I commented on Joe Morris Group 1 and Jennifer
Warrner Group 2
Adult Education in the 1990's: A New Generation
Vincent L. Stults
Ball State University
Introduction
The cutting satire of the Simpsons was still fresh over the
airways, the internet was in its infancy, but growing at an exponential rate
and influence. Nelson Mandela went from being in prison as a rebel because of
the color of his skin to president of South Africa. The early years of the
1990's revealed sweeping change in technology, and in societies around the
globe. The globe was changing: reunification of Germany; the collapse of the Soviet
Union; and the end of the cold war. The global change was even coming
into our homes with the dawning of the dot-com revolution and the launch of the
new media bringing the world closer. As a nation, the U.S. experienced
unprecedented growth and prosperity, and faced death and destruction. The LA
riots after the Rodney King decision, the Oklahoma City Bombing, the Unabomber,
and the shooting in Columbine revealed a dark side to our inner turmoil. This
global world too was a smaller place and not all of it was good: the Gulf War;
the 93 Trade Center Bombing; and genocide in Bosnia and Rwanda.
Yet this global realization was not all bad news, as Bhopal,
(1998 p. 493-494) described it:
The positive side of globalism contributed to human
solidarity, as peoples from all places on all continents began to feel a shared
responsibility for the future of the human race. There was a heightened sense
of urgency about healing the Earth and saving all the Earth’s creatures and
their environments. Peoples agitated and acted for participative democracy,
affirmative action on behalf of those culturally and historically oppressed,
and the inclusion of all those that had been excluded. Human solidarity, peace
on earth, harmony with nature, and sustainable development become important
values. For citizenship in this global world, education became a necessity.
Adult education acquired centrality.
Social Background
Globalization (Education for All)
In many ways this
movement could be a chicken or the egg kind of global factor. Yet it is clearly representational of many of
the trends to unfold. Perhaps the
greatest theme for Adult Education in the 90's was rooted in the Education for
all Commitment, by the World Conference on Education for All that took
place in 1990 created by UNESCO, UNDP,
UNFPA, UNICEF and the World Bank (Haddad, 1990). It formed a backdrop behind
the stage of adult education on a global level, and characterized many of the major debates that dominated adult educational
theory in the 1990', spilling over into today.
An aggressive goal
to implement the programs and accomplish goals started the decade off with
great enthusiasm. But by the year 2000 it was clear that efforts had failed. A
new initiative in Dakar, 2000 recommitted to a refined understanding of the
original goal and spelled out a plan to accomplish that goal by 2015. What is
astounding about all of this is the redefinition of the key focus of the
educational efforts. In conference after conference over the decade of the
1990's the six goals of education were further clarified and plans of
implementation adjusted. Three out of the six goals clearly included the role
of adult education even beyond basic adult education. They were (italics in bullets points mine):
- Goal 3
- Ensuring that the learning needs of all young people and adults are met through equitable access to appropriate learning and
life-skills programmes
- Goal 4
- Achieving a 50 per cent improvement in levels of adult literacy by 2015, especially for women, and equitable access
to basic and continuing education for all adults.
- Goal 5
- Eliminating gender disparities in primary and secondary education by 2005,
and achieving gender equality in
education by 2015, with a focus on ensuring girls’ full and equal access to
and achievement in basic education of good quality.
- Goal 6-
Improving all aspects of the quality
of education and ensuring excellence of all so that recognized and measurable
learning outcomes are achieved by all,
especially in literacy, numeracy and essential life skills.
But in almost every
major decision the hope for adult education was pushed to the side or redefined
to make the financial, organizational, time, and/or labor efforts more
manageable. So primary education won out, while continuing to redefine adult
education in terms of basic adult
education only, and even diminishing that as a priority against the greater
priority of primary education for children and youth (Bhola 1998) and (Toress, 2000).
Governmental Emphasis of Vocational Training
Starting in the
late 80's and culminating in the Workforce Investment Act of 1998, the US government moved towards a renewed interest
and commitment to vocational training for adults in the 1990's. Ruberson (2011, p. 4) says it plainly, "The resurgent interest
in lifelong learning has been largely informed by the need to ensure the
competitiveness of national economies in the global market, employ-ability of
the workforce, the integration of immigrants, demographic change, and the
graying of populations in postindustrial societies."
The Internet and the New Media
It is clear that the internet played a key role in almost
every trend in adult education. Its
relevance to distance learning, and lifelong learning are the clearest. As
Maehl (2004, p. 13) gathered stats on the advance of online learning in the
90's the numbers are nothing short of amazing, considering the decade started out with zero: "...
distance learning courses and degrees... on two-year and four-year institutions
from 2000–2001 is illustrative. These institutions offered an estimated 118,100
different distance learning credit courses during the reporting period, mostly
at the undergraduate level," all applying the new technologies of the
internet.
