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CAEP Annual Plan: 2019-20 53 Accel San Mateo County

Status: Consortium Approved

California Adult Education Program : Annual Plan : 2019-20 Produced: Aug 15, 2019, 9:27 PM UTC Kelsey Harrison

53 Accel San Mateo County

Plans & Goals - Consortium Approved

Executive Summary
San Mateo County is located just south of San Francisco and features a strong thriving economy that is home to industry sectors such as: bioscience, computer software, green technology, hospitality, financial management, health care and transportation. In the southern part of the county lies the heart of “Silicon Valley,” and is home to Stanford University, Facebook, Oracle, LinkedIn, Electric Arts, Box, Hewlett Packard and Tesla. San Mateo County’s overall economy is strong; it presently has an unemployment rate of 2.5%, the lowest unemployment rate in the State of California. However, even in the midst of this economic prosperity, there are growing and acute inequities in the region. Economic indicators show a disturbing trend; the wage gap is widening. Economic experts predict that San Mateo County’s employment landscape will largely consist of two levels; one with a large number of jobs with a median wage under $20 per hour, as well as a large number of high-wage jobs with a median wage over $35 per hour. Even though San Mateo County job wage levels have increased, middle-tier jobs - which historically have made up the majority of employment - now make up a smaller proportion which has contributed to a growing wage gap and economic inequity. When many people think of San Mateo County, many assume that most of the County’s thousands of new jobs are high-paying positions in the technology sector. In fact, many of the jobs in San Mateo County are in the service and retail sectors; and many of these jobs pay lower wages. There is a housing crisis in San Mateo County. The gap between income and housing costs are difficult for many, even those who earn high salaries. However, the greatest burden is found in communities of color and low income households. Rentals are out of reach for many. For example, to afford a two-bedroom apartment rental in San Mateo County, an annual income of $118,000 is needed. For those employed in the service or retail sector, this means two to three times his or her salary.
Regional Planning Overview
Our consortium engaged in a planning approach that consisted of the following elements:1. Action-oriented; 2. Inclusive and transparent; 3. Human centered design;4. Visionary/paradigm shifting; 5. Ongoing learning over 3 – years; 6. Data-informed decision making;7. Inclusive of customer-stakeholders; 8. Capacity building; and 9. Connect resources. ACCEL’s planning process consisted of on-going discussions and input from Consortium steering committee members, and input from faculty, staff, teachers, administrators, classified staff, students, work force development board and community partners. In addition, we had discussions during ACCEL Steering Committee project based work group sessions, and meetings with stakeholders from NOVA Job Works, Job Train, and Allies 4 Innovation. Our 3-Year Planning focused on the following key questions: 1. Where has ACCEL been?; 2. What have we learned?; 3. What did we accomplish?; 4. Where do we want to go in the future?

Meeting Regional Needs

Regional Need #1

Gaps in Service / Regional Needs
Adult Basic Education/Adult Secondary Education
How do you know? What resources did you use to identify these gaps?
According to the most current US Census Data San Mateo County, 65,719 individuals have no high school diploma, GED or high school equivalency. Data collected also included dropout rates, unemployment and poverty.
How will you measure effectiveness / progress towards meeting this need?
Effectiveness will be measured by student assessment scores, completion of courses, certificates and surveys.

Regional Need #2

Gaps in Service / Regional Needs
Programs for Immigrants
How do you know? What resources did you use to identify these gaps?
According to the most current US Census Data, 46% of individuals living in San Mateo County are non-English speakers. The most common languages: Spanish - 136,434 (18.7%); Chinese (including Mandarin & Cantonese) - 62,444 (8.55%); Tagalog (including Filipino) - 49,957 (6.86%). Data resources also included population, drop out data, English language proficiency (ESL learners in schools as well as census data on English language ability) unemployment and poverty.
How will you measure effectiveness / progress towards meeting this need?
Asessment scores, completion of courses, certificates and surveys.

