[NLA] Discussion: Building Policy Vision

[Eileen Eckert]

Thanks to those who took the time to answer my question. I was actually 
asking about individual ideas of the "big picture"--themes and principles 
that you, personally, use to guide decisions about what policies to support. 
I'd still be interested in hearing that--next week, after this leg of the 
funding advocacy journey?

I don't think that developing such a personal "big picture" conflicts with 
broader policy advocay efforts; in fact, I think it informs them. I look 
forward to seeing the documents Jon and David referred to. Here are a couple 
of discussions of adult literacy politics and policy I've recently found 
helpful, both from the New Directions for Adult and Continuing Education 
series from Jossey-Bass, No. 91, Fall 2001, "Understanding and Negotiating 
the Political Landscape of Adult Education."

Barbara Sparks, "The Gendered Construction of the Adult Education and Family 
Literacy Act" and

B. Allan Quigley, "Living in the Feudalism of Adult Basic and Literacy 
Education: Can We Negotiate a Literacy Democracy?"

OK, I'm going to refrain from adding more now in deference to the many 
things we all have to do, and the need to focus right now on action rather 
than reflection. I need to go make some phone calls to D.C., as my 
representative's one of those moderate Republicans!






From: Jon Randall <jrandall at fedstrategics.com>
Reply-To: nla at lists.literacytent.org
To: "NLA Listserv (E-mail)" <nla at lists.literacytent.org>
Subject: [NLA] Discussion: Building Policy Vision
Date: Sun, 26 Jan 2003 22:38:20 -0500

Re: policy vision ...  Please look at the Action Agenda for
Literacy. It has influenced the strategic planning of a
number of local, state, and national organizations,
including but not limited to TESOL and the National
Coalition for Literacy, Everyone that uses it prioritizes
its action items differently, but the idea here is that we
can all work from the same playbook. Let's build on the more
than two years worth of work and tens of thousands of
dollars that this field has already spent soliciting input
from the field to put this together.

Some would like to see its recommendations grounded in a set
of socio-political foundational principles. To those folks,
I say go for it if you have the energy and the time. I wish
I did. I think it's a worthy exercise. Those of you who do,
please DON'T do it <instead of> writing letters and making
phone calls to preserve our field. This is going to be a
very tough year and we will loose more ground that we've
ever lost before unless there is a massive commitment to
advocacy by folks like yourselves and everyone else you can
mobilize.

I am concerned that the many discussions on the NLA listserv
about the desire a common set of foundational principles has
had (for some ) the unintentional (I hope) effect of
throwing a wet blanket on the Action Agenda. It may not be
perfect, but we'd all better get on <some> same page here
pretty quickly - even if it is a work in progress - because
our long-term future depends on us all rowing in a common
direction.

The Action Agenda for Literacy is the genesis of the Omnibus
Literacy Legislation Concept Paper. The final version of
this paper will be available on the NCL web site by week's
end. It is the culmination of two years worth of work by the
NCL to put into draft legislation all of the recommendations
made in the Action Agenda that require new legislation or
changes in current law. It recommends changes in NINE public
laws. Look for it on the NCL web site later this week.

Best,
Jon


Jon Randall
Public Policy Committee Chair
National Coalition for Literacy
www.natcoalitionliteracy.org

Action related to this communication is
provided pro bono by FedStrategics
www.fedstrategics.com

FedStrategics, LLC
8413 Park Crest Drive, Silver Spring, MD 20910
Tel: (301) 588-5304   Fax: (301) 588-5353
jrandall at FedStrategics.com



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