Adult Education Responds to Workforce Needs With a Focus on Rider 82

The ESL Learning Community Workforce Model

In Austin, the problem for our students isn’t so much about finding employment, but rather, finding better employment. Our Adult Education ESL program has always been focused on improving English and work readiness skills. Our EL Civics program has the added component of citizenship preparation. Upon completion of these programs, we transition students into ABE/GED or higher level ESL classes offered at the college. What our students needed was a third option: a sustainable workforce option.

Austin Community College’s (ACC) Continuing Education Department offers a wide variety of workforce courses, but these courses were all designed for native speakers of English, and when our students attempted these training programs, they encountered great difficulties. We decided to create a learning community (a pairing of an ESL class with a pre-existing training course), using the I-BEST model from the Washington State Board for Community and Technical Colleges (see their Research Report No. 05-2 for more information). We decided to pilot this model using the Certified Nurse Aide (CNA) for two reasons:

1. Continuing Education reported that non-native speakers of English had an interest in the CNA program, yet lacked the English skills to be successful.
2. The CNA course equips students with basic medical skills, prepares them for the state certification exam, and acts as a launching pad to other medical training and careers.

We structured our ESL/CNA Learning Community so that classes alternate between ESL class and the first of the two CNA courses (see Figure 1). Students take the first course as a cohort; the CNA course is not altered from the version offered to the native speaking population, except for the addition of the ESL support class. However, the second course in the series, the clinical class, has no ESL support for students. Non-native English speaking students must register for that class with the general population. Our rationale for providing no ESL assistance for the clinical portion of the program is two-fold:

1. Students will be working with residents in a long-term care facility and must be able to communicate with them.
2. Having completed the first course with ESL support, students are ready.

ESL students need support in two areas in order to pass the state certification exam: (1) CNA content and (2) oral communication. In the regular CNA course, students are expected to read the textbook and complete workbook exercises largely on their own. Such a task is extremely difficult, even for advanced English language learners. ESL students need a great deal of assistance with interpreting the textbook and becoming accustomed to the language of multiple-choice test questions. Surprisingly, the greatest obstacle is not the medical vocabulary, but commonplace words such as promote, refuse, and avoid. Discussion of the textbook material and practice test questions helps identify and clarify unsuspected problem vocabulary as well as reinforces students’ grasp of content.

The second area of the curriculum consists of oral communication activities designed to promote conversational fluency. A CNA must carry on constant oral communication with the people they are working with. Not only must they explain procedures they are doing, but their role also includes that of active listener and conversation partner. In a collaborative relationship with the CNA teacher, the ESL teacher follows up the introduction of new CNA skills with communication activities and role play.

The first offering of this learning community enrolled six students. All but one completed the course and most either found work in the profession or enrolled in further medical training at ACC. We enrolled eight students in the second offering, and 11 in the third.

As a result of our success with this model, ACC and WorkSource (Capital Area Workforce Development Board) were awarded one of four statewide Vocational ESL (VESL) grants. With the VESL grant, we launched a 16-week intensive ESL/Administrative Assistant program and a one-year intensive ESL/ Dental Assistant program. In our regular Adult Education ESL classes, we will be piloting two workforce ESL courses: ESL for the Health Professions and ESL for Business and Technology.

ACC has chosen to actively pursue workforce programs for its ESL students. To that end we have initiated and cultivated relationships with important content experts. In our case we actively pursued partnerships with our Department of Continuing Education and WorkSource. Programs not affiliated with a community college may have more difficulty finding and creating partnerships with training providers; however, the growing body of evidence shows that when these programs are planned and executed well, they benefit all stakeholders.

David Borden is an experienced teacher, curriculum developer, and program administrator. He has worked in academic, tuition-based, and grant-based ESL programs here in the United States and abroad. He holds a Master’s Degree in ESL. He currently works as the ESL Coordinator for the Division of Adult Education at Austin Community College.

Nancy Meredith has taught EL/Civics in the Adult Education Department of Austin Community College for the past four years, in addition to teaching the ESL-CNA course. She holds an M.A. in speech from Northwestern University and a B.A. with Honors from the University of Texas at Austin. She is currently a candidate for the Adult Education Teacher Credential and is Sociopolitical Concerns Chair for TexTESOL III.