Urban Alliance (formerly Urban CAFÉ) 2022-2023 Year-End Report

Prepared by Paul Jurmo, David Rosen, Federico Salas-Isnardi and Laurie Atkins-Holliday

Originally posted on May 18, 2023 and Updated June 27 and August 30, 2023

Urban CAFÉ (Urban Collaborations for Adult Foundational Education) is a national network of urban adult foundational education (AFE) networks. Its purpose is to provide participating collaborations or networks and their members with opportunities to share their successes and challenges and learn from and possibly collaborate with other urban AFE networks. This report describes Urban CAFÉ and its activities to date.

ORIGINS

•   A five-person Organizing Group (later renamed as “Steering Committee” aka “SC”) began meeting via email and Zoom calls in June 2022. The Steering Committee, as of May, 2023 included the first four people below:

o   Laurie Atkins-Holliday: Cleveland, OH: latkins@literacycooperative.org 

o   Paul Jurmo: Washington, DC: pjurmo@comcast.net

o   David Rosen: Boston, MA: djrosen123@gmail.com 

o   Federico Salas-Isnardi: Houston, TX: Federico.Salas-Isnardi@houstontx.gov  

o   Dena Giacometti: Chicago, IL

•   Over the subsequent year, the SC members (who did this work as volunteers without funding) explored whether and how to form an updated version of a “national urban adult foundational education (AFE) network” that would be informed by and build on three previous related networks. 

WHAT WE’VE DONE

Planning and continuous Improvement

•   Beginning with our first meeting and survey in October 2022, we invited an initial group of urban AFE collaboration representatives that we were familiar with to give us input about possible purposes and activities.

•   Based on that input, the SC began putting in place the programming activities and administrative supports described below.

•   As we did so, we documented what we were doing, shared it with the growing group of urban AFE collaboration members who were participating in meetings, and invited their input. SC members also held regular Zoom calls and email exchanges to discuss what we were learning in those activities and how we might move forward with this idea of a new national network.

Programming activities

The Steering Committee has . . .

•   Hosted four monthly “sharing and planning” Zoom meetings for urban AFE collaboration representatives from January through April 2023.  Each meeting was structured around a presentation and discussion of a topic that we estimated (based on the input of participants and our own observations and experiences in urban AFE work) might be of interest to participants.  The topics were:

o   January 2023: “How Urban AFE Coalitions Can Support Equitable Workforce and Economic Development”

o   February 2023: “How Urban AFE Coalitions Might Adapt the ‘Collective Impact’ Approach to Collaborative Planning and Services”

o   March 2023: “How Urban AFE Coalitions Can Support Digital Equity and Access National Digital Equity Act Funding”

o   April 2023: “The Houston Mayor’s Office for Adult Literacy as a Model for Urban AFE Coalitions”

The meetings also provided opportunities for members to discuss programming and administrative issues/tasks that Urban CAFÉ needs to deal with.

•   Polled participating representatives of urban AFE collaboratives about the possible purposes, membership, and activities of Urban CAFÉ.

•   Circulated reports and relevant slides and recordings of those meetings to those participating in the meetings.

Creation of an administrative infrastructure

The Steering Committee has . . .

•       Identified “Urban Collaboratives for Adult Foundational Education” (aka “Urban CAFÉ”) as the name for the network, based on input of meeting participants and SC members;

•       Created and used a Zoom account for Urban CAFÉ-related meetings (paid for personally by SC members);

•       Created a one-page awareness/recruiting flyer explaining the purposes and activities of Urban CAFÉ, to circulate to current and potential participants and supporters;

•       Recruited new participants for Urban CAFÉ, via outreach to those who had participated in our various meetings and other networks that SC members are part of, a Google search for “urban literacy coalitions,” and emails to 110 former members of the now-closed “National Alliance of Urban Literacy Coalitions”;

•       Created an initial version of an Urban CAFÉ website that would publicize Urban CAFÉ’s existence, purposes, membership; provide profiles of Urban CAFÉ members; provide documents and other resources of interest to urban AFE collaborations; and provide resources (slides, recordings, reports) from Urban CAFÉ meetings; 

•       Conducted initial research about previous urban AFE coalitions (through communications with Margaret Doughty, Jean Hammink, Peter Waite, and others);

•       Created an online asynchronous discussion group that can be used by Urban CAFÉ members;

•       Discussed criteria for membership in Urban CAFÉ;

•       Created a simple email mailing list and explored more-advanced mailing list systems;

•       Reached out to a national AFE organization that might serve as an “umbrella” non-profit organization within which Urban CAFÉ could operate.

WHAT WE’VE LEARNED

Potential of an Urban CAFÉ

Our limited interactions with urban AFE collaborations so far have shown:

•       Significant promising work being done in urban AFE networks around the US;

•       An interest within AFE collaborations in both social justice-related models and use of effective adult foundational education strategies;

•       Potential interest/willingness of those representatives to be part of a new national network (to share ideas and strategies, build their own capacities and that of others, carry out joint activities such as cross-collaboration professional development and resource sharing, advocacy and fundraising);

•       An interest of members of urban AFE collaborations in communicating with members of other urban AFE collaborations.

Strengths we can build on

•       Significant current promising work and models that urban AFE coalitions can build on;

•       A potential interest among urban AFE collaborations for chairing information and exchanging ideas;

•       The models of past urban AFE coalitions (i.e., Urban Literacy Network and PLUS Campaign urban PLUS Task Forces of mid-1980s to early 1990s and National Alliance of Urban Literacy Coalitions of mid-1990s to about 2012);

•       Other national organizations and initiatives (e.g., ProLiteracy, ALL IN, COABE, Open Door Collective, ….)  that might have an interest in “urban AFE collaborations.”

•       The infrastructure of programming and administrative supports that Urban CAFÉ has been putting in place in the past year.

Challenges we face

•       Starting a new national network requires expertise (in both “urban AFE” and “network-building”), collaborative leadership abilities, contacts, time, technical tools (e.g., Zoom account, online discussion group, desktop publishing, mailing lists, etc.), and the time of an active core group of organizers.

•   Participation of Urban AFE collaboration members in Urban CAFÉ meetings and administrative activities (to give us input, to help with tasks) has been limited and fluctuating.

•   Potential “members” have other demands on their time.

•   Some potential members aren’t familiar with past models of urban AFE networks, sometimes making it necessary to start discussions from scratch with some members while potentially boring more-experienced ones. 

•   We have had limited resources to work with, including:

•   No funding

•   Reliance for labor and in-kind supports (e.g., funding for Zoom account, personal computers and files, Doodle polls, ….)  on a very small number of Steering Committee volunteers who have other professional and personal responsibilities.

POSSIBLE NEXT STEPS

•   Continue the work of the Steering Committee, preferably with several new members coming on board by October, 2023 

•   Continue discussions about being part of a national organization (and confirm specific supports that that organization might give to Urban CAFÉ);

SUPPORTS WE NEED

•       Additional active Steering Committee members to carry out important tasks.

•       Agreements with a national organization that will provide in-kind supports to Urban CAFÉ (Options include publicizing Urban CAFÉ within the organization’s networks, recruiting participants for Urban CAFÉ, fundraising, managing of a mailing list, hosting Urban CAFÉ presentations at the organization’s conferences);

•       Funding from one or more sources to cover basic operating costs (possibly to include part-time staff).