Challenges and opportunities of adult education in the cities and regions
Adult Learning Policies in Europe. An Insight of Regional and Local Stakeholders
This book summarises the results of a survey on regional capacity for adult learning and education (RegALE), led by the European Association for Education of Adults (EAEA) and funded by the European Commission.
The goal of the survey was to derive a multi-layered view on:
- the challenges and opportunities of the adult education sector at the regional and local level, and
- the gaps and needs of the adult learning and education staff to use them for the future steps of the project.
Opinions of regional and local European policy makers and professionals, here presented, suggested three key findings:
(i) Local and territorial networks are the solution to the lack of overarching adult learning systems;
(ii) Like employers, civil service organisations represent an essential actor to implement and deliver non-formal and informal adult learning opportunities, especially for medium and low-skilled adults;
(iii) Adult learning reaches millions of adult citizens thanks to the engagement of a wide variety of adult learning professionals being both teaching and non-teaching professionals.
Nonetheless, everywhere in Europe, public policies pay little attention to the quality of adult learning workforce. The book analyses each of the findings based upon the opinions that were expressed by regional and local policymakers and professionals on actual and future adult learning policies.
These are common issues at European level and in all the seven countries that were investigated (Croatia, Estonia, Germany, Greece, Italy, Norway, The United Kingdom).
The same problems exist everywhere, albeit in different ways. The Country Reports provide an in-depth insight on it.
Adult Learning Policies in Europe. Factsheets
Background report
The background report describes the outcomes of the survey analysis and includes the first recommendations of the RegALE consortium. It identifies and explains the challenges and opportunities of decentralisation of policy design, monitoring, and funding for the adult learning and education sector (ALE). It also describes the needs and assets of ALE organisations working at the regional and local levels: in particular, as regards their capacity to cooperate in their territories, their sustainability struggle, and their internationalisation efforts. The report analyses the results of the survey referring to nine thematic areas:
- Public policies
- Adult Education Organisations
- Disadvantaged groups
- Investments
- Systems
- ALE workforce
- ALE supply and demand
- Governance
- Internationalisation
The report has gone through a thorough validation process. It includes more than 50 pages and is available here.
Survey
The survey aimed to investigate the challenges and opportunities of the adult education sector at the regional and local levels. It was addressed to adult education organisations, regional and local policymakers dealing with adult education policies, and adult education providers in their countries. The survey was promoted to all the organisations/people identified as crucial stakeholders but was also open to the public. The tool used for collecting data was Survey Monkey, which guaranteed anonymous and safe data collection and diversification of questions according to the respondents’ backgrounds. Thus, only one survey was launched rather than two, as envisaged in the application. The consortium gathered 241 respondents. The survey was available online for three months. The required time to fill the quantitative part was approximately 20′ and 40′ for the qualitative one. Respondents also had the option to upload any document they found meaningful in relation to the expressed opinion.
