Author: Ajal

Posted on

Book review – What did you learn at work today? The forbidden lessons of labor education

The Work: What did you learn at work today? The forbidden lessons of labor education. Helena Worthen, Hardball Press, 2014, 276 pages.

Reviewer: Michael Brown, LaTrobe University, Melbourne

Edition: Volume 54, Number 3, November 2014

In brief:  The book provides numerous vignettes and stories which are worked through and analysed using various aspects of interesting and significant learning and workplace theories.
The book is primarily about labor education and workers learning through adversity and struggle in their workplaces and in their communities……

 

Facebooktwitterlinkedinmail  Share a copy of this abstract.

This article is part of AJAL, Volume 54_3. The entire volume is available in .pdf for purchase here.

Posted on

Book Review – Adult Education in Changing Times: Policies, philosophies and professionalism

The Work: Adult Education in Changing Times: Policies, philosophies and professionalism.
Marion Bowl, NIACE, Leicester, UK, 2014, 190 pages

Reviewer: Gary R Chitty, Deakin University, Victoria

Edition: Volume 54, Number 3, November 2014

In brief:  Marion Bowl’s book looks at aspects of the experience of adult education globally, and more directly in England and New Zealand, drawing upon literature, policy and research into the careers of adult educators. The book’s accessibility makes an excellent first impression…..

 

Facebooktwitterlinkedinmail  Share a copy of this abstract.

This article is part of AJAL, Volume 54_3. The entire volume is available in .pdf for purchase here.

Posted on

Staying in a certain state of mind: becoming and being a freelance adult educator in Singapore

Authors: Peter Rushbrook, Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology University; Annie Karmel and Helen Bound, Institute for Adult Learning, Singapore

Edition: Volume 54, Number 3, November 2014

Summary:  Over recent years Singapore has developed a strong adult and vocational education system based on those of Great Britain, Australiaand New Zealand. Its Continuing Education and Training (CET) sector makes use of competency-based training in the form of Workforce Skills Qualifications (WSQs) which are delivered in mainly small private providers by learning facilitators qualified through a range of WSQ-based training programs. Most facilitators are mature-age and second-career people drawn from diverse career backgrounds and employed on a casual and part-time rather than ongoing basis. They identify themselves as ‘freelancers’ in the training market place and compete vigorously for the work opportunities available. In the paper we argue that continued workplace success is premised on a strong sense of professional identity and its management through a process of ‘shapeshifting’ according to the diverse requirements of the adult education industry. We explore this idea through revisiting three of our projects examining Singaporean CET educators and ask of our data a new question: ‘How do individuals “become” and “be” Singaporean adult education freelancers?’ We draw our insights from interviews with freelancers, Singapore’s political and economic context and a range of literature drawn principally from a socio-cultural theoretical perspective.

Keywords: Adult education, vocational education, workplace learning, professional identity, Singapore education

 

Facebooktwitterlinkedinmail  Share a copy of this abstract.

This article is part of AJAL, Volume 54_3. The entire volume is available in .pdf for purchase here.

Posted on

Policy and barriers related to implementing adult e-learning in Taiwan

Authors: Hsiu-Ying Chung, Gwo-Guang Lee and Shih-Hwa Liu, National Taiwan University of Science and Technology

Edition: Volume 54, Number 3, November 2014

Summary:  The work quality of public servants direct affects a country’s administrative performance, and the Taiwan government has recently invested a considerable amount of funds in constructing e-government learning platforms and developing digital courses to provide all public servants with sufficient on-the-job training and enhance the quality of human resources. Therefore, the circumstances under which public servants use e-government learning platforms warrant investigation. In this study, questionnaires were used to collect data for quantitative research, and a theoretical model was created to clarify the impact of ‘Barrier Factors’ and ‘Policy Factors’ on e-government learning. These factors have been examined inadequately in previous research on the theory of e-learning behaviour. The results presented here show that Barrier Factors and Policy Factors strongly influence the willingness of public servants to use e-learning systems, and these factors explain more than 80% of the variance in users’ behavioural intention. These results revealed the characteristics of the research participants, and the findings can be used as a reference in future studies and by management agencies responsible for providing e-government learning. Furthermore, these results might facilitate further research on and the practice of adult e-learning.

Keywords: e-learning, adult learning, barrier factors, public servants, behavioural intention, structural equation modelling (SEM)

 

Facebooktwitterlinkedinmail  Share a copy of this abstract.

This article is part of AJAL, Volume 54_3. The entire volume is available in .pdf for purchase here.