: I hasten to add that I do not mean to imply that the foregoing
> categories and numbers must necessarily be labeled as I have them or
> include the components I have included. Some may wish to refer to 
> GAELS-3
> as GAELS-7, or GAELS-4 as GAELS-2 and so forth. Each person is 
> entitled to
> his or her own preferences in how they name any or all of these
> educational sub-systems and what they include in them. That’s what 
> makes
> America great (among other things!)!
>
>
>
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