Tag: adult learning

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Insights into attrition from university-based enabling programs

Author: Cheryl Bookallil and Bobby Harreveld
CQUniversity, Australia

Edition: Volume 57, Number 1, April 2017

Summary: High attrition rates from university-based enabling programs continue to be the subject of much research and administrative effort. Understanding the factors behind decisions to withdraw from such programs is difficult since those who do not successfully complete an enabling program may not readily agree to participate in research into their motivations for enrolling, and reasons for withdrawal, leaving them silent in the literature. Students who are relatively successful with enabling study have ‘insider’ perceptions to share concerning the motivations of their fellow students, and the barriers some face. They can provide unique insights into factors behind the intractable problem of high attrition from enabling programs and the low rates of articulation into university study.

Keywords: University-based enabling programs, attrition, articulation, barriers

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This article is part of AJAL, Volume 57_1. The entire volume is available in .pdf for purchase here.

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Second chance education: barriers, supports and engagement strategies

Author: Harry Savelsberg, Sylvia Pignata, Pauline Weckert
University of South Australia

Edition: Volume 57, Number 1, April 2017

Summary: Second chance education programs are now a well-established presence in institutions seeking to provide access and equity pathways for socio-economically disadvantaged groups. This paper focusses on the strategies used to support positive engagement in second chance equity programs, drawing upon evaluation research data from four TAFE sponsored programs. Interviews were held with service providers involved in the programs’ development and delivery, and focus groups were held to gather information from program participants. The findings highlight the complex and often multiple barriers facing participants and the importance of delivering programs with sustained and tailored approaches. While tangible educational and/or employment outcomes were delivered, it was the associated social and personal development that made these programs especially successful. Hence, there is a need for equity programs to be holistic, scaffolded, and tailored to practical and vocational pathways.

Keywords: Vocational pathways, second chance education, access and equity

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This article is part of AJAL, Volume 57_1. The entire volume is available in .pdf for purchase here.

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Protest music as adult education and learning for social change: a theorisation of a public pedagogy of protest music

Author: John Haycock, Monash University

Edition: Volume 55, Number 3, November 2015

Summary:  Since the 1960’s, the transformative power of protest music has been shrouded in mythology. Sown by musical activists like Pete Seeger, who declared that protest music could “help to save the planet”, the seeds of this myth have since taken deep root in the popular imagination. While the mythology surrounding the relationship between protest music and social change has become pervasive and persistent, it has mostly evaded critical interrogation and significant theorisation. By both using the notion as a theoretical lens and adding to scholarship in the field, this article uncovers understandings of the public pedagogical dimensions of protest music, as it takes place as a radical practice and critical form of contemporary mass culture. In doing this, this article provides a theorisation of public pedagogy as it encapsulates protest music, and those who are conceptualised as the critical and radical public pedagogues who produce this mass cultural form.

Keywords: public pedagogy, protest music, adult learning, education for social change

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This article is part of AJAL, Volume 55_3. The entire volume is available in .pdf for purchase here.

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How a personal development program enhances social connection and mobilises women in the community

Authors: Nandila Spry, Hillsong City Care and Southern Cross University: Teresa Marchant, Griffith University

Summary:  Gender equity and the empowerment of women is a significant international issue. Successful adult education programs are vital to enhance women’s situation. Lessons learned from a personal development program provided for thousands of women are analysed. The program is conducted by community service providers in Australia and internationally, with an Australian evaluation reported here. The three phase evaluation included 500 participants, with pre- and post-tests for a sample of 161, structured phone interviews with 53 and third-party observations from six organisations. The value includes multiple measurements over time, in a thorough evaluation with mixed methods, along with policy and practice implications. Key adult learning issues canvassed include the role of empowerment, adult education and transformative learning. Key findings included that women’s self-esteem, emotional intelligence, purpose and mobilisation increased, with the latter evident in vocational outcomes and social connection. Some women expressed interest in facilitating the program for other groups. As one facilitator observed ‘the program really empowers women to tap into their own gifts and talents’. Lessons learned encompassed improvements to the program including sustainable social networks, since for these women purpose in life and mobilisation were intertwined with social connection and helping other women.

Keywords: community, empowerment, evaluation, personal development, self-esteem, women

 

 

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This article is part of AJAL, Volume 54_2. The entire volume is available in .pdf for purchase here.

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Learning and leadership: Evaluation of an Australian rural leadership program

Authors: Wendy Madsen, Cathy O’Mullan and Helen Keen-Dyer, Central Queensland University

Summary:  Leadership programs have been extensively promoted in rural communities in Australia. However, few have been evaluated. The results of the evaluation of a rural leadership program provided in this paper highlight the need for adult learning theories to be more overtly identified and utilised as the basis of planning and implementing leadership programs. Transformative learning theory and social learning theory were used to explain the impact the program had for participants and to provide insight into how similar programs could be enhanced.

