CAEP
Annual Plan

Produced: Aug 14, 2023, 09:37 PM UTC - By Cecil Edwards

03 Barstow Area Consortium for Adult Education
CONSORTIUM APPROVED

2023-24

Plans & Goals

Executive Summary

The Barstow Area Consortium for Adult Education (BACAE) is located in Southern California's Mojave High Desert. The region is in San Bernardino County and it consists of four Member Districts: Baker Valley Unified School District (BV), Barstow Community College (BCC), Barstow Unified School District (BAS), and Silver Valley Unified School District (SV). BACAE holds Member Districts to a spirit of collaboration in all decision making. This annual plan serves as a foundational plan for the Consortium toward the realization of our collective vision and goals while maintaining alignment to the California Adult Education Plan. With a renewed commitment to the CAEP initiative, this plan was developed in a spirit of collaboration and partnership. During the 2022-2023, BACAE will primarily address gaps in service, rebuilding programs decimated by the COVID-19 Pandemic, and focus on student support services to accelerate learning, retention and completion of programs. Our goal is to deliver essential programs and services in adult basic and secondary education, ESL/EL Civics, and career education/training to help adult learners cultivate the skills they need to live, work, and thrive in the Barstow area. Another focus will be student transitions to college programs, training and employment. Since returning in-person from the pandemic, BACAE District Members have seen a significant increased level of barriers and needs for our adult ed. students, e.g. homelessness, food insecurity, and other social issues that prompts the dire need to work on building relationships with more community partners to leverage existing resources and together create additional support services. BACAE will collaboratively monitor progress and provide support to District Members throughout the year to help ensure proposed strategies come to fruition. 

•    All BACAE District Members have had an increase in enrollment and outcomes with the use of the online/hybrid/high-flex courses in all programs

•    BACAE Members have expanded marketing and outreach efforts

•    BACAE has established relationships with local industries/business community

•    BACAE District Members now have in place technology loan programs and IT support

•    District Members have increased the number of student students participating in co-enrollment

•    BCC - Has increased number of enrollment in the non-credit short-term trainings/courses (CDCP) that lead to certificates in Trades Technician, Digital Literacy, and Customer Service; Developed an Entrepreneur & Innovation Center on campus; Increased enrollment in the GED Preparation program (English and Spanish); MOU for Career Technical Education/Workforce non-credit courses continue to be offered at the local San Bernardino County Probation Dept. for probationers; Established weekly office hours for a job counselor to serve all Adult Ed. students in the consortium. This year began to offer Workforce Workshops to AE students to increase their employment opportunities. 

•    BAS has had a significant increase in graduation rates; successfully conducted pre/post CASAS testing to all participating AE students; successful in retaining quality teachers; and continued to offer online instruction during the summer

•    BV has created a facility dedicated to Adult Education with advanced technology, which includes increased access to academic programs

•    SV received full WASC Accreditation; Opened on-site Pearson Vue Testing Center; and continues to offer CTE training programs using Ed2Go

Regional Planning Overview

The annual planning process came from the work taken in the three-year planning cycle. This included an intensive inquiry of the Barstow area community, involving stakeholders, an analysis of data collected from students, faculty, partners, as well as District Member plans and priorities developed that were shared during scheduled meetings. The BACAE District Members went through an extensive process in developing the Three-Year Plan where the consortium identified activities and measurable goals to increase success of AE programs. Collectively, members chose to focus on the most prevalent needs: enrollment; support to retain students until completion of their programs, then transition to the next educational goal/employment. Our students present significant challenges, barriers, such as unemployment, food/housing insecurity, language needs, and lack of access to technology tools and skills, it is imperative that BACAE District Members provide wrap-around services to support students through our programs. The COVID-19 Pandemic only amplified the needs in our community and the BACAE is committed to continuing to provide programs to support the adult learners in our community by actively promoting programs, expanding offerings and providing access to much needed educational and workforce services.


