Thomas F. Damon
Palo Alto Unified School District,
Director of Adult Education,
1967 - 1982
Principal, Cubberley Adult School,
1958 - 1967
California State Department of Education,
Consultant, Bureau
of Adult Education, 1957 - 1958
Los Gatos Unified School District,
Principal, Los Gatos
Evening High School,
1954 - 1957
National Association for Public Continuing and Adult Education,
President,
1978 - 1979
Association of California School Administrators,
Adult Education Chair,
1973 - 1976
Santa Clara County Office of Education,
Consultant in Adult and Vocational Education, 1966 - 1969
University of California Extension, San Jose State University Extension,
Instructor of Classes in Adult Education, 1959 - 1970
National professional organizations (NAPCAE/AAACE)
Excerpt from an interview with:
THOMAS F. DAMON by CUBA Z. MILLER
December 8, 1994
Los Altos Hills, California
DAMON:
And I think also at the federal level, the national level, NAPCAE [National
Association for Public Continuing and Adult Education, pronounced NAP-GEE] has
been the spokesman in Washington for any legislation that resulted in monies
for basic education and English as a second language monies flowing from
Washington to the local districts.
MILLER:
One of the first memories I have of you [chuckling] is encouraging NAPCAE
membership. I'm sure that at the very first meeting that I went to as an adult
educator that you were there encouraging us to join NAPCAE.
DAMON:
I think my favorite line was, "It's your voice in Washington; and if you're not
a member, you ought to be." I recall one of my predecessors, and I guess you'd
have to say that this man was kind of a mentor, this was Ted Goldman of San
Francisco. I think it was he who first proposed my name as a part of the NAPCAE
Board of Directors. That was shortly after I came to Palo Alto, and it would
have been in the middle '60s sometime. But he used to speak about NAPCAE, his
favorite organization, and he did become president of NAPCAE. He was,
unfortunately, killed in an automobile accident during the height of his
career.
MILLER:
That's always hard to [take]. California has offered a lot of national
leadership to NAPCAE and AAACE [pronounced triple A-C-E] which followed it. Why
don't you just kind of give us a rundown of Californians and their
contributions to the national level, and if there's anything about the national
conferences out here that you might want to say something about?
DAMON:
Well, our national organization that [historically] relates directly to adult
education most directly has been the National Association for Public Continuing
and Adult Education. Although there was a name change, it was originally
founded as the National Association for Public School Adult Education, NAPSAE;
and to be more inclusive and to include the community colleges, they changed it
to NAPCAE.