Personnel Issues

Dear Readers:
Welcome to another issue of Literacy Links…our Autumn issue. I don’t know about you, but for me, Autumn brings with it images of pencils, papers, school buses, teachers—the inevitable return to school. Perhaps, it is all the years of being socialized as a student, but I cannot help but to associate the fall season with school. And while many of our state’s adult literacy classes meet year round, I have gotten the sense from several of you, administrators and practitioners alike, that fall brings with it a sense of newness, a sense of this year being the year we “get it right” as an organization. A new program year is hence a new beginning. Therefore, we think it’s very fitting that this issue of Literacy Links deals specifically with Personnel Issues for who else helps to get it right than the personnel who make up our organizations. This issue addresses the hiring, training, retaining, and yes, the sometimes necessary, firing process of adult and family literacy personnel.

Remember when you were a child and you’d be playing kickball or a game of tag and you’d yell, “DO OVER” when the game didn’t quite go your way. That’s how the termination process makes me feel as an administrator. I feel everyone, the terminated employee and his or her supervisor wants a Do Over—a chance to get it right. I believe in my staff and developing their potential from the beginning, which is why the hiring and selection process is so important. I want my hires to be permanent ones, which means not only having a rigorous selection criteria to produce the most qualified candidates but in the end trusting my instincts before offering the position to anyone. I count myself exceptionally lucky as I really do believe I work with one of the best staffs in the state. TCALL as a Center now boasts a staff of twenty. These twenty individuals make it possible for me to love my work more than I already do. Now that’s not to say that as an organization we do not have personnel issues of course, we do. We anticipate, prepare for, and try our best to effectively manage personnel issues. As a staff, we participate in semi-annual staff retreats to address how best to communicate across differences, manage conflict, and work together as a team. I am committed to the individuals that I work with, I genuinely care about them, and I respect what each one contributes to TCALL. I feel this respect and care in return because as a staff we’ve emphasized these as shared organizational values. These are traits I would look for in any personnel member I would choose to hire.

I hope wherever you find yourself in terms of personnel issues that you’ll find this edition of use. I know it’s one that I plan to return to again and again whether I’m in the hiring, training, or retaining phase. And yes, I’ll certainly refer to it if I’m ever in the firing process. I know I found Sue Barker’s article, Called in on the Red Carpet, on the releasing of full-time employees particularly helpful recently. And if it’s hiring and recruiting that you are in need of doing, several authors offer you their insight into hiring effective personnel.

Helen King in her article, Identifying Effective Personnel for Family Literacy Employment, on identifying effective family literacy personnel stresses the importance of care, genuine respect, cultural awareness and appreciation, and personal efficacy as qualities effective family literacy personnel should possess and the ones that administrators should look for when hiring. Christia Moore in her article, Adult Ed 101: Strategies for Recruiting Effective Personnel, describes the strategy she has developed for recruiting prospective teachers. It’s a strategy that gives prospective teachers pre-employment opportunities that allow them to “realize whether teaching Adult Education is their niche.” Patti Groce, Hiring Practices for Small Non-Profits, addresses effective hiring processes for small non-profits and Ted Klein, Hiring New ESL Teachers, offers his expertise on hiring new ESL teachers.

In this edition, you’ll find contributions from several members of the TCALL staff. If it’s teacher retention you’re interested in, then Harriet Vardiman Smith’s cover article, Teacher Retention in Adult Literacy Programs: Uncharted Territory - or Something We Already Know How to Achieve?, will provide you with not only the logistics of the problem but also program practices that seem to improve teacher retention. Several articles also address the importance of training personnel. Jacqueline Gramann’s article, The Learning Team, on the importance of learning teams in family literacy discusses both their significance and the role in-service training plays in the development of “responsive and connected” learning teams. Ken Appelt’s article, Multi-Region Master Teacher Initiative Launched Get on the Train or Get off the Tracks, provides timely information on the recently launched Master Teacher Initiative. He provides useful information on how practitioners can get involved. And one of TCALL’s graduate assistants, Marilyn Byrd, Texas’ Curriculum & Instruction IPQs for Adult Education - Are They Evidence Based?, reports on the research project she’s been involved with all year. The information she’s been gathering on Texas’ Curriculum and Instruction IPQs is useful for all program personnel.

As always, you’ll find the “Welcome to our Library” section filled with useful suggested readings available for free through our Clearinghouse. And you’ll want to mark your calendars with all of the “Upcoming Events”.

I hope this issue will be one that you return to at each stage of dealing with personnel issues from hiring to firing. And I hope that this year will be the program year that you and all of your wonderful personnel get it right.

Happy Reading,

Dr. Dominique T. Chlup
Director of TCALL &
Principal Investigator on the Clearinghouse Project