California Adult Literacy Professional Development Project

Course Description:
This self-paced course supports independent professional development; there is no facilitator nor other participants. Sign up now and access the class for 3 months. There is no official start or end date to worry about.

This course explores the nature of critical thinking and metacognition as well as the relationships among critical thinking, problem solving, and decision making. It considers the process, results, and various levels of critical thinking. It presents the concept of metacognition as a key attribute of critical thinking. It also distinguishes between simple and complex problems. Participants are encouraged to think about how these concepts can be taught in their classrooms. This course features excerpts of recordings from CALPRO’s online workshops on Teaching Critical Thinking Skills. The estimated course completion time is 12 hours.

Enrollment verification with Moodle login information will be sent to registrants within one business day of registration.

Goals:
Upon successful completion of the course, the participant will be able to: define critical thinking and metacognition; identify levels of critical thinking; distinguish between didactic teaching and teaching for critical thinking; plan classroom activities that require critical thinking; plan activities to assist students in developing metacognitive skills; distinguish between simple and complex problems; explain the relationship between critical thinking and problem solving; and plan classroom instruction that reflects the most adequate decision making processes, based on research.

Registration Information:
This course is free of charge to all California adult education programs.

Contact Information:
Please contact CALPRO at calprohelp@air.org or at 916-286-8803 for more information.

What Is A Professional Learning Community (PLC)?
“A professional learning community is educators committed to working collaboratively in ongoing processes of collective inquiry and action research to achieve better results for the students they serve” (adapted from DuFour, Learning by Doing). LEARN and DO, DO and LEARN!

A PLC is a teacher-led, collaborative team process committed to helping all students learn by addressing the following critical questions:

1. What do we want students to learn?
2. How will we know if they have learned it?
3. What will we do if they don’t learn it?
4. What will we do if they already know it?

Why Attend The CALPRO Professional Learning Community Institute?
Professional Learning Communities help schools improve and be more accountable by impacting teaching and learning. Join us at the CALPRO PLC Institute to explore the core characteristics and processes on how to effectively implement a professional learning community that focuses on student learning outcomes and creates a system for sustainable school improvement. 

A Professional Learning Community (PLC) naturally aligns very tightly with both WASC accreditation expectations and Continuous Improvement Plan (CIP) goals because all three are built around the same core idea: ongoing, data-driven improvement of student learning.

• Need Evidence of Student Work and Collaboration for WASC Accreditation?
  Evidence of student work and collaboration in a PLC shows how programs examine student learning and use it to drive improvement. This includes analyzed student work samples, assessment results, and documentation of team discussions where staff identify gaps and adjust instruction, demonstrating both student achievement and a collaborative, evidence-based approach to continuous improvement.
• Need to Establish a SMART Goal Around Student Learning for Your Continuous Improvement Plan?
  Participation in the PLC Institute helps programs develop SMART goals focused on student learning. These goals provide a clear, data-driven roadmap for continuous improvement, guiding teams to monitor progress, adjust strategies, and improve student outcomes over time.
• Need to Learn How to Use Data to Inform Instruction?
  Participation in the PLC Institute builds participants’ ability to use data to inform instruction and improve student learning. Teams analyze student data to identify needs, guide instructional decisions, and continuously refine practice based on results.

Benefits Of Participating In The PLC Institute:

• Shift school culture to focus on learning results.
• Develop PLC processes of inquiry to achieve better results for the students you serve.
• Establish collaborative teams to identify essential student learning.
• Work collaboratively to develop common formative assessments for learning.
• Work collaboratively to analyze evidence of student learning and use that evidence to learn from one another.
• Embed professional development that fosters the ongoing processes of collective inquiry and action research.
• Eighteen months of PLC implementation coaching support

CALPRO PLC Institute
CALPRO's experienced and knowledgeable staff is excited to offer an intensive, multi-session PLC Institute for teams of program administrators and professional development specialists/lead teachers to learn to improve student learning outcomes by establishing professional learning communities. CALPRO typically accepts up to 8 programs a year for this institute. Each of the selected agencies will send a team of three to include its agency director and two teachers (and/or administrators designated to serve as professional development practitioners) to participate in the initiative.

