The first model, that of the
workplace partnering with an educational institution, is the
most common. Although federal funding is not a prerequisite
for this type of partnership, such money has often been the
catalyst for beginning a project. State and local
governments may also support these projects. In this model,
the educational institution generally provides the
instructors and develops the curricula. It also conducts the
needs assessment and keeps all stakeholders informed. The
business will usually provide space for classes.
Increasingly, the company is covering the entire cost of the
program including paying the instructors and providing pay
or release time for the workers to attend the
classes. Coordinators, teacher trainers,
teachers, and curriculum writers from projects of this type
were interviewed. The projects were the Arlington Education
and Employment Program (REEP), the El Paso Community College
Workplace Communications Program (EPCC), the Worker
Education Program of Northeastern Illinois University, the
Fairfax County Adult ESL Workplace Program, and the Pima
County Adult Education (PCAE) Workplace Education
Project. 1. The Arlington
Education and Employment Program (REEP) 2. El Paso
Community College (EPCC) Workplace Communication Skills for
Limited English Proficient Garment Industry
Workers What makes the El Paso project
unique is that learners are not placed in classes by their
English language proficiency or literacy skills. Learners
with low English literacy or minimal speaking ability may
choose to take higher level "Workplace
Communications"&emdash;which focuses on problem solving and
other skills needed for the team-based
approach&emdash;before or instead of "Workplace ESL" or
"Workplace Basic Skills." Hence, the classes are generally
mixed, with a range of speaking and literacy skills in every
class. The heterogeneity in English levels may be tolerated,
if not encouraged, because almost all of the employees at
this Levi Strauss (with the exception of several managers)
speak Spanish fluently, if not natively; all teachers in the
program are bilingual; and in class, as on the job, both
English and Spanish are freely used. However, as much as
bilingualism is accepted, if not encouraged, speaking and
reading and writing English are still prerequisites for
advancement on the job. 3. The Worker
Education Program of Northeastern Illinois University What is notable about this
project is that the union is such an active partner. The
union helps guide the university in deciding which companies
will be most receptive to holding workplace ESL classes.
Union staff also accompany the education staff to all
meetings with the companies, especially the initial,
pre-project meetings. The union and the university work so
closely together that the Worker Education Program staff
have offices both at the university and at the union hall,
and some classes are held at the union hall. Having offered instruction in
basic skills and low-level literacy, the project has
recently expanded to include classes for language minority
bank workers with high-level skills in English. For them,
the workplace instruction is focused on pronunciation and
higher order communication skills to facilitate working in
teams and problem solving. 4. Fairfax County
Adult ESL Workplace Program An interesting development for
FCPS, one that makes it stand out from the other workplace
ESL services providers, is that, in recent years, under
contract from the county Department of Human Development
(DHD), it has offered vocational ESL (VESL) classes
targeting specific job skills for potential employees in
retail sales, basic computer work, custodial services and
property maintenance, and accounting. With this program,
VESL teachers support vocational teachers working with
refugees (funded by refugee resettlement monies) and
immigrants (under the Fairfax County DHD monies). FCPS
currently offers both the publicly-funded VESL classes and
the contract-funded workplace ESL classes. Fairfax has continued to seek
outside funding: In 1995, FCPS won a grant from the Project
in Adult Immigrant Education (PAIE), funded by the Andrew W.
Mellon Foundation and headquartered at the Center for
Applied Linguistics (CAL). This grant has allowed FCPS to
investigate setting up a coalition of small businesses to
offer workplace ESL instruction jointly. In late 1996, the
FCPS won another PAIE grant enabling them to develop and
pilot, in workplace, vocational, and ESL classes, lessons
that incorporate the Secretary (of Labor's) Commission on
Achieving Necessary Skills (SCANS) competencies, to improve
the workplace readiness of adult learners. 5. The Pima County
Adult Education Workplace Education Project
(PCAEWEP) The Pima County Adult Education
program (PCAE) has offered workplace basic skills and
workplace ESL classes since 1988. Although PCAE had received
four workplace grants from the U.S. Department of Education,
it was not awarded a three-year grant in 1994. Unlike some
of the other formerly-funded projects, it has maintained
many of the worksite projects originally funded through the
NWLP. PCAE now funds its workplace
classes through a combination of contracts with companies
and county adult education monies. PCAEWEP continues to
serve many diverse industries including local manufacturing
companies and has served companies such as the Westin La
Paloma, Allied Signal Controls and Accessories, Bun-Brown
Corporation (semi-conductor manufacturing), 3M, Tri-Tronics,
Inc., the University of Arizona, and the Tucson Medical
Center. PCAEWEP's success in
maintaining workplace programs is due to several factors.
