Adult Education Division

About the Adult Education Division

The Tennessee Department of Labor and Workforce's Adult Education Division has as its mission to provide basic education services to adults in Tennessee to help them improve their literacy, math, and English language skills. The program integrates workforce preparation skills, helps students earn their high school equivalency diploma, and transitions them to college and career opportunities. Check out Adult Education's No Wrong Door Podcast!

The Adult Education program is part of the Workforce Innovations and Opportunity Act (WIOA). Students served include:

• Adult Basic Education (ABE) students (who may simultaneously work toward their high school equivalency and postsecondary training credentials);
  
• English-as-a-Second-Language (ESL) students (who may receive English language acquisition instruction at their workplace, focusing on the vocabulary necessary to succeed at their job).

The Adult Education Division does the following:

• provides oversight and guidance to 15 local adult education service providers across Tennessee;
• develops collaborative partnerships to offer pathways to postsecondary education and training for students;
• collaborates with local jails across the state to provide education services to the incarcerated population;
  
• oversees Tennessee’s high school equivalency credential and associated records;
• liaises between Educational Testing Service (ETS) ─ the publisher of the HiSET® exam ─ and local test centers to ensure HiSET® testing needs are met across the state.

Read the list of free services offered by Tennessee Adult Education and American Job Centers. | No Wrong Door Podcast