Collaborating to Serve Adult Learners of Color: Lessons from the Partnerships for Adult Learner Success Initiative

This brief explores how partnerships and collaboration, on and off university campuses, can motivate cultural, structural, and programmatic change to better serve adult learners of color. It draws insights from a study of the Partnerships for Adult Learner Success (PALS) initiative and includes staff members’ and students’ perspectives and experiences at the eight urban-serving universities that received grant funding through the PALS initiative. Although this work focused on urban-serving universities, these insights can also help other institutions seeking to better reach and serve adult learners of color. This brief offers examples of partnerships and collaboration that can shift institutional culture, structures, and programming—strengthening the supports and pathways for adult learners of color and helping universities sustain and scale the supports over time.