Where I work/Who I serve

Where I work . . .

In addition to our regular college students, Continuing Education and Basic Skills Education are a priority.

Some of the programs our library serves include:

ABE--Adult Basic Education

"Adult Basic Education (ABE) is a program of instruction designed for adults who need to improve their reading, writing, speaking, problem-solving, or computation necessary to function effectively in society, on a job, or in the family.
Adult Basic Education (ABE) includes coursework designed to improve the employability of the state's workforce through instruction in mathematics, reading, language, and workforce readiness skills. It is designed to provide adults with sufficient basic education to enable them to benefit from job training and retraining programs and obtain and retain productive employment so that they might more fully enjoy the benefits and responsibilities of being citizens." (NC Community Colleges: Creating Success: Adult Basic Education http://www.ncccs.cc.nc.us/basic_skills/adultbasiceducation.htm)

AHS--Adult High School

"Adult High School is offered by 41 of the 58 community colleges in North Carolina. The program consists of core courses required by the Department of Public Instruction along with electives required by the public school system and the community college. The number of credits (20-28) varies depending upon the specific affiliation agreement between a particular community college and the local public school system." (NC Community Colleges: Creating Success: Adult High School http://www.ncccs.cc.nc.us/basic_skills/adultHighSchool.htm)

CED--Compensatory Education

"Compensatory Education is a community college program designed to compensate adults with intellectual disabilities (formerly called mental retardation) who have not had an education or have received an inadequate one. The focus of the Compensatory Education Program is on helping the individual become as independent as possible through acquiring basic and life skills needed to function successfully in daily living. (NC Community Colleges: Creating Success: Compensatory Education http://www.ncccs.cc.nc.us/basic_skills/compensatoryEducationCed.htm)

GED--General Education Development

"The GED (General Educational Development) Program is a program that provides instruction to prepare for the official GED tests. The GED is offered by all 58 community colleges in the North Carolina system. Each college is an official GED testing site. To obtain a GED diploma, students must take a battery of five tests: Language Arts- Writing, Social Studies, Science, Language Arts – Reading, and Mathematics. Each student is required to pay a test fee of $7.50. A General Educational Development Diploma is awarded to students by the State Board of the North Carolina Community College System. Those students scoring 2,250 or higher are eligible for the diploma. (NC Community Colleges: Creating Success: General Educational Development http://www.nccommunitycolleges.edu/Basic_Skills/ged.htm)

Huskins

"The Huskins Bill authorizes programs for “qualified high school students.” For the purpose of developing cooperative program agreements between high schools and community colleges, the wording “qualified high school students” is defined as students in grades nine through twelve who have achieved a level of academic and social maturity necessary to perform successfully in college credit courses and who have also been recommended by their principal for enrollment. There must also be mutual agreement between the two systems to define the criteria for student selection." (High School Student Programs: Huskins Bill Classes: Beaufort Community College Web site http://www.beaufortccc.edu/admisson/high.htm)

AHS, ABS, Huskins and GED students are located on our campus and use the library, especially the AHS and Huskins students whose classrooms are just up the hall. The CED students work at another location but the Basic Skills person on our campus has invited the library to partner with her in a training exercise for them. Oh! and I forgot the PreK. We have a Child Development curriculum at the college and a year-round preschool. We have a large collection of children's books and every now and then I invite them up for story time!

In addition to these K12 level students and the Pre K, many of our regular college students come from rural areas with no broadband access and may not have even dial-up at home. Many are students retraining after layoffs, and like me, predate computers and information literacy training in their previous school settings. I am also enrolled in LIBS 6142, Instructional Foundations of the School Library Media Program, in which we discuss instructional standards and information literacy education. Everything that I have learned in 6142 and in the readings in this class have found applications in every population we serve.