Regional Need #3

Gaps in Service / Regional Needs
Short Term Career Education
How do you know? What resources did you use to identify these gaps?
Economic data on key industries and growth trends in the region were researched from existing sources. Source documents included the trends affecting workforce development in San Mateo County and the San Francisco Peninsula, SAMCEDA, the Labor Market Index, NOVA Job Works, the Economic Employment Department, and EMSI data provided by ACCEL member community college workforce development directors. A growing knowledge based economy demands that more workers have post secondary credentials - training beyond high school. Today’s work environment requires a higher level of skill to remain gainfully employed. A number of employers are requiring existing workers to upgrade their skills to remain employed, while other employers are using educational and occupational credentials in the hiring process to find the most qualified workers. Educational and occupational credentials are also used as a measure to determine a candidate’s adaptability and train-ability.
How will you measure effectiveness / progress towards meeting this need?
Assessment scores, completion of courses, certificates, industry certifications, strategic partnerships, surveys, intern/externships, and employment gains.

Gaps In Service

New Strategies

Strategy #1
Adult Basic/Adult Secondary Education: Develop tools and promising practice guidelines to support the integration and contextualization of basic skills to educational and career pathways. Support collaboration beween ESL, ABE/ASE, CTE, and community college faculty to promote contextualization and seamless transition.
Strategy #2
Programs for Immigrants: In addition to offering ESL classes and programming, ACCEL will focus on three specific areas of the Immigrant Integration Framework developed by Allies 4 Innovation: health, financial literacy, and civic/volunteer/community engagement.
Strategy #3
Employment: development of strategic connections/relationships/partnerships with regional workforce development, Strong Workforce Deputy Sector Navigators, the Small Business Administration, labor. industry leaders and employers. The focus and goal of this relationship establishment and maintenance is for the development and alignment of education and career technical education programming, opportunities for job shadowing, intern/externships, and job placement in entry level careers with opportunities for advancement and upward economic mobility.
Strategy #4
Outreach/Strategic Marketing Campaign: ACCEL has engaged Full Capacity Marketing, a marketing firm to create a marketing and outreach campaign. This focus of this strategic marketing strategy: (1) to identify and clarify who is our target audience (current and prospective adult school students); (2) profiles of the adult school student and/or adult learner; (3) what language or content resonates with our target audience?; (4) develop a brand and brand strategy; (5) develop a new logo and consortium website.
Strategy #5
Packaging of Support Services: develop support services networks and host regional network resource events consisting of community based organizations, local government, Title 1 & Title II referrals, and community colleges. Increase awareness and alignment of services among partners. Utilize data base software program Community Pro as a strategic tool for referral and data management.

Seamless Transitions

New Strategies

Strategy #1
Curriculum Alignment Across Adult Schools. The student’s first experience sets a foundation for success. Curriculum alignment across the adult schools will include aligned assessments which will allow the student to clarify their long-term educational, career, and/or community objective, develop an individualized plan and understand the pathway to achieve it. Strategies to accomplish this goal: Align adult school courses so that students across the region are learning the same set of skills in the following areas: literacy, numeracy, technology/digital literacy, communication/soft skills (power skills) and contextualized learning; Facilitate professional learning among adult school teachers.
Strategy #2
Curriculum Alignment Between Schools, Colleges, and Training Partners. ACCEL’s member adult schools and community colleges have over the years pioneered promising practices for coordination and alignment. As independent segment, both the adult schools and the community colleges respectively have significant collaborative initiatives. Strategies to accomplish this goal: 1. Shared professional development [may include professional development workshops taught by college instructors for adult school faculty]; 2. Create faculty teams to compare adult school and community college curriculum in transition programs; 3. Revise the curriculum as needed; 4. Prepare adult school students for college classes; 5. Inform them of what is expected in college; 6. Assignments, study time per credit hour; 7. Instructor’s expectations; 8. Present sample college activities at the adult schools.
Strategy #3
Community Pro. ACCEL has purchased and implemented a new data base management and referral system (Community Pro). Community Pro allows ACCEL adult school transition navigators, community college coordinators, community-based, local government, and other referral resource partners together in service to our students. The developers at Community Pro created a comprehensive catalog of ACCEL classes, programs, and services available throughout our region. This tool also features a common Intake Form augmented by records from the consortia member adult schools, community colleges, community and referral partners allowing our transition staff to make and receive informed referrals, confirm intake appointments, track student transitions, and know that our students are being served. ACCEL has invited community partners Upward Scholars, NOVA Job Works, and Job Train to join our data base program.
Strategy #4
In Response to AB705, ACCEL will be working with its members to develop a plan with appropriate time lines, milestones, and evaluation to respond to the need for remedial math.
Strategy #5
Short Term Career Technical Education & Training: Identify and assess what CTE/certificate programs exist within the community colleges, adult schools, non-profit providers, pre-apprenticeships and apprenticeships. Strategies to accomplish this goal: 1. Convene college CTE Directors and Adult School Directors to identify careers of opportunity for adult learners; 2. Identify and/or develop college pathways to in-demand high income potential careers; 3. Business/Entrepreneurship; 4. Medical Assistant; 3. Proposed: Health Careers; 5. Build on existing programs relevant to industry/employers that are in-demand, with high earning potential and align them with adult school courses to assist with smoother transitions and academic success; 6. Establish guidelines and define the process for referring students to CTE Certification Training [some of the colleges are registered training providers via WIOA Title I.]; 7. Determine what students may be eligible for WIOA Employment.

