Group Calls For More Spending On Adult Education

The Michigan League for Public Policy has issued a new report calling on the Snyder Administration to increase funding for adult education programs.

The report “Willing to Work and Ready to Learn: More Adult Education Would Strengthen Michigan’s Economy” cites a decrease in adult education enrollment by nearly half since state funding was reduced from an annual $80 million appropriation between 1997-2001, to only $22 million each year since then. The League recommends spending $10 to $30 million more per year.

Peter Ruark, the report’s author and a senior policy analyst at the League, says Michigan could educate 8,000 more adults with $10 million in additional funding, and 40,000 more with $30 million more in funding. He argues that workers without post-secondary skills and credentials will have an increasingly difficult time finding family-supporting employment.