2019 Annual Conference

Women’s Issues, Status, and Education

Shared Concurrent Session (Approx. 12 or 20 minutes)

Women have the unique power to lift communities out of poverty. We believe there are many ways to educate and empower ESL and ABE/ASE students regarding the issues of gendered income inequality, unemployment, health problems, trauma, violence, and more.

This session is designed for new or experienced teachers working in English Language Acquisition, Adult Basic Education, and Adult Secondary Education classes. I could also benefit adult education support staff.

Learners will learn about background data which supports the need for women's empowerment in ESL and ABE/ASE classrooms, the theoretical underpinnings behind empowering women and specific lesson plan and activity ideas to utilize in the classroom.

According to Heartland’s annual poverty report: “Gender, gender identity, and gender norms shape experiences of poverty for women and gender minorities—and how women who have other marginalized identities experience even more inequity.” However, we know that women have the unique power to lift communities out of poverty. We believe there are many ways to educate and empower ESL and ABE/ASE students regarding the issues of gendered income inequality, unemployment, health problems, trauma and violence. In this session we will talk about specific ways to introduce these topics with students, and then productive ways to move forward. Our goals are to reduce the barriers (child care, health, domestic violence, unemployment, etc.) experienced by the women in our adult education programs in order to educate them on these issues, assist them in mapping and achieving their goals, and to empower them to fight for social and policy changes themselves.

We will have a power point presentation and handouts with both background data which supports the need for women's empowerment in ESL and ABE/ASE classrooms and specific lesson plan and activity ideas to utilize in the classroom. We will also lead a few group activities to demonstrate how the activities work. There will also be time for discussion and questions.