{"id":33046,"date":"2026-04-13T23:17:52","date_gmt":"2026-04-14T03:17:52","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/necc.edu\/newsroom2\/running-the-campus\/https-president-necc-mass-edu-a-venture-capitalists-guide-to-adult-basic-education-or-the-roi-of-abe\/"},"modified":"2026-04-13T23:17:52","modified_gmt":"2026-04-14T03:17:52","slug":"https-president-necc-mass-edu-a-venture-capitalists-guide-to-adult-basic-education-or-the-roi-of-abe","status":"publish","type":"running-the-campus","link":"https:\/\/necc.edu\/newsroom\/running-the-campus\/https-president-necc-mass-edu-a-venture-capitalists-guide-to-adult-basic-education-or-the-roi-of-abe\/","title":{"rendered":"A Venture Capitalist\u2019s Guide to Adult Basic Education (or, The ROI of ABE)"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

\u201cDuring my 18 years, I came to bat almost 10,000 times. I struck out about 1,700 times and walked maybe 1,800 times. You figure a ballplayer will average about 500 at bats a season. That means I played seven years without ever hitting the ball.\u201d <\/p>\n

–Mickey Mantle<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Each year, more than a million people<\/a> in America participate in adult basic education programs<\/a>, like English for Speakers of Other Languages (ESOL) classes, high school equivalency preparation and testing, and incarcerated individuals preparing life and vocational skills for their release and reintegration into their communities.<\/p>\n

These programs are largely supported by funding from the nearly thirty-year-old Adult Education and Family Literacy Act (AEFLA)<\/a> which, if the Trump Administration has its way, will be completely eliminated next year.<\/p>\n

In its proposed budget for fiscal year 2027<\/a>, the White House recommends zeroing out the $715 million distributed to states by AEFLA, along with billions of dollars for TRIO, GEAR UP, work-study, Supplemental Educational Opportunity Grants and other programs meant to serve some of the most overlooked and vulnerable populations in our country.<\/p>\n

Secretary of Education Linda McMahon has argued<\/a> that adult education programs funded by AEFLA have \u201cdismal results\u2014in the most recent reported year, only 43 percent of participants had any measurable skills gains.\u201d<\/p>\n

On the surface, and to the untrained eye, those results might indeed seem \u201cdismal.\u201d  Less than 50% success?  That drives the cost for each newly skilled person from $729 to $1,695, or more than twice the public investment if everyone enrolled in an adult education program succeeded.<\/p>\n

But is 100% success expected from adult education programs?<\/p>\n

If it\u2019s not, what\u2019s reasonable?<\/p>\n

And how much should <\/em>it cost?<\/p>\n

After all, we accept that in many other, far more expensive endeavors, challenging conditions affect outcomes, and failure rates are consistently quite high.<\/p>\n

Yet we support them\u2014even applaud them\u2014anyway.<\/p>\n