Meeting Regional Needs

Regional Need #1

Gaps in Service / Regional Needs

A major gap that needs to be addressed is reaching student groups that are currently not being serviced. There is a challenge on how to reach these student populations to include them. This solution would significantly increase enrollment, improve transition to college, training, and workforce. A shared tracking system of students needs to be created to support each student upon entering the AE program until completion of their academic and workforce goals. There is more that needs to be done in community outreach area, especially to connect with groups that have started out isolated or have been substantially affected by the pandemic. There has been a waive of recent immigrants to the area, an increase of unemployment that has led to housing and food insecurities, people with disabilities, or have been under the pressure of social issues. 

How do you know? What resources did you use to identify these gaps?

Through the 3-Year Plan process, BACAE ensured the community's voice was acknowledged. In-depth conversations, focus ­groups, and interviews were held with key individuals and stakeholders representing a variety of student populations, e.g. military, formerly incarcerated, disabled, and single parents. A community survey was also conducted with former and current students, as well as in the community at-large. A collection of these responses demonstrated gaps in the current AE programs consortium-wide, prompting the need to create new strategies to be implemented in this first year of the plan. 

How will you measure effectiveness / progress towards meeting this need?

BACAE will utilize data to measure student outcomes and effectiveness of programs. This will include the monitoring of enrollment and efforts to ensure the retention of students. The data to be used are TopsPro DIR Reports, MIS Data, and fiscal expenditure reporting. Measures of success will consider the number of student levels achieved and completion of certificates. We will know we are being successful when we see an increase in the number of students enrolling, persisting and moving on to postsecondary options and/or employment. 


Regional Need #2

Gaps in Service / Regional Needs

Providing student support services to decrease barriers would make certain of their retention and the acceleration of successful completion of AE programs. For example, the shift to Distance Learning/Hybrid teaching and learning format requires for students to be provided with Digital Literacy and technology to ensure their participation. Transportation and child care continue to be a challenge. Improving consistent communication with the AE students is imperative to make them aware of resources and services available to them from the schools or community agencies. The language barrier is still a major obstacle, prompting the need to have more bilingual staff. Communication presentations, such as fliers need to be available in a multilingual format. Developing a monthly newsletter, out-going messages via text and voice would help increase participation in the support services. 

How do you know? What resources did you use to identify these gaps?

Through the 3-Year Plan process, BACAE ensured the community's voice was acknowledged. In-depth conversations, focus­groups, and interviews were held with key individuals and stakeholders representing a variety of student populations, e.g. military, formerly incarcerated, disabled, single mothers. A community survey was also conducted with former and current students, as well as in the community at-large. A collection of these responses demonstrated gaps in the current AE programs consortium-wide, prompting the need to create new strategies to be implemented in this first year. 

How will you measure effectiveness / progress towards meeting this need?

BACAE will utilize data to measure student outcomes and effectiveness of programs. This will include the monitoring of enrollment and efforts to ensure the retention of students. The data to be used are TopsPro DIR Reports, MIS Data, and fiscal expenditure reporting. Measures of success will consider the number of student levels achieved and completion of certificates. We will know we are being successful when we see an increase in the number of students enrolling, persisting and moving on to postsecondary options and/or employment. 

Regional Need #3

Gaps in Service / Regional Needs

There has been an increase of K12 AE and ESL students interested in the BCC non-credit CTE classes. It is important to develop an IET component to these classes to include ESL students to help them enter the workforce. Just as important, is to make K12 students aware of the college non-credit opportunities to help with college transitions. Our 3-Year Plan process indicated there are a great number of individuals in need of English language acquisition, and career skills to enter the workforce. 

How do you know? What resources did you use to identify these gaps?

The recent rise in enrollment and the student requests being submitted to the AE office and to the Transitional Counselors has identified this gap. Through the 3-Year Plan process, BACAE ensured the community's voice was acknowledged. In-depth conversations, focus-groups, and interviews were held with key individuals and stakeholders representing a variety of student populations, e.g. military, formerly incarcerated, disabled, single mothers. A community survey was also conducted with former and current students, as well as in the community at-large. A collection of these responses demonstrated gaps in the current AE programs consortium-wide, prompting the need to create new strategies to be implemented in this first year. 