Who Is Eligible To Apply?
Any California Department of Education, Adult Education Office WIA Title II, or California Adult Education Program (CAEP) funded agency may apply. The Agency Director/Principal and a nominated lead teacher or PD staff member will participate as a team in the CALPRO Professional Learning Community Institute. Click here to apply.

For More Information
For more information, contact coordinator Sudie Whalen.

The California Adult Literacy Professional Development Project (CALPRO), in conjunction with the California Department of Education (CDE), annually seeks nominations and applications for the California Adult Education Leadership Institute (the Institute). We seek aspiring and new administrators (defined as three or fewer years) for the Institute. 

This is an opportunity for your organization to nominate an aspiring or new administrator from your adult education program to attend. We accept up to 24 participants in the Institute annually. Priority registration is given to nominees with the most recent appointment date to their administrative position. 

Nearly 700 of California’s leading adult educators have participated in this program since its inception in 1985. The Institute covers topics and skills that new and aspiring adult education administrators need to perform their jobs effectively. Topics for the Institute will focus on:

 Fiscal and Personnel Management 

• Collaborations and Partnerships 
• Career Pathways 
• Data Analysis and Data-Based Decision-Making 
• Public Relations and Program Marketing 
• The California Adult Education Program 
• Strategic Planning 
• Instructional Leadership  
• The Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act (WIOA) 

Institute participants have numerous opportunities to engage with experienced and new adult education administrators, representatives from CDE, and the three State Leadership Projects (OTAN, CASAS, and CALPRO). The Institute also includes nine months of coaching support after the training concludes. 

For more information, contact coordinator Cherise Moore.

The California Adult Literacy Professional Development Project (CALPRO) and the California Department of Education are pleased to offer a unique professional learning opportunity! Join other agency teams of ESL instructors, CTE instructors, and program administrators for an Integrated Education and Training (IET) Implementation Clinic. 

FORMAT
There are five principal features of this unique online professional learning opportunity, which is open to up to 8 agency teams (each team is composed of 3 staff members).

1) Two day-long virtual training sessions. Participants will have the opportunity to engage in interactive planning and curriculum development activities as well as to share best practices.

2) Live, interactive discussion through three 75-minute online webinars with engaging guest speakers, seasoned facilitators, peer mentors, and colleagues from around the state (see below for complete details). In each meeting we will:

• Highlight the relevancy and value of the featured topic for the work that we do
• Explore best and promising practices in the featured topic
• Learn from subject matter experts and peer mentors on effective related strategies
• Share successes and common challenges with fellow teachers and program administrators
• Get help on solving issues we face

Topics will be tailored to the needs of the participating practitioners and identified through the application process and may include:

• Starting Strong: Developing the Team-Teaching Partnership
• Co-Teaching & Alternating Teaching: Which Model, Why, and How?
• Developing a Single Set of Learning Objectives and Integrating Lesson Plans
• Building an Integrated Syllabus
• Promising Intake & Onboarding Strategies for lET
• Action Planning: Process considerations, potential challenges, and solutions to address challenges
• IET and Distance Learning: Considerations & Strategies

3) Ongoing online discussions, sharing, and resource creation through a designated private group within CALPRO’s online Community of Practice.

4) Completion of a capstone project and presentation of the project at the second day-long session.

5) Coaching now included! IET clinic participating teams will now have the support of an IET implementation coach to support you for nine months upon completion of the IET clinic. 

For more information, contact calpro@air.org. 

Fall 2026 IET Clinic application window: August 4–September 25, 2026

WHAT AND WHERE? 

CALPRO annually conducts the Training-of-Trainers (ToT) Institute for the new community of practice (CoP) at the CALPRO office in Sacramento. The purposes of the ToT Institute are: 

1. To develop a group of certified trainers to facilitate presentations of CALPRO professional learning modules 
2. To build professional development capacity and leadership in California adult education.

