CRADALL SeminarGlasgow University

2 June 2010

(Re)invention of tradition: adult education in contemporary higher

education

Professor Maria Slowey

Dublin City University

‘All too often the practice and conventions of our own day are influenced by a faulty view of the past’. For example, it is widely assumed that universities have always:

Had rigorous entry requirementsBeen governed by an academic eliteWith serious, scientific research at the coreThat doors were only opened by establishment of

welfare state‘Yet none of this is true’

Robert Bell and Malcolm Tight (1993) Open Universities: A British Tradition? p12

(2005)2005

University of

Glasgow

2005

‘Adult studentsare neither schoolChildren nor University (undergraduates).Often it is necessary to evolve new techniques to teach subjects in different ways and to move to the hinterland between specialised subjects.’

West of Scotland Joint Committee1947-1948 Annual Report

Schofer and Meyer (2005) The World-Wide Expansion of Higher Education, CDDRL Working Papers 32: Stanford University

CONTEXT OF GROWTH FROM ‘MASS’ TO ‘UNIVERSAL’ SYSTEM

Pace of technological change Pressure of social movements DemographyRising levels of initial educationKnowledge Economy GlobalisationPolicy borrowing- role of international

and intergovernmental agencies

Source: UNESCO (2009) Global report on adult learning and education

Source: Schuller and Watson (2009) Inquiry into the future of lifelong learning, NIACE

Human capitalEquitySocial engagementPersonal developmentSocial cohesionDemographic

Contested conceptions of lifelong learning over 1990s-2000s

Higher education and lifelong learning: longitudinal comparative study

Europe: Ireland, UK, Sweden, Germany, Austria, Portugal

North America: USA, CanadaPacific area: Australia, New Zealand, JapanView from middle income countries from the

‘south’H.G.Schuetze and M.Slowey (2000) Higher education and lifelong learning: internationalperspectives on change. Updated 2010

Conceptualising lifelong learners in higher education

Life stage of student

Mode of study

Types of programmes Organisation of provision

Adult education in contemporary higher education

• Interdisciplinarity• Civic and regional engagement• Translational research• Knowledge exchange• Widening access• Partnership with public, private and NGO sectors• Connecting with alumni• Lifelong learning

A University is a place where enquiry is pushed forward and discoveries perfected and verified, and rashness rendered innocuous and error exposed by the collision of mind with mind and knowledge with knowledge