Susan Williamson,  supervisor of the Lenoir City-Loudon County Adult Education, marshalled her forces on Thursday and, along with other adult education advocates across the state, was able to change the language of House Bill 7006 that would have taken adult education out of the Department of Labor and place it under the auspices of the Board of Regents. 

It was removed from the bill, so Adult Education in Lenoir City remains under Lenoir City Schools. 

"We're definitely celebrating a victory today," Williamson said on Friday. 

There was no time to waste since Williamson was only made aware of the amendment early on Thursday morning - the same day the bill was scheduled for a vote in Nashville. 

"We were unaware of this situation until yesterday and the vote was at 3 p.m. We had hours," Williamson said. 

With the state house poised to vote on the measure Thursday afternoon, Williamson was working a full court press on Rep. Dennis Ferguson and Rep. Jimmy Matlock to impress upon them her view that adult education programs should be kept under the administration of the Tennessee Department of Labor and that the Tennessee Board of Regents serves a different target constituency with priorities different from that of adult literacy. 

She couldn't say enough about the response of the representatives and she also singled out Director of Lenoir City School Wayne Miller as being instrumental in his support. 

"They were so helpful, they just immediately got on this. I had personal conversations with them yesterday. They were absolutely advocates for the Adult Education program," she said. "They were right there yesterday." Williamson also noted that adult education advocates from across the state were also making the push to eliminate the proposed amendment. 

"We had a strong support for Adult Education across Tennessee," she added.  

 Williamson made several points to support her position including that the target audience of adult education is the 1.2 million without a diploma - not the developmental and remedial courses the Board of Regents wants to use adult education dollars for; Adult Education would completely lose the autonomy to make the best program and fiscal decisions for its target population; and 72 of 95 Adult Education programs across the state are associated with K-12 school systems.

The state legislature agreed and the proposed amendment putting adult education programs under the auspices of the Tennessee Board of Regents was removed from the bill. 

The proposed amendment lit a fire under Williamson and her colleagues. "We were all up in arms. This was first priority for all supervisors yesterday," she said adding "We will continue to operate through the school system. I am very happy today."