[NLA] Fwd: Metro Briefing New York

[Catherine B. King]

Hello Art:

You say:  "What would you do in their place if decreasing
taxes and government spending was your primary platform?"

If it is true that the "primary platform" is such for many of our
representatives, it speaks of a very short-term and severely
circumscribed view of things on the part of those representatives.

In other words, our representatives have no vision--either of the
long-term or of the whole--and they do not understand how
the economy is supported by accessible education over the long
term. Education is not a commodity--its the basic foundation on
which commodities develop.

Advocacy of adult education at its core is about individuals--
but it is nested in a short or long-term vision.

In the long term, we can project that:

(1)  people in the U.S. live increasingly longer lives;

(2)  we change and grow over a much longer time--and various
      forms of formal and informal education are essential
      for that growth to happen, including our vision about others
      in the world;

(3)  the world will increase in complexity and, therefore, it's demands
          on ALL of us to be "continually open and educated" will
          increase accordingly over a lifetime of change;

(4)  Over time, most of us will need more than our K-12 education
        will give us for three reasons:  (a)  WHAT we know changes so
       quickly--much that we learn goes out of date shortly after high
       school; (b) some of us don't learn much in k-12--our learning curve
        is set at a different arch for many well-explored reasons;and
       (c) High school consciousness is hardly finished developing. The
       potential difference in comprehension of the same material for an
      18 or a 30-year-old is enormous.

(5)  Many in our culture will not be able to afford continuing education;
       and some will need it but won't understand its value until much
later.

Our long term economic health, as well as what we mean by creating
and maintaining a "vibrant democracy," are tied directly to a long-term
vision of the whole.  Governmental representation and support for
these long-term issues can be drawn not from notions of welfare as
"giveaway" to individuals, but can be translated into a notion of
"providing for the general welfare" and as for the common good of the
whole dynamic thing.

The notion of "welfare" seems to always be understood through the lens
of individuals--where it looks like freebees to those who cannot or don't
want to help themselves--rather than through the lens of a long term
vision of the whole and what would in fact be "providing for the general
welfare" of our economy and "the people" in a democracy so that we
all may continue to provide for ourselves.


Here is a quote from Gail Spanglenberg's note where
ALBANY: PATAKI VETOES BILL. . . "But in his veto message, he said
that by 'de-emphasizing the primary importance of work, the bill could
have a detrimental effect on recipients achieving self-sufficiency.' Current
law
>authorizes social services districts to assign recipients to work,
>education and other activities and that power should stay with the
>districts, the governor said. He also said that Mayor Michael R.
>Bloomberg's administration had urged him to veto the bill.    (AP)"

Our representatives who have enough vision to understand the long-term
whole will understand the comprehensive value of systematic community
and adult education and library supports as underlying absolute
essentials for continued growth and development and therefore as
essential to their stewardship of a democracy.  I guess people who
have any job at all are off the radar as far as continuing education is
concerned?  Without the political uproar, however, we wouldn't have
even gotten unemployment benefits--yesterday.

Advocacy is directly connected to divisive economic classes in this
regard.  Either We provide the basics for the "common/general welfare"
for everyone at the community level regardless of our income levels; or

We severely limit or end community and adult education in the
"public square" and leave the split to occur:

If you already have added income/capital/money, you can keep up
with the world and your education in it all the while increasing your
understanding of that need--and keep the money in the family, or

If you don't have income/capital/money, you are basically an outsider
in a separate culture.   Then we need to put a sign on our democracy:

"Continuing Education for the economic upper or middle class only."

This is, of course not a democracy, but rather capitalism raised to
the level of political ideology.

Though the individual program and student details are important,
they rest in a larger nest.  The ultimate justification of providing for
individual community, adult and library education and programs
hangs on this larger vision.

The across-the-board shift from public governing to corporate and
private funding (neither are necessarily dirty words) carries with it a
loss of general secular order that, I would argue, does not fare well for
either democracy, education or the notion of a civilized public square.

This shift also changes the tone of "advocacy" from (a) arguments
drawn from our vision for "the common good" to (b) arguments drawn
from begging and from the midst of religious and/or psycho-social
ideological sycophancy.

Regards,

Catherine King

----- Original Message -----
From: Art LaChance <arthur at ellijay.com>
To: <nla at lists.literacytent.org>
Sent: Monday, January 06, 2003 9:14 AM
Subject: Re: [NLA] Fwd: Metro Briefing New York


> I think it goes along with the thought that we need to downplay the
> 'welfare' philosophy and get all these folks back to 'work'.  When you
> look critically at the NRS data that was collected - nationwide - adult
> lit only saw about 10% of the target population or that population who
> should 'need us'.  Out of that 10%, only about 20% of them were actually
> served successfully in terms of upping a level or two.  So overall they,
> the fed legislature, only sees us as 'effective' for what - 2% of the
> target population ???  Not good in terms of funneling additional $$ our
> way.  The fact that the data was almost impossible to attain is not a
> factor in their decision making process.  What would you do in their
> place if decreasing taxes and government spending was your primary
> platform ?   Especially when the precursor to the funded program, the
> local volunteer based programs, had almost the same outcome as the funded
> version ?   I've been seeing the trend build on the NLA list for a year
> now, I'm not surprised at this.
>
> art
>
> "Landrum, Elaine" wrote:
>
> > These emails are not good news. What are these people thinking?
> >
> > Elaine
>
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