Kentucky Council on Postsecondary Education Information

The Kentucky Council on Postsecondary Education coordinates change and improvement in Kentuckys postsecondary education system as directed by the Kentucky Postsecondary Education Improvement Act of 1997. The Council is a statewide coordinating agency with sixteen members: fourteen citizens, one faculty member, and one student appointed by the Governor; the Commissioner of Education is an ex officio member.

The Council on Postsecondary Education is charged with leading reform efforts envisioned by state policy leaders in HB1. Among its many responsibilities, the Council:

The Kentucky Council on Postsecondary Education was originally established in 1934 as the Council on Public Higher Education, and was renamed the Council on Higher Education in 1977. Twenty years later, the Kentucky General Assembly passed higher education reforms in the Commonwealth with the passage of the Postsecondary Education Improvement Act of 1997, commonly referred to as House Bill 1 (HB1). House Bill 1 created the Council on Postsecondary Education to provide direction and oversight to all Kentucky postsecondary institutions. This groundbreaking legislation set Kentucky on the path to improve the quality of life of its citizens to at least the national average by the year 2020. State leaders recognized that to increase quality of life, Kentucky must increase the educational attainment of its citizens, and therefore mandated that by the year 2020, the Commonwealth would have:

These goals were included in the Kentucky Postsecondary Education Improvement Act of 1997. Goal six was amended with the passage of the Kentucky Adult Education Act in 2000.

The Kentucky Adult Education Act, or Senate Bill 1, passed by the 2000 General Assembly created a partnership between the Council on Postsecondary Education and Kentucky Adult Education and set the stage for dramatic improvements in the educational status of adult Kentuckians who lack a high school diploma, function at low levels of literacy or want to learn English.

The mission of Kentucky Adult Education (KYAE) is to raise the educational levels of more than one million Kentucky adults with low literacy skills and to assist the nearly 786,000 adults who do not have a high school credential to earn a GED. KYAEs goal is to help these adults gain the academic skills and credential they need to function productively in the workplace, support themselves and their families and make positive contributions to society and the economy. A local adult education program in every county provides academic instruction in reading, writing, math, science and social studies to help adults improve their literacy skills, earn a GED, prepare for college and employment and learn English as a second language.

The states current adult education outreach efforts are focused on an access and success campaign known as KnowHow2GOKy.

To further support lifelong learning in the Commonwealth, HB1 also created the Kentucky Virtual Library (KYVL). KYVL serves all Kentuckians by providing free access to multiple learning and research tools to anyone with a library card. KYVL provides users with the ability to search a number of databases of books and scholarly works, while also providing help on research methods and techniques. KYVL serves public and private postsecondary institutions, public and private K-12 schools, public libraries and special research institutions.

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