Adult Education and Family Literacy Act Program

The Colorado Department of Education (CDE) AEI office is the State’s Eligible Agency for oversight of funding provided through the Adult Education and Family Literacy Act grant. AEI is responsible for administering funds to eligible providers and providing program management. AEI will provide technical assistance and guidance to programs originally funded under the Workforce Investment Act to prepare for continuation for 2016-2017. For 2017-2018, AEI will provide funding to eligible providers at the local level for the provision of adult education and family literacy services as a component of the Colorado talent development system through a competitive Request for Proposal (RFP) process. The competitive grant process for local adult education and family literacy providers will include a request for models associated with customer-centered services, including adult basic and secondary education and English language acquisition within career pathways and family literacy to promote stronger educational advancement of children, helping break cycles of poverty, and building stronger local areas within Colorado.

CDE will use the considerations specified in section 231(e) of WIOA to fund eligible providers by incorporating each of the considerations into the narrative portion of the application. Each applicant will be required to provide narrative detail to demonstrate how the applicant will meet each consideration. Finally, CDE will attach a point-based scoring rubric weighting each of the considerations.

Funds will be available for multi-year cycles for the development and implementation of adult education and family literacy programs that support strengthening of local areas. After successful development and implementation of a program, a provider may apply on an annual basis for continuation of financial support through Title II funding.

AEI will accept proposals from:

• Local educational agencies,
• Community-based organizations or faith-based organization,
• Volunteer literacy organizations,
• Institutions of higher education,
• Public or private nonprofit agencies,
• Libraries,
• Public housing authorities,
• Nonprofit institutions that are not described in any of the above that have the ability to provide adult education and family literacy activities to eligible individuals,
• Consortia or coalitions of the agencies, organizations, institutions, libraries, or authorities described above, and
• Partnerships between an employer and an entity described above.

Eligible individual means an individual (1) who has attained 16 years of age and who is not enrolled or required to be enrolled in secondary school under State law (CRS 22.33.104) and (2) who is basic skills deficient; does not have a secondary school diploma or its recognized equivalent, and has not achieved an equivalent level of education; or is an English language learner.

The Colorado Department of Education (CDE) Office of Adult Education Initiatives (AEI) will ensure direct and equitable access to grants and contracts and will use the same grant or contract process for all eligible providers in the state. All applicants follow a detailed request for proposal, and each proposal is evaluated by a team of trained evaluators and AEI staff.

AEI will establish a work group of core partners and Combined State Plan partners to develop a communications/outreach plan to announce, inform, and provide technical assistance to eligible providers across Colorado. Written proposals will be solicited through a formal Request for Proposal (RFP) which provides application procedures and forms to be completed by applicant organizations. RFP information will continue to be provided throughout the year to all persons on the AEI provider email distribution list and to others with an interest in adult education and family literacy. The announcement will also be placed on the CDE web site, communicated through the official CDE newsletter, and in the public notices sections of the state’s largest newspapers.

The entire RFP and related documents will be posted each year on the CDE web site in a format that allows local providers to download and print them. Efforts will be made to solicit proposals from each of the ten federally designated workforce development areas to ensure adult education and family literacy services for Coloradans in each local area.

As a critical component of the Colorado talent development system, providers will expand and improve the current system of delivering adult education and family literacy services through evidence-based practices and continuous improvement in order to:

• Build career pathways providing adults with basic and secondary education to enable them to earn a high school equivalency diploma, transition into postsecondary education or training, and/or gain or advance in employment in order to achieve self-sufficiency.
• Provide parents and guardians with sufficient skills to become full partners in the educational development of their children.

In accordance with legislation, eligible providers may receive adult education and family literacy funding for the delivery of any of the following adult education and family literacy activities:

• Adult education;
• Literacy;
• Workplace adult education and literacy activities;
• Family literacy activities;
• English language and acquisition activities;
• Integrated English literacy and civics education;
• Workforce preparation activities; or
• Integrated education and training that:

1. Provides adult education and literacy activities, concurrently and contextually, with both workforce preparation activities and workforce training for a specific occupation or occupational cluster, and

2. Is for the purpose of educational and career advancement.

Through further expansion and implementation of career pathways models across Colorado to serve adult learners, for competition programs will be expected to document collaborative efforts with talent development system partner programs in the local workforce development area, including but not limited to postsecondary training and education, vocational rehabilitation, and/or workforce. Concurrent enrollment of programs in the competition will ask eligible providers to first leverage partnerships for integration of workforce preparation activities and occupational components of integrated education and training in order to limit duplication of services.

To meet the needs of families in support and development of their children, concurrent enrollment of programs in the competition will ask eligible providers to describe research-based practices for integration of family literacy activities and English language acquisition activities. Additionally, eligible programs will be asked to document collaborative efforts with talent development system partner programs in the local workforce development area, including but not limited to human services and connections with K-12.