WHAT IS CALPRO’S COMMUNITIES OF PRACTICE INITIATIVE AND HOW DOES IT IMPACT THE ToT?
Communities of Practice are formed by groups of professionals who engage in a process of collective learning in a shared domain (adapted from Wenger, 2002). CALPRO’s Communities of Practice (CoP) Initiative aims to increase the field’s focus on supported implementation of skills, strategies and action plans that participants develop in CALPRO trainings and institutes. 

For each CoP training, an online community is established. Participants meet each other and begin learning together online; they continue to build community, knowledge and skills in the face-to-face training sessions; and they have the option of continuing to support each other’s efforts to apply new learning after the conclusion of the face-to-face sessions. CALPRO CoP trainers facilitate the entire process, including online and face-to-face sessions. 

WHO SHOULD ATTEND?
The ToT is open to applicants from all California Adult Education Program (CAEP) funded agencies (see page 2). The ToT is for individuals who will commit to following up on the ToT by presenting the module for their agency, for their region, or for CALPRO at least once within a year of the ToT. 

WHAT ARE EXPECTATIONS OF PARTICIPANTS?
Participants will be expected to complete pre-Institute assignments online. Participants are expected to attend the entire ToT Institute – no exceptions –  and demonstrate facilitation skills in practice sessions during the ToT. After completing the ToT, participants are expected to be available to facilitate training at their agency, at other agencies, or at CDE- or CALPRO-organized events within a year of the ToT. Trainers will receive an honorarium for training conducted. 

WHAT’S IN IT FOR MY AGENCY? 
Your agency will have trained facilitator(s) on your staff who can serve as an in-house content specialist. Your agency will have increased capacity to provide high quality professional learning opportunities. 

WHICH AGENCIES ARE ELIGIBLE TO PARTICIPATE? 
Employees of all California Adult Education Program (CAEP) funded agencies are eligible to apply. For more information, contact coordinator Marcela Movit. 

Course Description:
This self-paced course supports independent professional development; there is no facilitator nor other participants. Sign up now and access the class for 3 months. There is no official start or end date to worry about.

Do you wonder how to integrate employability skills into your adult education setting to support workforce preparation for middle-skills jobs? Employability skills, also referred to as 21st-century workplace skills, soft skills, or non-cognitive skills, are needed by our adult education students for readiness and success regardless of the industry or job position. This course will provide an overview of the middle-skills job landscape, an employability skills framework, and strategies and hands-on resources to connect the needed employability skills for these jobs within the adult education setting. The estimated course completion time is 2 hours.

Enrollment verification with Moodle login information will be sent to registrants within one business day of registration.

Goals:
By the end of the course, participants will be able to: define “middle-skills jobs” and provide several examples; define “employability skills” and explain why they are important; categorize employability skills using the Employability Skills Framework; describe the connections between the Employability Skills Framework and the College and Career Readiness (CCR) Standards for Adult Education; and apply the Employability Skills Framework to their lesson plans to identify ways to improve their instruction.

Registration Information:
This course is free of charge to all California adult education programs.

Contact Information:
Please contact CALPRO at calprohelp@air.org or at 916-286-8803 for more information.

Description:
This self-directed course supports independent professional development; there is no facilitator nor other participants. Sign up now and access the class for 3 months. There is no official start or end date to worry about.

Many adult education classrooms contain students whose ages, native languages, educational backgrounds, and academic skills vary widely, which poses many teaching challenges for instructors. Research shows that differentiated instruction is one of the most effective approaches for helping students learn. This course walks participants through the steps of planning a differentiated lesson, including how to write effective learning objectives, choose among approaches to differentiation (content, process, product), and design assessments. In completing the course, participants produce their own differentiated lesson plans that are suited to their instructional content and environment. The estimated course completion time is 5 hours.

Enrollment verification with Moodle login information will be sent to registrants within one business day of registration.

Registration Information:
This course is free of charge to all California adult education programs.

Contact Information:
Please contact CALPRO at calprohelp@air.org or at 916-286-8803 for more information.