RECOMMENDATIONS for
POLICY MAKERS
There is an overwhelming sense of the positive contribution
that adult learning makes to the quality of life of people
who are involved both as individual learners and to the quality
of life of the community. The acquisition of essential skills,
alongside the social nature of the learning undertaken enhance
the lives of many but all agreed that the opportunities to
take part are limited by many factors. Policy makers should
recognise the contribution that adult learning has to make
to the economic, social and political life of the country
and do more to expand provision.
A Clear Policy for Adult Education Provision
There is a real sense that policy in relation to adult education
lacks coherence in terms of both national strategy and agreed
standards of provision. This is reflected in the numerous
references to issues such as a lack of local provision, no
agreed standards for tutor training, access issues, the short-term
nature of provision and a perceived lack of accessible information.
Recommendation: A clear national strategy for adult education
should be devised which includes minimum standards of provision
across the country for providers at a local authority level
as well as in the Further and Higher education sectors. This
should include clear targets for the short, medium and long
terms. These would encourage more public accountability on
the part of providers and allow them to make more stable and
consistent plans for provision. This should be linked to budgets
which are earmarked for provision, making adult education
provision less vulnerable in periods of fiscal restriction.
Learners Engaged in Policy Making
The conference noted with interest the proposals for learner
involvement in decision making contained in the report of
the Lifelong Learning Committee of the Scottish Parliament
published earlier this year. This proposed initiative is to
be welcomed but with no national body run by and for adult
learners and only a few more local examples like ALFiE, there
is the danger that any representation may become tokenistic,
unrepresentative and, as a result, unaccountable.
Recommendation: Efforts should be made to support the development
of Learners Forums in each educational institution with more
strategic forums being established at local authority and
national levels. These fora should remain independent with
clear funding commitments to ensure their existence. The forums
would provide a source of information for research, networking
for support and accountable representation. This small scale
research is a brief example of what may be possible if a more
permanent structure were to exist for adult learners which
would allow them to participate in policy making in a more
informed way.
Provision for Tutors
The research re-emphasised the centrality of the relationship
between learners and tutors in adult education. The pedagogical
approach of tutors to adult students is characterised in the
research as one of dialogue and mutual respect. This partnership
of learners and tutors leads to a sense of common cause which
emerged in the learners' calls for a more considered approach
to the provision of better support, training and conditions
for tutors.
Recommendation: Along with the more general recommendation
in relation to agreed standards of provision the conference
wanted to make special mention of these in relation to adult
teachers. The conference calls on policy makers to seek the
views of adult tutors in relation to their training and recommends
that specific training programmes be established for adult
tutors to ensure an adequate standard of teaching across all
sectors. We note with interest the proposals for a national
training qualification for adult literacy tutors contained
within the training review of community learning. While we
welcome this we would recommend that this proposal be extended
to include all adult tutors.
Further, we urge policy-making bodies to review the terms
and conditions of adult tutors' contracts to develop strategies
which improve their security of employment. Any long-term
improvement in teaching standards must be linked to a more
secure form of employment that allows tutors to approach their
skills development and knowledge base in a more sustained
and developmental way.
Access and Inclusion
Many of the learners interviewed faced continual barriers
to their participation in terms of issues of accessibility.
Inaccessible buildings, transport that was unreliable, lack
of childcare and unaffordable fees were just a few of the
on-going obstacles which frustrated peoples attempts to engage
with education.
Recommendation: Education is everyone's right, regardless
of their disposition. Policy makers at all levels must ensure
that these rights are enshrined in their practices. The new
Disability Discrimination Act should go a long way to ensuring
the right of recourse for those who find themselves excluded
from provision. However, much of the Act relies on the discretion
of providers with its emphasis on ‘reasonability’. Policy
makers in adult education should make every effort to emphasise
the need for full and free access to provision and use what
powers they have to ensure providers' compliance to the spirit
of the Act.
RECOMMENDATIONS for PROVIDERS
Providers may wish to take note of the recommendations listed
above as much policy is made and implemented at an institutional
level. Many of the students who responded to the research
were complimentary in relation to the work of providers, valuing
the efforts that were made on their behalf to ensure a good
quality of provision. What follows then may appear to be critical,
however we hope that the recommendations below will be received
in a spirit of a mutual desire to see that which exists improved.
