The Men Behind ALFICan: Mark Gallupe

 Mark has been an adult educator for twenty four years. He is a professor in the Social Service Worker Program at Loyalist College in Belleville, Ontario and  the coordinator of the Facilitator of Adult Learning Program. Prior to joining the college he was employed as a youth counsellor and as the coordinator of a community corrections program in Trenton for ten years. Mark began his association with the college when he was invited by his long time colleague (co-conspirator) and friend Paul Zakos, to become involved with the social work program by providing field placement opportunities for students and making presentations to students at Loyalist. His relationship with the college gradually evolved and in 1988 Mark accepted a full time teaching position in the SSW program. Over the years he has worked closely with Paul on many projects involving adult learning practice, prior learning assessment and portfolio development. He has developed a professional passion for and experience in these areas. This passion was nurtured and expanded through attending and participating in eighteen annual PLA conferences conducted by First Nations Technical Institute (FNTI)  in Belleville. As part of his PLAR work he helped create training manuals for PLA advisors and practitioners.  Mark’s work in adult education (in addition to teaching at the college) incorporated many different experiences and learning opportunities. He chaired a Return to Learn Committee at Nortel which oversaw the development of a company wide adult education program. His work with Paul Zakos involved several projects encompassing adult learning and PLAR including the Ontario Association of Children’s Aid Societies, the Forum for International Trade Training (Ottawa), Kingston Psychiatric Hospital, Hastings County Social Services, CFB Cold Lake(Alberta), York Region Neighbourhood Services (Toronto), First Nations Technical Institute, National Aboriginal Land Managers Association, to name  a few. In addition Mark’s work has involved training PLAR advisors in Ontario, South Africa and Chile and training PLAR assessors at Cambrian College and Loyalist College. Mark has worked on the ALFICan project facilitating the implementation of the institutional self-evaluation process. He often works as part of a dynamic team which includes Paul Zakos and Rose Marie Reid. Together they developed PLAR training resources and a PLAR advisor training program and created a community based service in Belleville called the Portfolio Development Centre. The centre has trained approximately seventy PLAR advisors in the Belleville area. Mark continues to develop his PLAR assessor skills as an assessor for social work and adult facilitator students at Loyalist College and for the Bachelor of Professional Arts in Human Services degree at Athabasca University.

Mark’s formal education includes a B.A in Sociology from Queen’s and an M.Ed. in adult education from OISE/UT.