As adult educators, we know that our students need more classes, stronger programs, and additional support services. We know that ABE teachers and staff need better salaries, benefits, and job stability. But legislators, the ones who have the power to allocate money for adult basic education, do not have the same knowledge and experiences we do about ABE, and they don't have the same analyses we do for improving a system so adult learners are best served.

Aggressive advocacy efforts nationwide and statewide have been largely responsible for increases in the adult education budget over the past several years. These efforts need to continue; the field needs to educate and persuade legislators by describing our students and classes. We also need to convince them of the importance adult basic education has in strengthening peoples' abilities as "parents, workers, and citizens" in the language of "Equipped for the Future." Further, we need to show legislators that with sufficient and stable funding, we know where to go next; we need to present them with a clearly articulated vision that outlines priorities and establishes an action plan for the "next steps" we need to follow in building a strong infrastructure for adult basic education services.

Such an articulated vision would also allow for proactive planning. Rather than taking bits and pieces of funding and applying it in an ad hoc fashion, losing the dollars if not spent within an allocated time, a "game plan" would allow us to strengthen our services by building a more coherent and unified infrastructure of adult basic education.

But how does such a vision get built? Two major efforts are underway as starting points for developing a plan to guide our work over the next several years. One is a national effort, one is statewide. Practitioners can find ways to add their voices to both.

National Scene: The Literacy "Summit"
On February 14 and 15, 2000, a National Literacy Summit was held in Washington, DC. The invitational meeting, attended by researchers, administrators, teachers, students, heads of national organizations, and others in adult education nationwide reflected several years of planning by three national literacy organizations: the National Institute for Literacy (NIFL), the National Center for the Study of Adult Learning and Literacy (NCSALL), and the Office for Vocational and Adult Education (OVAE) with collaboration from the National Coalition for Literacy, Voice for Adult Literacy United for Education (VALUE), and many other literacy organizations in the field.

According to NCSALL's Director John Comings, the national Summit is one step in a longer process -- a process that predated the DC Summit and will continue in regional meetings this spring and summer.

Goal One: The Summit Document
The first goal of this process is to produce a document that sets out a common vision for the field of adult basic education, one that might rival the importance of Forrest Chisholm's 1988 document, Jump Start, which helped convince legislators of the need for a stronger response to adult literacy needs nationwide. According to John, the Summit process itself, a process intended to lead up to the product/document, is intended to develop "not a vision formed in reaction to the present legislation but one built around what we feel represents a positive future for our field. The document will set out our case for investment in ABE/ESOL/ASE services" and a plan for improving and expanding those services. "The Summit paper was posted online with an invitation for practitioners to read and respond to its contents. That paper, after several revisions, became the focal point of the discussions at the DC Summit.

Goal Two: The Summit Process
The second goal, according to John, "is to involve as many members of our field (practitioners and students) in this dialogue as possible so that the common vision will be shared by all. The Summit document should emerge as the result of feedback, critique, and revision by as many members of the adult literacy community as possible." John stressed that the purpose of the Summit process and paper is not to identify micro objectives for the field, but to look for overarching concerns shared by all members of the adult basic education community. When the Summit process has been completed, the document should reflect the following:

• A description of where the field is now;
• A strong case for why congress should invest in adult basic education by providing more funding for the field;
• An analysis and description of the five to ten most important areas for future funding.

Who Was Invited?
Due to lack of space and money, the February Summit was invitational. That is, various literacy organizations (such as the State Adult Education Directors organization, the National Institute for Family Literacy, and others) were identified by the Summit steering committee; those organizations were then asked to invite members of their constituencies to attend, including learners, teachers, program directors, state directors, researchers, national officials, representatives of foundations, government agencies and advice groups. The Steering Committee reviewed the lists, identified gaps, and invited other participants.

Some participants of the National Literacy Advocacy (NLA) listserv and others have critiqued the invitational process as exclusionary and leadership-heavy. Summit organizers have explained one of the greatest challenges is to make the process as inclusive as possible, and that the DC Summit is viewed as a first step to a longer, more inclusive process, including regional summit meetings across the country to respond to the outcomes of the DC Summit. To read the list of participants in the DC Summit, go to the following Web page: www.nifl.gov/nifl/policy/summit/rostersummit.doc    (Note: The full participant list is a 17-page MS Word document.)

