AAACE-NLA and Program Leadership Colleagues,

 From time to time government agencies at the federal and state level  
fund programs to develop curricula.  For example, for several years,  
through the U.S. Department of Education's Workplace Education  
Program, federal grants supported the development of workplace- 
specific or industry-specific basic skills (including ELL) curriculum  
for workers.  I think that it is useful for federal, state and local  
government agencies to fund curriculum development.  I wish they  
would fund more curriculum projects, both generic and industry- 
specific, in all areas of adult education and literacy (which  
includes ELL and numeracy.)

However, there are two things I would like to see government agencies  
require, that grantees:

1. Develop the curriculum against a set of curriculum standards or  
frameworks.  Given that we do not have federally-approved standards,  
national curriculum projects should use EFF standards, SCANS  
competencies, or possibly CASAS competencies, or a set of state- 
approved  curriculum frameworks. State and local curriculum projects  
could use state-approved curriculum standards.  Exceptions could be  
made for curriculum projects which use a participatory curriculum  
development model where a curriculum is developed from the  
interaction of a teacher and a particular group of students, growing  
from that particular group of students' needs.

2. Publish the curriculum in a government-sponsored curriculum  
database on the Web where anyone (especially teachers) could  quickly  
find it, using a set of adult education curriculum categories, and or  
search terms.

I have recently been searching for some specific workplace  
curriculum, and have been surprised to find how much time it takes to  
chase it down.  I am sure this curriculum exists; it is just not easy  
to find.  And when I have found it, it is rare that the curriculum  
was developed against a set of curriculum standards, or at least it  
isn't clear what the curriculum standards are.  I have often found  
that the curriculum is no longer in print.

Why do I bring this up here?  There are two reasons:

1) This is a public policy issue.  I would like to see the U.S.  
Department of Education, the U.S. Department of Labor, HUD, and other  
federal government agencies, and all state agencies which fund adult  
education and literacy curriculum development adopt this as a policy.  
It would add value to government-funded projects if others could  
benefit from the curriculum development work.  It would not cost much  
to create this web-based database or to maintain it.

2) I would like to hear your reactions to these proposals, for  
example from a program improvement (curriculum improvement is part of  
program leadership) and from a public policy perspective.

David J. Rosen
newsomeassociates.com
djrosen at comcast.net