Technologies relationship to the other factors of the day
for adult education is less obvious.
Merriam et al (2012, p. 44) draw
on a few sources to demonstrate this
factor:
...knowledge has become an important business
commodity that is readily marketed, due, in part, to the explosion of the Internet
and other information technologies. Finger (2005b) and others (Cunningham,
2000; Schied, Mulenga, & Baptiste, 2005) believe that adult education is in
danger of losing its social action orientation as it focuses on helping
individuals cope with the overwhelming economic and other challenges that
threaten their identities and survival. Learning in a global community can be
empowering but it "can also serve as a mechanism for exclusion and
control. The move to a knowledge-based economy means that those who have the
lowest level of skills and the weakest capacity for constant updating are less
likely to find sustainable employment (Schied, Mulenga, & Baptiste, 2005,
p. 396).
Highlights
So what did Adult
Education look like in the 90's? What are the main themes or ideas that can
help us understand this time?
The Advent of Distance Learning
Maehl (2004:12) examines three trends in the 1990's that
impacted the rapid advancement of distance learning:
- an
emphasis on occupational preparation or human capital development
- growth of for-profit providers with an acute
sense of emerging market potential and the need to maintain high standards of
service.
- advanced technology in distance learning to an
extent that outstripped earlier technology-based programs.
McGee and Green
(2008), discuss the connection of online
learning to the idea of lifelong learning systems, and share several key
Learning Content Management Systems that were launched in the 1990's.
- Angel™
– Conceptualized by Ali Jafari at Indiana UniversityPurdue
- University
Indianapolis (IUPUI) and offered as OnCourse, as an institutional CMS, and then
it was released by the newly formed CyberLearning Labs, Inc. in July 2000 and
subsequently renamed ANGEL Learning.
- Blackboard™
– Founded in 1997, it offered its first software package to Cornell University
in 1998. The company began by producing consulting services to the IMS Global
Learning Consortium.
- Educator™
– Conceptualized by Ed Mansouri at Florida State University, Educator™ was
first released in 1999.
- Moodle™
– Designed by Martin Dougiamas while he was at Curtain University, it was first
released in 2002 and supported through an active users and designer group who
are committed to improving this open source system.
- WebCT™
– Conceptualized in the mid1990s by Murray W. Goldberg at the University of
British Columbia from which the company was formed and the system released in
19961997.
Re-emergence of the Idea of
Lifelong Learning
Lifelong learning, Hake (1999, p.80) argued was one of the
"hottest" focuses in public
dialogue concerning training for adults in the 21st century. He also adds that , "Japan set the pace
in 1990 with the establishment of the Promotion of Lifelong Learning Law and a
National Lifelong Learning Council." Then he references "the
Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) in 1996 starting
programs on lifelong learning as "a reality for all. UNESCO even
established a medium-term plan for 1995- 98 focusing on "sustainable human
development, lifelong learning and peace. The idea of lifelong learning was also often a part of the
idea behind many of the distance education efforts.
A Return to Critical Theory
Possibly as a
result of adult education being, as Wilson and Kiely (2002) say,
"epistemologically and theoretically stuck
in the history of Mezirow's transformational theory," there was a
buzz of debate about reclaiming the role of the greater critical theory of Habermas
that occurring in the 90's. Even more they emphasized that this shift was
happening by citing the rise and fall in
popularity of dissertations "offering mostly confirmations of the
existence of transformational learning
and incremental refinements to theory itself." This rise and fall, coupled
with the need they saw for a framework that could help adult educators be
better equipped to deal with the complexities of managing power in their role
to help learners construct meaning from their experiences, and for their social
lives was the driving force behind this call for a return to Critical Theory.
A Shift in Research Emphasize from
Quantitative to Qualitative Research
Brookfield , 1995
argues that for a better understanding of the role of critical reflection in
facilitating adult learning from their experience, there needed to be a move
from the psychological quantitative approach to the use of ethnography and
qualitative analysis, in order to move away from many of the ethnocentric
biases inherent in this process. Wright (2003) reviews more than half a dozen
authors of peer reviewed articles (from the 90's) discussing the disadvantage
that the marginalized have in receiving the benefits of a truly facilitative
learning experience, which she uses as the basis of her need to employee qualitative
methods to her "investigation of linkages among local settings of everyday
life, organizations, and translocal processes of administration," through
an institutional ethnography.