How will you measure effectiveness / progress towards meeting this need?

BACAE will utilize data to measure student outcomes and effectiveness of programs. This will include the monitoring of enrollment and efforts to ensure the retention of students. The data to be used are TopsPro DIR Reports, MIS Data, and fiscal expenditure reporting. Measures of success will consider the number of student levels achieved and completion of certificates. We will know we are being successful when we see an increase in the number of students enrolling, persisting and moving on to postsecondary options and/or employment. 

Address Educational Needs

2023-24 Strategies

Marketing and Outreach

Activity that Applies to this Strategy

1.4 Extend Offerings to Hard-to-Reach Groups

Metrics that Apply to this Activity/Strategy

  • All: Adults who Became Participants (AE 202 - Overall)
  • Progress: Participants with Educational Functioning Levels Gains ABE (AE 400 - ABE)
  • Progress: Participants with Educational Functioning Levels Gains ASE (AE 400 - ASE)
  • Progress: Participants with Educational Functioning Levels Gains ESL (AE 400 - ESL)

Expand and increase marketing efforts for Adult Education programs to include social media presence and community outreach to increase enrollment, persistence and retention. BA CAE will focus efforts to increase printed material, videos and community presence to support the increase in enrollment, persistence, completion, and transitions. The goal is to develop a strong campaign to reach underserved student groups. 


Consistently Implement CASAS Testing & Data Reviews

Activity that Applies to this Strategy

1.1 Increase Student EFL Gains

Metrics that Apply to this Activity/Strategy

  • All: Adults who Became Participants (AE 202 - Overall)
  • Student Barriers: English Language Learner (AE 305 - Overall)

All District Members will engage in ongoing CASAS/MIS/TopsPro training resulting in cleaner data submission, deeper understanding of the data that will support focused driven instructional practices. Working groups will conduct quarterly data reviews that will give guidance for program evaluation, learner transition, and curriculum development. This will also open up opportunities to hold student goals setting with CASAS testing. 


New CTE Non-Credit Certificates

Activity that Applies to this Strategy

1.2 Develop New CTE Non-Credit Certificates

Metrics that Apply to this Activity/Strategy

  • All: Adults who Became Participants (AE 202 - Overall)

BACAE District members will develop new CTE non-credit certificates as follows: BAS - Food Services & Tourism; BCC - Innovation & Entrepreneurship/Makerspace, Allied Healthy short-term CDCP trainings; BV - Hospitality; SV - ED- 2-GO certificates 


Develop I ET/ESL VESL Courses

Activity that Applies to this Strategy

1.3 Develop IET/ESL VESL Courses

Metrics that Apply to this Activity/Strategy

  • All: Number of Adults Served (AE 200 - Overall)
  • Student Barriers: English Language Learner (AE 305 - Overall)

College will develop IET with current CTE non-credit courses. 

College and K1 2 adult schools will develop contextualized ESL courses (VESL)

Improve Integration of Services & Transitions

2023-24 Strategies

Provide Flexible Instruction Modalities

Activity that Applies to this Strategy

2.4 Provide Flexible Instruction Modalities

Metrics that Apply to this Activity/Strategy

  • All: Adults who Became Participants (AE 202 - Overall)
  • Progress: Participants with Educational Functioning Levels Gains ABE (AE 400 - ABE)
  • Progress: Participants with Educational Functioning Levels Gains ASE (AE 400 - ASE)
  • Progress: Participants with Educational Functioning Levels Gains ESL (AE 400 - ESL)

Adult Ed. students will be offered instructional delivery via in-person, online, or/and in a hybrid format. Infuse computer and digital literacy instruction into curriculum and provide access to technology for adult learners. 