Student Acceleration

New Strategies

Strategy #1
ACCEL's Adult School Transition Navigators and Community College Coordinators will work together to inform students regarding dual enrollment, the promise program, and other educational, career, or community/civic engagement opportunities. These opportunities may expedite student exposure, experience, and allow them to move forward expeditiously and successfully in their transition to career, college, and/or community.
Strategy #2
Basic information technology skills training, along with google suite basic courses will be embedded in ESL courses, and also available alongside to enable students to simultaneously gain technology and English language skills.
Strategy #3
ACCEL will develop and implement career exploration and assessment instruments to be used across the Adult Schools to assist the students in creating their personalized educational/career roadmap for transition to college, career, and/or community.

Professional Development

New Strategies

Strategy #1
Conduct regional shared professional development on relevant timely topics such as: contextualized teaching, learning. and leadership . Professional development may include workshops taught by college instructors for adult school faculty.
Strategy #2
Promote and share information on upcoming educational conferences and webinars. Convene meetings with Community College CTE, Workforce Development staff, and Deputy Sector Navigators.
Strategy #3
Professional Development speakers will be conducting presentations on timely and relevant topics selected by the consortia members periodically during consortia meetings.

Leveraging Resources

New Strategies

Strategy #1
Leverage existing community-based and local government support services to address barriers faced by students in the ACCEL region in order to provide holistic support.
Strategy #2
ACCEL will continue to develop and strengthen its relationship with NOVA Job Works and is in the process of offering NOVA 's workshops at ACCEL member adult school sites. ACCEL's Executive Director is a member of NOVA Job Works Stakeholders Advisory Committee.
Strategy #3
ACCEL will continue to strengthen its relationships with Strong Workforce Regional Deputy Sector Navigators for ongoing conversations and opportunities to develop programming leading from the Adult School to career, college, certification, life-long learning, skill attainment, and economic self-sufficiency.
Strategy #4
ACCEL is planning to develop an advisory board consisting of members from industry and small business to further inform and shape educational programming for career technical education and entry level employment with upward mobility and increased earning potential. This advisory board will also assist in the development of opportunities for ACCEL students to engage in intern/externships, job shadowing, and entry level employment opportunities.

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.
ACCEL member agencies are implementing the strategies and activities developed through the steering committee process and under the direction of the Executive Director which is consistent and in alignment with our CAEP 3-Year Strategic Plan. With state assurances that funding is ongoing, all members are committed to implementing our annual plan and spending the 2019-2020 funds in the same manner.
An approach to incorporating remaining carry-over funds from prior year(s) into strategies planned for 2019-20.
ACCEL will have no carry over funds in 2019-2020.

Certification

Cabrillo Unified - Member Representative

Approved by Jason Owens

2019-08-14

Jefferson Union High - Member Representative

Approved by Jefferson Education

2019-08-14

San Mateo Co. Office of Education - Member Representative

Approved by Vera Jacobson-Lundeberg

2019-08-14

San Mateo County CCD - Member Representative

Approved by Ms. Kelsey Harrison Ms.

2019-08-15

San Mateo Union High - Member Representative

Approved by Tim Doyle

2019-08-14

Sequoia Union High - Member Representative

  • Lionel de Maine
  • Director, Sequoia Adult School
  • ldemaine@seq.org
  • (650) 306-8866
Approved by Lionel de Maine

2019-08-15

South San Francisco Unified - Member Representative

Approved by Stephen Redmond

2019-08-15