Step 3: Adult-Centered Implementation
Adult Learning Focused Institutions
Many of the components in this Implementation section are featured in CAEL’s Principles of Effectiveness for Serving Adult Learners. These principles are the foundation of CAEL’s Adult Learning Focused Institution (ALFI) initiative, which provides tools and resources to higher education institutions to help them adapt their practices to better serve adult learners. The College of New Rochelle and Sinclair Community College (profiled earlier in this report) are two institutions that were raised up as best practice institutions in the 1999 CAEL/APQC benchmarking study for the ALFI initiative.
Publications and Resources Related to the ALFI Initiative
- Flint, T. A. & Associates. (1999). Best Practices in Adult Learning: A CAEL/APQC Benchmarking Study. CAEL. Dubuque, IA: Kendall/Hunt Publishing Company This book reports on a year-long study to find and document some of the innovative ways colleges and universities serve adult learners. An executive summary is available free of charge at www.cael.org.
- Flint, T. A. & Associates. (2000). Serving Adult Learners in Higher Education: Principles of Effectiveness: An Executive Summary.CAEL. The principles themselves are described in this summary, available free of charge at www.cael.org.
- Flint, T.A., Zakos, P., & Frey, R. (2002). Best Practices in Adult Learning: A Self-Evaluation Workbook for Colleges and Universities - CAEL. Dubuque, IA: Kendall/Hunt Publishing Company This workbook provides an informal means to assess how well an institution observes the Principles. The workbook offers detailed descriptions of policies, procedures and outcomes that exemplify an Adult Learning Focused Institution. Itemized worksheets for each of the Principles contain performance indicators that may indicate success, and dozens of examples of the Principles in practices are shown. Available through www.cael.org.
- The ALFI Assessment Toolkit: The Toolkit offers colleges and universities a formal assessment of adult learner programs. The Toolkit is comprised of two assessments that provide concrete measures on adult learners’ perception of their experience as compared to faculty and administration’s perception of its programming. The first tool is an Institutional Self-Assessment Survey (ISAS) that is designed to assess a wide range of activities, policies and practices at institutions, from outreach to financial aid to instructional delivery. The second tool, the Adult Learner Inventory (ALI), probes adult learners’ experiences to examine how important and how satisfying a college or university’s programs and practices are to them. Together, the Institutional Self-Assessment Survey and the Adult Learner Inventory provide institutions with information to guide decision-making activities for improving adult learner services and program quality, with the ultimate goal of boosting access and retention. To order a toolkit, go to www.cael.org/alfi/isas_order.html. For more information, contact Diana Bamford-Rees, Associate Vice President at CAEL, (215)731-7169.