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What Came Out of the Summit?
Revised Draft Online
At the February Summit, participants worked in small groups and whole group sessions where they reviewed the draft Summit document and made recommen- dations for proposed revisions. The revised draft, substantially different from the one posted prior to the Summit, is now online at: www.nifl.gov/nifl/summit.html

According to one participant, the small groups at the Summit agreed on many areas, including the following:

• Learners should be central to the system and at the center of the document;
• Program quality is crucial;
• Funding needs to increase, be more sustained and predictable.
• There is a need for full-time, well-paid, benefited positions;
• Professional development is critical;
• Marketing and awareness of what ABE does is critical.

None of the recommendations were prioritized, and many of them remained on a general level. Participants agreed that follow-up regional Summit meetings would be responsible for setting priorities and refining the recommendations from the DC Summit.

What Next?
The revised draft of the Summit document went online March 1. This draft includes discussion guidelines and reporting procedures for further input. The United StatesDepartment of Education will be sponsoring public hearings for responses to the document. Practitioner forums will also be held to solicit input. The purpose of the follow-up discussion is:

• Continued and expanded discussion regarding the agenda and recommendations;
• Consensus building around the recommendations;
• Commitment from stakeholders to continue to implementations.

By June 10, reports from practitioner forums and public hearings will inform a final action agenda and recommendations. By September 8 (National Literacy Day), presentation of the action agenda and recommendations will be made public.

Adding Our Voices
In our region, the New England Literacy Resource Center (NELRC) will sponsor forums to critique the Summit document. Call Silja Kallenbach at World Education (617-482-9485) for more specific information. Here's an opportunity for those who were not invited to the DC Summit to add a voice to the process.

The Local Scene: Massachusetts
While the Summit process focuses on national recommendations for the field and certainly dovetails with the needs for ABE in Massachusetts, each state has its own local needs for building a strong ABE system.

According to Bob Bickerton, director of Adult and Community Learning Services at the Massachusetts DOE, the most important mission ahead of us in the state of Massachusetts is to build an infrastructure that would ensure a continuum of ABE and ESOL services across the state. Such an infrastructure would offer ABE classes in enough locations that would ensure access for every adult learner in the state. To accomplish this goal, we would have to increase funding from the current $40 million per year to an estimated $175 to $200 million a year. To put funding into perspective, at the beginning of the last decade, ABE in Massachusetts was working with a budget of $7 million a year. At the end of this decade, the amount had risen to $40 million a year. Again, aggressive advocacy across the state was responsible for such an astounding increase in funds.

Before continuing to build such a system however, we need to know where we are going. In short, Massachusetts needs to do its own "Summit" work where the resulting vision is specific to the needs of the state. According to Bob Bickerton, the building of such a vision should reflect a grassroots process where practitioners' voices are heard and valued. The broad vision must then be broken down into manageable increments and prioritized before it is adopted by those involved in carrying it out.

A Local Process: MCAE
The Massachusetts Coalition for Adult Education (MCAE) is the major advocacy organization for adult basic education in Massachusetts. MCAE is a membership organization open to anyone with an interest in adult basic education. In addition to organizing professional development opportunities for practitioners, most notably the annual Network Conference each fall, MCAE sponsors subcommittees, including a public policy committee. This committee works to develop strategies for continual funding of ABE. The public policy committee is trying to move from an ad hoc advocacy approach to a more systematic one. That means crafting a long-range plan and going after money to make that plan become a reality.

Getting Involved
Practitioners on all levels are encouraged to join the public policy committee. Unlike the national Summit in DC, which was invitational, the MCAE public policy committee is open to any interested practitioner. Lets imagine that the public policy committee expands to include ESOL teachers, ABE counselors, teachers in prison settings, youth settings, and volunteers.

We need a variety of voices -- voices that will insist on certain areas as priorities, and voices that will express limits and caution us not to grow too quickly beyond what we can already handle.

The information for this article was collected from John Comings, Sally Waldron, Bob Bickerton, Janet Isserlis, and voices from the National Literacy Advocacy (NLA) list.

To subscribe to the NLA list, go to the following Web page: www.nifl/lincs/discussions  Click on "Subscribe" in the menu and follow the instructions. Within a few minutes of submitting your list subscription, you should receive e-mail confirmation.