The Open Door Collective stands against police murder, brutality, and unjustifiable suspicion of Black Americans and other Americans of color, and against the systemic racism that contributes in profound and multifaceted ways to poverty.
What's New?
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New Open Door Collective Paper
An Open Door Out of Poverty By John Comings, Steve Reder and David Rosen This document uses data from the 2017 PIAAC assessment to identify adults aged 18 to 54 years who are not in school. This is a population that might benefit from completion of a community college program. Of the 127.8 million adults in this population, 42.1 million adults speak or write English not well or not at all, have low literacy or math skills, or do not have a high school credential. The paper breaks this population into five subgroups defined by the major skill or credential barrier to their success in a community college program. The paper identifies the existing services addressing this problem, makes a case for funding these services at a higher level, and makes specific suggestions on how to improve and expand these services. |
2020 COABE Conference Presentations by ODC members. (Clickable link) Open Door Collective Webinars
Greening U.S. Adult Basic Skills Efforts: What Eco-partners and Adult Educators Can Do Together September 24, 2020 This webinar featured Alex Risley Schroeder, Barbara Krol-Sinclair, David J. Rosen, and Paul Jurmo, with technical help from Emma Keating. They described why and how adult education programs can collaborate with “eco-partners” (supporters of environmental sustainability and green jobs) and social justice organizations. The presenters described examples of basic skills curricula that integrate environmental themes; green job training customized to adults who have basic skills limitations; green service learning; and joint advocacy, fundraising, research, and professional development by adult education, environmental, and social justice stakeholders. Links to Resources, slides, and webinar recording https://drive.google.com/file/d/1I6AnKrTjmqplA0Y6a3-tQLQT0z0AVxWR/view?usp=sharing Addressing Health Disparities: What Health Practitioners and Adult Educators Can Do Together August 4, 2020 A lively discussion of why and how adult education programs and “health partners" (organizations that in various ways support public health and healthcare jobs) can work together. Links to the webinar slides, webinar recording , chat log.and resource list. Learn more about ODC health-related resources: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1W-EFpoemapm7vA7dv3mQV4_AorjB4-ym/view?usp=sharing.) |
Open Door Collective's E-BAES Task Force Report, COVID-19 RAPID RESPONSE REPORT FROM THE FIELD,published on July 31, 2020
ProLiteracy, the ODC E-BAES Taskforce, and the EdTech Center @ World Education are pleased to share a new report, “COVID-19 Rapid Response Report from the Field.” It includes information gathered and compiled by members of the E-BAES Taskforce and EdTech Center staff that describes adult education’s response to the pandemic. Findings are intended to inform the field and offer useful suggestions from which adult education and literacy practitioners can benefit.
The Evidence-Based Adult Education System (E-BAES) initiative began in early 2019, in response to a need for national research in adult education. E-BAES is led by the Open Door Collective, a program of Literacy Minnesota. A volunteer E-BAES task force, led by Eric Nesheim (Literacy Minnesota) and Margaret Patterson (Research Allies for Lifelong Learning), consists of 30+ researchers, practitioners, government officials, professional developers, and education leaders. E-BAES’ plan of action includes initial planning steps, to launch the E-BAES national network model, and implementation steps, planned for May through August 2020. On the task force’s recommendation, the initiative will “start small and build” so that E-BAES’ national network model has time to grow, complete its initial projects, and conduct research that has a positive impact on practice and adult learner outcomes. (Continued at https://drive.google.com/file/d/1n43RE_sPRCxaQHe27MFkIBpWYx3xQRqs/view?usp=sharing) |
Other News
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Open Door Collective Profiled in ALE Journal
In the Fall, 2019 issue of the Adult Literacy Education journal, published by ProLiteracy, is a review of the Open Door Collective by Dr. Johan Uvin, Executive Director of the Institute for Educational Leadership and former Associate Commissioner of Education overseeing adult basic skills education. His review focuses on Labor and Workforce Development Issues Group publications. The ODC Labor and Workforce Development Issues Group updated its Work-related Basic Skills Archive as of March 2020. The archive now has 200 resources. It also updated two of its Can-Do Guides: • Strengthening Public Health and the Healthcare Workforce: What U.S. Health Partners and Adult Basic Skills Programs Can Do Together (September 30, 2019 Edition) • Greening U.S. Adult Basic Skills Efforts: What Eco-Partners and Adult Educators Can Do Together (Sept. 30, 2019 Edition) Anti-Poverty Partnerships This paper describes why and how anti-poverty organizations and adult basic skills programs can collaborate to help individuals who have basic skills-related challenges (e.g., lower levels of literacy, English language, and numeracy skills needed for work, family, and civic roles; lack of a high school credential; learning disabilities) to improve their economic security and that of their families and communities. http://www.opendoorcollective.org/anti-poverty-partnerships.html |
The Open Door Collective (ODC) assists poverty reduction initiatives to take advantage of, expand, or improve adult basic skills services to meet the needs and broaden the economic opportunities of low-income adults. We advocate for effective policies and program designs that will reduce poverty, narrow income inequality, and provide free basic skills education for all adults in the United States. Improved policies and programs will enable adults living in poverty to increase their incomes as well as enjoy more economic stability and better health. These outcomes will diminish the need for social services, increase tax revenues, and lower overall healthcare costs. Expanded adult basic skills services will, therefore, pay for themselves.
ODC's mission is to help adult basic skills advocates make common cause with advocates for other issues (community health, employment, criminal justice reform, digital inclusion, older adults services, libraries, etc.) in order to build an integrated approach to ending poverty. The ODC advocacy issues groups, therefore, are the engines of ODC's efforts. They produce advocacy papers and presentations that set out the common cause within each ODC issue group. We do this because we believe that the efforts taking place within other issue areas will be more successful if adult basic skills advocates and practitioners support them and they support adult basic skills. In addition, we believe that an integrated approach to ending poverty that includes adult basic skills and all of the other issues groups is the only way to be successful.
ODC Issues Groups These currently include: Labor and Workforce Development, Public Libraries, Digital Inclusion, Community Health and ABE, Criminal Justice Reform, Immigrant and Refugee Education and Integration, Well-being of older adults and ABE services. Click on this ODC Issues Groups link for more information.
ODC's mission is to help adult basic skills advocates make common cause with advocates for other issues (community health, employment, criminal justice reform, digital inclusion, older adults services, libraries, etc.) in order to build an integrated approach to ending poverty. The ODC advocacy issues groups, therefore, are the engines of ODC's efforts. They produce advocacy papers and presentations that set out the common cause within each ODC issue group. We do this because we believe that the efforts taking place within other issue areas will be more successful if adult basic skills advocates and practitioners support them and they support adult basic skills. In addition, we believe that an integrated approach to ending poverty that includes adult basic skills and all of the other issues groups is the only way to be successful.
ODC Issues Groups These currently include: Labor and Workforce Development, Public Libraries, Digital Inclusion, Community Health and ABE, Criminal Justice Reform, Immigrant and Refugee Education and Integration, Well-being of older adults and ABE services. Click on this ODC Issues Groups link for more information.
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The Open Door Collective is a national program of Literacy Minnesota.
Literacy Minnesota is an internationally recognized non-profit leader and driving force behind the latest developments in literacy learning. We believe literacy has the power to advance equity and justice, and we envision a world where life-changing learning is within everyone’s reach. |