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Adult Education Administrator's Manual

Instructional Services
Students

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Federal adult education reporting guidelines mandate that programs report on students only after they have attained 12 hours of instruction in the program. Additionally, since programs cannot count students who have not been appropriately assessed, it is important that programs pre-test students as soon as possible before enrolling them in class. Engaging new students in an orientation before they start classes is a good way to ensure students complete their first 12 hours of instructional services and get assessed.

Orientation is designed to assist the student in obtaining his or her goals while enrolled in the program. Programs are encouraged to include the following components in the orientation process:

• program (location and times of classes);
• assessment (critical to placement);
• learning styles (focus on student strengths, not weaknesses);
• goal setting;
• motivation to learn and commitment;
• local employment information;
• study skills;
• test taking skills;
• time management
• information about the GED test (components, cost and registration process, scoring guidelines, etc);
• additional training/education opportunities,

The student will be given information about how he/she will progress through the program. Orientation should be held on a regularly scheduled basis. A successful orientation will increase retention and the number of contact hours. It should include managed enrollment (regularly scheduled days for enrollment and waiting lists) so as to decrease daily interruptions to enroll new students. The proper pre-test should be administered during orientation.

For more ideas on how to implement a student orientation, please visit the TCALL website.

The registration/intake form must include student’s name, ID number (Social Security), date of birth, address and phone number, highest level of education completed, native language, immigration status, ethnicity, gender, age, and employment status. A review of the required participant information in Texas Educating Adults Management System (TEAMS) is recommended when creating an intake form.

All students must be assessed when they enter the ESL and ABE/ASE programs. ESL students are administered the BEST and ABE students are given the TABE. This original score is the baseline score and allows the program to place students according to their functioning level. The Texas Education Agency (TEA) and the National Reporting Service (NRS) use the BEST and TABE scores to provide correlation to the Student Performance Levels (SPL) and the functioning levels. The functioning level then determines the students’ Domain of Significance (DOS). Programs determine students functioning level by comparing the different sections of the assessment.

On the BEST, the lower score between the Oral Interview and Literacy Skills is the functioning level. A lowest score of the TABE Math, Reading and Language tests determines the functioning level for ABE/ASE students.

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