First, the program had the expertise of an evaluator who
started a workplace ESL program at Motorola many years
before the NWLP was in existence. Second, it received help
from the local Chambers of Commerce, consortia of
businesses, and innkeepers' associations in recruiting their
member companies for the workplace programs. Third, it has
strong support from the Pima County Adult Education Program,
which supports activities employers may be less willing to
subsidize, such as curriculum development and instructor
training. Finally, PCAE's Workplace Education Project has a
full-time administrator, a project manager, whose sole
responsibility is to manage the workplace program. The
project manager works hard to keep the program in the public
eye. She is actively involved in marketing the program and
attends local and regional business association and training
consortia meetings. She will also make "cold calls" if
necessary to promote the program. She will spend time with a
company initially to explain the program, and distribute
written materials describing the program and its
accomplishments, courses offered, participating companies,
and contact information. And, at the conclusion of each
class, the project manager sends the company a report about
program highlights, evaluation results, and anonymous
results of learner assessment measures. A partial list of
classes offered follows: Earlier, the project sought to
link workplace instruction, to improved productivity at the
workplace. Due to myriad other factors (including for
example, change in supervision, improved technology, and
reorganized workforce) it was nearly impossible to prove
that the educational program was directly responsible for
this improvement. Therefore, the PCAE Workplace Education
Project no longer advertises that it will improve workplace
productivity. The decision not to tie the
program to increased productivity at the workplace
apparently has not been a factor in keeping companies
involved and in recruiting new companies: A number of the
businesses are repeat customers, having contracted with the
Workplace Education Project many times. They also recommend
the program to other employers. Several of the workers have
taken multiple classes and asked for additional
classes. Over time, project staff have
learned to listen carefully to what the companies are saying
in the initial meetings to see exactly what a job entails
before agreeing to do it. They have learned to maintain the
quality of the class they offer, because, as the project
manager says, "it's all you have in the end." Because of
this quality issue, the PCAE Workplace Education Project
prefers not to offer multilevel ESL classes, but rather to
offer smaller, more homogeneous classes, if possible. It has
learned the value of a good, solid, generic workplace
curriculum that can be readily customized to the individual
worksite and the individual job, if need be.
The Arlington Education
and Employment Program (REEP) of Virginia has provided ESL
instruction at the workplace since 1988. From 1988 until
1993 it received four NWLP grants. During that time, REEP
established partnerships with various businesses (hotels,
residential care centers, light industry, and restaurants),
with chambers of commerce, and with restaurant associations
from Arlington and Alexandria counties in Virginia. REEP is
currently using other sources and seeking additional funds
to continue workplace projects previously funded under the
NWLP that had provided ESL instruction to food service
workers, housekeepers, and nurses' aides in retirement homes
and restaurants.
A second project based on the model of a partnership between
a workplace and an educational institution is the El Paso
Community College (EPCC) Workplace Communication Skills
Program for limited English proficient garment industry
workers. Like REEP, the project received initial funding
from the Department of Education's NWLP and now operates
without this money, working with several employers in the El
Paso area including Levi Strauss and Company and Baxter
Converters. It also works with a union partner, the Rio
Grande Workers Alliance/AFL-CIO. The EPCC operated a more or
less traditional workplace project at the start, but changed
as the business partners began to restructure their
organizations to follow more of a team-based approach. The
project adopted a dynamic curriculum-development process
teaching communication and teamwork skills through
problem-solving activities, as well as videotaped role plays
about learner-generated workplace themes and
issues.
The Worker Education
Program of the Northeastern Illinois University Chicago
Teachers' Center is the only project described in this paper
that continues to receive funding from the NWLP. This
project has been in operation since 1993 and has received
three grants from the U.S. Department of Education since
then. The business partners are a variety of light
manufacturing companies (e.g., Henri Studios, Midway Cap,
Chicago Transparent Products). The Union of Needletrade,
Industrial, and Textile Employees (UNITE!), which is present
in all shops in the project, is the union
partner.
Fairfax County (Virginia) Public Schools (FCPS) has been
offering "ESL in the workplace" classes through its
department of adult ESL since 1981. The department has
received several grants to support these classes including
some Adult Education Act, Section 353 monies from the state
and two NWLP grants. When taking advantage of this monetary
support, employers from the (targeted) banks and hotels
tended to favor longer, more extensive ESL programs.
However, because the project costs have shifted to the
employers, the classes have been shorter and more focused.
Since the loss of federal funding, FCPS has concentrated on
providing classes to beginning-level learners, generally
hospital workers and workers in property
maintenance.
The Pima County Adult Education Workplace Education Project
(PCAEWEP), in Tucson, Arizona is the fifth and final project
of the first model. It will be discussed in the most detail
because it has had the most success in making the transition
from a federally-funded project to one supported almost
entirely by contracts. How it has successfully managed this
transition is important for the field.