Tag: relevance

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‘A reservoir of learning’: the beginnings of continuing education at the University of Sydney

Author/s: Darryl Dymock

Edition: Volume 49, Number 2, July 2009

Summary: Adult education has often been on the margin of university offerings in Australia and elsewhere, sometimes regarded as ‘non-core’ business or at least as a financial drain on the institution. At the University of Sydney, however, adult education has managed to survive in one form or other for over 140 years, currently through the Centre for Continuing Education. Partly this has been due to the support of influential academics who have believed in the principle of ‘extra-mural’ studies’, if not always agreeing with the way it has been delivered or funded. Research in the university’s archives and through contemporary accounts shows that the pattern of provision was established in the 1890s and first 20 years of the twentieth century, particularly through the development of tutorial classes in a relationship with the Workers’ Educational Association, following a model established in Britain at the universities of Oxford and Cambridge. However, the research also reveals that the relationship between the first Director of Tutorial Classes and senior members of  Sydney University was not always harmonious, especially against the background of the conscription debates of World War I.

Keywords: adult education, relevance, funding, Centre for Continuing Education, Workers’ Educational Association

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This article is part of AJAL, Volume 49_2. The entire volume is available in .pdf for purchase here.

 

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The international importance of a national association

Author/s: Edward Hutchinson

Edition: Volume 50, Number 3, November 2010

Summary: It is my experience that some of the most perplexing and time‑consuming problems that face the chief executive of a National Association in Adult Education, arise out of international contacts. I think it is very wise that the Australian Association should give attention to the matter early in its existence. By so doing, it can perhaps avoid some of the pitfalls and can offer creative leadership and example that may be of the greatest value in the next half century. One thing is certain—there is no established pattern of international relationships into which a new national association can fit comfortably and conveniently. There are a number of connecting strands but there is nothing approaching an organized network with a clearly discernible pattern.

Keywords: National Association in Adult Education, Adult Learning Australia, relevance, challenges, value

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This article is part of AJAL, Volume 50_3. The entire volume is available in .pdf for purchase here.

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Agenda for a national association 50 years on

Author/s: Barrie Brennan

Edition: Volume 50, Number 3, November 2010

Summary: I was honoured to be asked by the current Editor to write a response to W.G.K. Duncan’s 1961 paper, ‘Agenda for a national association’, in the first number of the Australian Journal of Adult Education , the journal of the newly established Australian Association of Adult Education (AAAE). The brief has been interpreted in this way. Duncan viewed AAAE as an ‘outsider’ and proposed challenges for the new association without giving guidance as to how the challenges may have been met.

Keywords: Adult Learning Australia, challenges, relevance

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This article is part of AJAL, Volume 50_3. The entire volume is available in .pdf for purchase here.

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Agenda for a national association

Author/s: W. G. K. Duncan

Edition: Volume 50, Number 3, November 2010

Summary: I was reminded of my schoolboy days when I read the opening words of the first number of the Newsletter, to be issued quarterly by the Australian Association of Adult Education. In our textual study of Macbeth (does this sort of thing still go on?), we were asked to say what punctuation mark we thought most appropriate after Lady Macbeth’s famous words ‘We fail’, when trying to screw her husband’s courage to ‘the sticking place’. A question mark, indicating that the possibility of failing had never occurred to her before? A full stop, suggesting resignation, or fatalism? An exclamation mark—to be accompanied by a scornful tone of voice? Which of these alternatives fitted in best with our conception of Lady Macbeth’s character? I plumped for the exclamation mark. (The edition I now have gives a colon—that would have floored us!)

The opening words of the Newsletter were simply “WE ARE!”—and I wondered whether the Editor had used the exclamation mark to indicate surprise, relief, triumphant satisfaction at difficulties overcome, or a sense of exhilaration at future prospects.

Keywords: Adult Learning Australia, Australian Association of Adult Education, relevance, future

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This article is part of AJAL, Volume 50_3. The entire volume is available in .pdf for purchase here.

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Recollections on the Association over five decades

Author/s: Arch Nelson (1960s), Barrie Brennan (1970s), Dianne Berlin (1980s), Alastair Crombie (1990s) and Roger Morris (2000s)

Edition: Volume 50, Number 3, November 2010

Summary: In 2010, fifty years after the establishment of the association now called Adult Learning Australia (ALA), the association still faces the dilemma about how to sell its message that adult learning matters. The dilemma is one of philosophy: in the nineteenth century, it was liberalism versus utilitarianism; in the mid-twentieth, the instrumental versus cultural; today, the dichotomy is couched in terms such as ‘social inclusion’ versus ‘productivity’.

Keywords: Adult Learning Australia, relevance, philosophy, social inclusion, productivity

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This article is part of AJAL, Volume 50_3. The entire volume is available in .pdf for purchase here.

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Diversity and excellence: prompts from the history of the tertiary education sector

Author/s: Francesca Beddie

Edition: Volume 50, Number 3, November 2010

Summary: In 2010, fifty years after the establishment of the association now called Adult Learning Australia (ALA), the association still faces the dilemma about how to sell its message that adult learning matters. The dilemma is one of philosophy: in the nineteenth century, it was liberalism versus utilitarianism; in the mid-twentieth, the instrumental versus cultural; today, the dichotomy is couched in terms such as ‘social inclusion’ versus ‘productivity’.

Keywords: adult learning, relevance, liberalism, utilitarianism, social inclusion, productivity

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This article is part of AJAL, Volume 50_3. The entire volume is available in .pdf for purchase here.