Keywords: rural leadership; adult learning; non-formal learning

 

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This article is part of AJAL, Volume 54_1. The entire volume is available in .pdf for purchase here.

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Introduction: Why food? Why pedagogy? Why adult education

Author/s:   Rick Flowers and Elaine Swan: University of Technology, Sydney

Edition: Volume 52, Number 3, Nov 2012

Summary:   We convened this special issue on Food pedagogies to start to address what we saw as lacunae in both research on adult education and food studies.  Thus, in spite of the expanding body of work on informal learning and pedagogies amongst adult educators, food has been relatively neglected (see Cook 2009; Jubas 2011 and Sumner 2011, for exceptions).  This is somewhat surprising as many good studies academics argue: the growing, buying, preparing, provisioning, cooking, tasting, eating and disposing of food have become the target of intensified pedagogical activity across a range of domains (Kimura 2011; Short 2006; Coveney 2006).  Hence, many different “pedagogues” – policy makers, churches, activists, health educators, schools, tourist agencies, celebrities, chefs – think we don’t know enough about food and what to do with it.

Keywords: food, pedagogy, adult education, adult learning

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This article is part of AJAL, Volume 52_3. The entire volume is available in .pdf for purchase here.

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Learning in the knowledge age, where the individual is at the centre of learning strategy and organisational success

Author/s: Carmel Kostos

Edition: Volume 46, Number 1, April 2006

Summary: Adult learning practitioners are being challenged to prepare for a revolution in the way workplace learning outcomes will be delivered. Recent thinking on the future of work by a number of leading business authorities from around the world reports that changes in the way students are being educated for work and the demands on workers in the knowledge age will force a major shift towards learner-centred organisational development strategies. These changes will require broad, strategic solutions, including a re-think on the capabilities and qualifications of those involved in  developing people and the formulation of new policies and practices that enable and support learners as they re-focus their careers into the new world of work.

Keywords: adult learning, workplace learning outcomes, knowledge age

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Getting connected: insights into social capital from recent adult learning research

Author/s: Barry Golding

Edition: Volume 47, Number 1, April 2007

Summary: This paper begins by teasing out the nature of social capital and its particular and current relevance to adult learning policy and practice in Australia. The paper identifies a number of benefits and significant problems with social capital as an organising construct for adult learning research and policy in Australia. Some connections are made between social capital and lifelong learning, and important distinctions are drawn between ‘bonding’ and ‘bridging’ social capital. I draw on my experiences and insights over the past seven years using network diagrams as a research tool. Network diagrams are identified as a useful tool for charting relationships between learning organisations and individuals. The paper suggests ways of using the network relationships in these diagrams as a proxy for social capital in a range of formal and informal settings in which adult learning occurs in Australia. Network diagrams are seen to have particular utility in situations where communities and organisations become too small for surveys, where relationships become complex and ambiguous as well as in rural and remote communities where distance and spatial relationships affect access to learning.

Keywords: social capital, adult learning, policy, practice, research, lifelong learning

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Learning to be drier in dryland country

Author/s: Erica Smith & Coral Campbell

Edition: Volume 49, Number 3, November 2009

Summary: This research project, part of a much larger study, considered how people in regional communities learnt to deal with the impact of reduced water availability as a result of drought or climate change. The communities in the Mallee-Wimmera region of Victoria, Australia, were the focus of this study and a range of local people from different sectors of the communities were involved in interviews, which became our main data source. We recognise the limitation that not all viewpoints could possibly be accessed in the participant selection process. The resultant data indicated that significant changes were being made to local practices as a result of the learning taking place and that there were a range of processes which enabled adult learning across the communities.

Keywords: Mallee-Wimmera, local practice, adult learning, communities, climate change

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This article is part of AJAL, Volume 49_3. The entire volume is available in .pdf for purchase here.

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Facilitating transformative learning: a framework for practice

Author/s: Judi Apte

Edition: Volume 49, Number 1, April 2009

Summary: This paper explores some of the challenges that are involved in facilitating transformative learning. It presents a framework for practice that considers transformative learning from the perspective of the facilitator. These ideas were developed through a doctoral study in which adult educators were interviewed about their experiences in facilitating transformative learning. The framework comprises four components: confirming and interrupting current  frames of reference, working with triggers for transformative learning, acknowledging a time of retreat or dormancy, and developing the new perspective. Using the four components of this framework for practice, I outline a series of questions for reflection. Through detailed reflection on aspects of program design and the  interactions in the learning group, we can further our knowledge about the transformative aspects of our programs.

Keywords: transformative learning, program design, interaction, adult learning

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This article is part of AJAL, Volume 49_1. The entire volume is available in .pdf for purchase here.