Langner, William R.

William Langner (1932-1998) was born in Morrisville, New York. He attended Morrisville-Eaton Central Schools and, after a family move, graduated from Henry Clay High School in Ashland, Virginia. During his freshman year at the College of William and Mary, while hitchhiking south to Florida for spring break, he was involved in a car accident which left him paralyzed from the waist down. He spent nearly two years in the hospital after which, undaunted, he enrolled at the University of Virginia where he earned a bachelor's degree in economics in 1957.

Despite his qualifications, Langner struggled for several years to support himself with a series of jobs including advance sales for circuses, advertising sales, owner/operator of an import/export business (Langner and Company), and teacher at the Blue Ridge School in St. George, Virginia. In the early 1960s he served on the Board of Directors of Cordet Foundation, a Richmond, Virginia job training program that specialized in finding employment for the disabled, and in 1964 he opened Commonwealth Tutoring Center in Richmond. Over the next decade Commonwealth Tutoring and its successor organizations -- Educational Development Center (1966?-1970) and Langner Learning Center (1970-1978) -- served hundreds of students from the local school districts as well as offering foreign languages and other training to local executives.

In addition to operating his tutoring schools, Langner served on the Virginia Board of Vocational Rehabilitation, the Governor's Commission on Employment of the Handicapped, the Mayor's Committee on the Handicapped, and the board of directors of numerous social and civic organizations including the local branches of Easter Seals and Goodwill. In 1973, President Nixon appointed him to the National Advisory Council on Adult Education (NACAE) where he served for three years. He received an M.Ed. from Virginia Commonwealth University in 1977 and was an adjunct faculty member there for two years (1977-1979). He also worked as an educational consultant to various business, governmental, and educational institutions. Langner also traveled several times to Central and South America which stimulated a lifelong interest in the region.

Persistent cash flow problems due to old and new medical expenses and intermittent hospitalizations had for years prevented Langner from achieving any kind of financial security, but that came at last in 1980 with an offer of a position with the Department of Health, Education and Welfare (HEW). When the Department of Education was split off from HEW, Langner took a position with new department's Division of Adult Education and Literacy (DAEL). While with the Department of Education, he implemented the National Adult Literacy and Learning Disability Center (NALLDC) and was instrumental in organizing the Clearing House on Adult Education and Literacy, which compiled, wrote, and published fact sheets, pamplets, guides, directories, bibliographies, newsletters and other resource material.

Langner was a member of the National GED Advisory Committee from 1981 to 1987 and worked with the GED Testing Service to train test administrators. He participated in the White House Adult Literacy Initiative (1983) and was on the advisory committee for the International Center for the Disabled's "Survey III," and served as advisory board member for the University of the District of Columbia Department of Adult Education. With Boris Bogatz of Gallaudet College, he organized a National Congress for Adults with Special Learning Needs in 1987, which resulted in several annual conferences and grew into the National Association for Adults with Special Learning Needs (NAASLN), and he coordinated the first World Congress for Adult Learners with Disabilities in 1995.

Langner was a founding member of the American Association for Adult and Continuing Education (AAACE) and chair of its Adult Learners with Disabilities Unit. He was a member of the International Council for Adult Education (ICAE) and served on the executive committee of its International Associates, and under its sponsorship coordinated the International Network for Adult Learners with Disabilities. He was a delegate to the World Assembly of Adult Education three times and during his career received nearly a dozen awards for his work in education of the disabled. In addition to his professional activities, he was a Freemason, a Rotarian, a member of the education honor society Kappa Delta Psi, traveled extensively, and opened his home to eleven foster sons over the years.

Langner retired from the Department of Education in 1995, intending to purchase a small farm in Florida or Belize. He died in 1998.