Student Support Services

Activity that Applies to this Strategy

2.3 Improve Access to Programs & Support Services

Metrics that Apply to this Activity/Strategy

  • All: Number of Adults Served (AE 200 - Overall)

Develop printed material to for the new adult ed. student to have a clear understanding of support services available across BACAE adult schools. This will include the transition counseling available, co-enrollment opportunities, tutoring/homework support, ESL Student Success Center, how to access public transportation, local childcare providers, food pantries, housing insecure services, and the support of the student encouragement team. 


Workforce Development Services

Activity that Applies to this Strategy

2.2 Integrate WDB/AJCC Services with BACAE Program

Metrics that Apply to this Activity/Strategy

  • All: Number of Adults Served (AE 200 - Overall)
  • Progress: Participants with Educational Functioning Levels Gains ABE (AE 400 - ABE)
  • Student Barriers: English Language Learner (AE 305 - Overall)

The goal to increase student transition from AE to postsecondary or the workforce will be addressed by developing an AE student on-boarding process that provides understand of support services to encourage students to make educational plans, conduct career exploration, participate in Workforce Re-entry workshops. The District Members will also develop a central student tracking system for student transitions to trainings, college or the workforce. Use of the BCC Innovation and Entrepreneur Center/Makerspace to be a channel in career exploration or small business ventures. Provide access to job counselor services, job fairs, and other employment opportunities.

Improve Effectiveness of Services

2023-24 Strategies

Collective Impact Model

Activity that Applies to this Strategy

3.1 Implement a Collective Impact Model Consortium

Metrics that Apply to this Activity/Strategy

  • All: Adults who Became Participants (AE 202 - Overall)
  • All: Number of Adults Served (AE 200 - Overall)
  • Progress: Participants with Educational Functioning Levels Gains ABE (AE 400 - ABE)
  • Progress: Participants with Educational Functioning Levels Gains ASE (AE 400 - ASE)
  • Progress: Participants with Educational Functioning Levels Gains ESL (AE 400 - ESL)

Hold monthly BACAE meetings to ensure alignment with CAEP requirements, consortium goals and outcomes of the BACAE Annual Plan. This will include the schedule of consortium quarterly working group collaborations. 

Fiscal Management

A narrative justifying how the planned allocations are consistent with the annual adult education plan which is based on your CAEP 3-year plan.

The BACAE board allocates funding to each member agency based on prior year allocations and regular evaluations of expenditures and community needs. Consortium District Members have come together to review existing practices and align efforts and policies to ensure seamless transitions for students. The BACAE Board utilizes a fiscal agent funding model with an annual review process for evaluating Member District allocations during the CFAD process. While much of the last three years focused on improving the quality of services, maintaining and establishing distance learning programs, efforts to increase enrollment and persistence are the area of focus for the current Three-Year Plan. We continue to focus on providing course offerings at varying times to meet student needs while increasing opportunities to support the needs of our students to ensure their basic needs are met to focus on their educational plans. The BACAE Board has allocated funds to each Member District to support the implementation of the 2023-2024 Annual Plan.  In May 2023, the BACAE board unanimously agreed to follow a 20% carry over maximum to be compliant with AB 1491 beginning with the 2023-2024 fiscal year at the end of Q4.

An approach to incorporating remaining carry-over funds from prior year(s) into strategies planned for 2023-24.

BACAE District Members who have carry-over funding will be using their funds to pay for important resources such as marketing of their programs, engagement and retention of students, offering additional classes, acquiring technology equipment for students and staff, hiring additional staff, to update curriculum, strengthening partnerships, professional development, and enhancing current offerings. The BACAE Board meets on a monthly basis and openly discusses fiscal allocation, quarterly expenses, student data submissions. All allocations can be adjusted based on the needs of each service area. 

Certification

Baker Valley Unified - Member Representative

Approved by Cecil Edwards

08/14/2023 02:37 PM PDT

Barstow CCD - Member Representative

Approved by Eva Bagg

08/14/2023 12:31 PM PDT

Barstow Unified - Member Representative

Approved by Scott Godfrey

08/14/2023 02:19 PM PDT

Silver Valley Unified - Member Representative

Approved by Jeff Youskievicz

08/14/2023 12:32 PM PDT