While adult education has been around for many years, the nature and quality has varied widely, depending on the type of community, whether any given school system sees adulted as a positive or negative part of its K-12 system, and more. Recently, more people in Connecticut (and perhaps elsewhere) see the potential for adult ed, in partnership with higher education, to help many people who have struggled educationally to:
- Improve their lives through pursuit of postsecondary education, often for the first time;
- Help address shortages of specific skills in the economy,
- Recognize the need for college credentials, of various types, to address these shortages; and,
- Be one answer to declining college enrollments (especially at community colleges and state universities),
Connecticut is now embarked on an ambitious program of adult education. This conference will look at the rationale for these programs, and dig into the critical but thorny imperative to track the results of these programs over time.