Information
Many people commented on the need for the provision of clearer
and more accessible information on classes and groups. Positive
comments were made about a recently produced learners' guide
but it needed to include information about childcare, transport
and other forms of support. It was also felt that more should
be done by way of taster courses or sessions as well as open
days for adult education.
Recommendation: Real advances have been made in recent year
in relation to national and local adult guidance and information
networks but much of this has been in relation to vocational
learning. Adult education activity contributes much to the
social capital of Scotland and its worth in terms of social
infrastructure is incalculable. Priority should be given to
a national campaign to encourage peoples participation in
what has been called the informal sector of adult education
in order to give it equal status with its vocational wing.
Adult Provision
Respondents to the research gave emphasis to the social nature
of provision ensuring a more adult and informal relationship
between learners. Many examples were given of activities which
reached beyond the immediate learning environment encouraging
social contact, support and wider learning opportunities.
These included the creation of social spaces for people to
meet before and after classes, meetings out of term time to
encourage continuity of contact and learning weekends.
Recommendation: The conference recommends that providers
look beyond the formal provision of classes to provide further
opportunities for learner contact with an emphasis on the
social nature of learning in more informal gatherings and
activities. Provision such as this can encourage greater commitment
to learning and more continuity.
Tutors
Recommendation: The conference wished to draw the attention
of providers to the recommendations made to policy makers
in relation to the training, support and employment of tutors.
Tutors are almost without fail, the employees of providers.
They provide the direct contact between the institution and
the learners and as such should be seen as the ambassadors
of the institution. As such, they should be given adequate
support, training and contractual employment to ensure their
best standards.
Student Forums
Recommendation: Every effort should be made at an institutional
level to encourage the formation of permanent student forums
which might represent the views of learners in policy making
matters.
RECOMMENDATIONS for
ALFiE
The Adult Learners Forum in Edinburgh is a voluntary group
of learners whose resources are small and much of its work
relies on the efforts of committed groups of learners. It
has three central roles; to represent adult learners at all
policy making levels, gather and disseminate information and
knowledge of and for adult learners and to provide opportunities
for adult learners to meet and network. The recommendations
of the conference fell into these three categories.
Representation
Recommendation: ALFiE should continue with its efforts to
lobby politicians, policy makers and providers. Special effort
should be made to make contact with the Lifelong Learning
Committee of the parliament in relation to its recent report
and recommendations in respect of learner involvement in decision
making. The ALFiE committee should attempt to organise a briefing
for MSPs.
Networking
Recommendation: Further efforts need to be made in relation
to the engagement of adult learners through their organisations.
The conference called for all adult education organisations
to support the establishment of independent adult student
forums.
Information
Recommendation: ALFiE should continue to act as a means of
interpreting policy for adult learners.
ALFiE should make itself better known through a more considered
use of the media.
The above recommendations should be published in the form
of a report and distributed to those who attended the conference,
the wider ALFiE membership and to policy makers and providers.
FUTURE RESEARCH
The ALFiE group along with the Adult Learning Project Democracy
Group realise the limitations of the research they undertook.
It was limited in its scope - involving approximately 100
learners - and its depth. However, it was unique in a very
important way in that it was carried out by learners on behalf
of learners. The research method used innovative approaches
to gather the data and the findings were arrived at as the
direct result of a participative conference of learners some
of whom were the research respondents. We hope that this form
of participative learner research will be encouraged and supported
in the future as a further step towards the fuller engagement
of learners in the research and policy making of their own
learning.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
The researchers, the ALFiE committee and the Democracy Group
would like to thank the adult literacies partnership - now
CLAN Edinburgh - for their financial support for this work.
Also, the Scottish Adult Learning Partnership for their financial
support for the conference and the City of Edinburgh Council
for their continuing support of ALFiE's work. A special thanks
goes to all those who gave of their time to act as respondents
to the research.
J. McAvinue and V.Galloway 24th September 2002.
REFERENCES
ALFiE (1999) Access and Power: Adults Returning to Higher
and Further Education, (unpublished)
Reason,P.(1994) Participation in Human Inquiry.
London, Sage.
Scottish Executive, Enterprise and Lifelong
Learning Department. (2000) The Report on Literacy and
Numeracy in Scotland. HMSO
Scottish Parliament, Lifelong Learning Committee
(2002) Interim Report on Lifelong Learning in Scotland.
HMSO.
Scottish Parliament, Lifelong Learning Committee
(2002) Community Education Training Review. Communities
Scotland
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