Judith Alamprese

Judith A. Alamprese has more than 35 years of experience directing research, evaluation and technical assistance projects in adult education and workforce development. Trained as a sociologist, she has focused on system and individual-level interventions to promote the social and economic well-being of low-skilled adults and at-risk youth. For 18 years she has led the division’s adult learning practice, where her work has ranged from leading rigorous evaluations of innovative practices in basic skills instruction to designing state-systemic change initiatives in career pathways.
 
Her research has focused on adult reading instruction, program quality and accountability, interagency collaboration, adult basic education (ABE) transition to postsecondary education and employment, and state and local leadership and skills development. Alamprese has successfully implemented large-scale experimental, quasi‑experimental and descriptive studies of adult reading instruction in over 60 programs across 25 states.
 
Alamprese is the principal investigator for the U.S Department of Education Institute of Education Sciences-funded Study of Effects of Accelerated Basic Skills Instruction on Adults’ GED Attainment and Enrollment in Postsecondary Education. For the U.S. Department of Labor’s TAACCCT grant program, she is principal investigator for a quasi-experimental evaluation of the Consortium for Bioscience Credentials grant activities, with 12 colleges in eight states. She is also director of technical assistance, as a subcontractor, for the Technical Assistance to States Developing Career Pathways Systems Project funded by the U.S. Department of Education. She has served as project quality advisor for workforce development, postsecondary education and STEM education projects.

Expertise

• Impact and implementation evaluation design and analysis
• Case studies of innovative programs
• Technical assistance in implementing statewide demonstration programs to improve educational and employment outcomes
• State and local monitoring systems for program quality and improvement
• State and local systems for career pathways
• Adult learning systems in the U.S. and internationally

Key Projects

• Study of Effects of Accelerated Basic Skills Instruction on Adults’ GED Attainment and Enrollment in Postsecondary Education, U.S. Department of Education/IES
• Evaluation of the Consortium for Bioscience Credentials, DOL
• Technical Assistance to States Developing Career Pathways Systems, U.S. Department of Education/subcontract with Kratos Learning Solutions
• Evaluation of Points of Entry: Guiding Adults to Education and Career Success
• Demonstration Project, Open Society Foundations/subcontract with Kratos Learning Solutions
• Oregon Pathways for Adult Basic Skills’ Transition to Education and Work Initiative, Oregon Department of Community Colleges and Workforce Development

Selected Publications

• Alamprese, J.A. (April 2012). Preparing adults for the future: Transition to postsecondary education or work. In B. Wasik (Ed.), Handbook of family literacy (pp. 209-222). New York, NY: Routledge.
• Alamprese, J.A. (October 2011). Contributions and follow-up activities to CONFINTEA VI (USA). Adult Learning, 22(4) and 23 (1), 29-33.
• Alamprese, J.A., MacArthur, C.A., Price, C., & Knight, D. (April-June 2011). Effects of a structured decoding curriculum on adult literacy learners’ reading development. Journal of Research on Educational Effectiveness.
• Alamprese, J.A. (2011). Using research to guide policy frameworks for building a learning society in the United States of America. In J. Yang & R. Valdes-Cotera (Eds.), Conceptual evolution and policy development in lifelong learning (pp. 169-197). Hamburg, Germany: UNESCO Institute for Lifelong Learning.
• MacArthur, C.A., Konold, T.R., Glutting, J.J., & Alamprese, J.A. (2010). Reading component skills of learners in adult basic education, Journal of Learning Disabilities, 43(2), 108-121.
• MacArthur, C.A., Konold, T.R., Glutting, J.J., & Alamprese, J.A. (December 2010) Subgroups of adult basic education learners with different profiles of reading skills. Reading and Writing: An Interdisciplinary Journal. OnlineFirst™, 17 December 2010.
• Alamprese, J.A. (2009). Developing learners’ reading skills in adult basic education programs. In. S. Reder & J. Bynner (Eds.), Tracking adult literacy and numeracy skills: Findings from longitudinal research (pp.107-131). New York, NY: Routledge.
• Alamprese, J.A. (February 2004). Approaches to ABE transition to postsecondary education, Focus on Basics, 6 (D), 26-27.
• Alamprese, J.A. (2004). Understanding adult education in the context of family literacy. In B. Wasik (Ed.), Handbook of family literacy programs (pp. 253-270). Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Inc.