Influential Factors
Leaders
Although many others could be listed as adult education
influencers of the 1990's, and these representatives span multiple decades,
their impact in this decade is unique. Mezirow and Horton for their influence
on the beginning of the NAAPAE (Below), and Brookfield for his prevalence in the
debates that ensued in the 1990's.
Mezirow and Horton
Simply looking on the internet
for the history of the NAAPAE, it doesn't take long to see that some
equate its start in 1988 (others 1982) as a failed start and other see its
beginning as a consensus building time, but regardless of the process the North
American Alliance for Popular and Adult Education (NAAPAE) emerged in the
1990's under the initial efforts of Mezirow and Horton. It was an attempt to
create a "civil society" organization to connect North American and
popular educators with one another, as well as being a part of the
International Council on Adult Education (ICAE) which was a transnational-NGO
for adult education. Though it is argued
by some that it never rose above the promotion of popular education. It
lasted 21 years (
Heaney 1996, p. 43).
Stephen Brookfield
Although there is
not room to unpack his predictions, Brookfield's (1995, p. 379) examination of the three big trends
coming out of adult education in the early to mid 90's is eerily accurate. Each of these three in fact touch in some way upon
all these themes covered. He sees them wielding their influence "into the
twenty first century." These trends are "(1) the cross-cultural
dimensions of adult learning, (2) adults' engagement in practical theorizing,
and (3) the ways in which adults learn within the systems of education
(distance education, computer assisted instruction, open learning systems) that
are linked to recent technological advances." Each of these three areas, on closer
examination would reveal trends of the day that have already been highlighted.
Many of the key debaters of the 90's seemed to have his voice echoing somewhere
in their tossing about of concerns and ideas. It wasn't so much that he was
responding to but that he in many ways seemed to be articulating what needed to
be said, and asking the questions that needed to be asked.
The Debate Over the Mission of
Adult Education
In
her feisty little six page article, Kerka, (1996) manages to pull together
several concise sources to articulate the division present within the field of
Adult Education in 1996. Although she wasn't the first to mention these ideas
she certainly made it abundantly clear that this debate was rooted in something
real. The debate was between those who saw their work as a call to social
action and change and those who supported the status quo through market driven
Adult Education or in accomplishing the call of government for training the
workforce. The root of this tension exists in the answer to the question she
asks:
Some believe that adult education was focused on a
mission of social change in its formative years as a field in the 1920s. As it
evolved and became institutionalized, the field became preoccupied with
professionalization. More recently,
emphasis on literacy and lifelong learning in a changing workplace has allied
it with the agenda of economic competitiveness. This Digest examines the debate
over the mission of adult education: is it to transform individuals or society?
It looks at whether adult education functions as a means of empowerment in a democratic
society or as an instrument for maintaining the status quo (Kerka 1996, pp.
1-2).
Push for and Push Back Against
Professionalization
Another theme being
debated that could stand on its own during this decade (but also fits squarely
in the debate over the mission of adult education), is the role of
professionalization. Kerka's (1996, p. 3) words are insightful here as well: "Professionalization
of adult educators also extends and upholds the existing system... they have a
stake in maintaining the status quo, which could affect their approach and
their responsibility to those outside the mainstream."
Implications
Remember the Story
"What the son wishes to forget the grandson wishes to remember."
- Marcus Lee Hansen
Globalization
Multiplied by the
speed of technological development, the dynamics of a global world impacted
adult educators in a unique way. Not only was the world closer to them, raising
an awareness of peoples and places across the globe, but it also brought them
closer to the world, recognizing the struggles of their global brothers and
sisters in ways never before experienced. But it was also somehow oddly
reminiscent of the very history of their youthful discipline.
Live the Story to Recover the
Mission
Governmental Emphasis of Vocational Training
Practically the
shift from promoting "structures of opportunity" to an "individual
learning" in the 90's means that, "learning in the workplace
has now become the dominant understanding of the development of adult education
in the early twenty-first century" (Rubenson 2011, p. 5). Coupled with a
new global awareness and the reminder of the past role of adult education in
America, there is a much clearer understanding of the rising debate on the
mission of adult education, as well as the struggle over community action and
individual workforce development concerns that now permeate every aspect of
adult education practice.
The need to reevaluate its theories was the natural
response, and again many found a return to the Critical Theory of Habermas a
helpful exercise. His philosophy provided answers to the very dilemma being
experienced in society as a whole. The external governmental pressure towards
narrowing the focus of adult education to individual learning outcomes naturally
moved many practitioners and theorists back to examining the mission of adult
education becoming central debate of the day.
Leaders
Though the dream of this organization did not reach the
aspirations of its founding, it relationship with ICAE and its connection to
UNESCO is a curious one. Regardless of its outcome, it represented at an
organizational level the global consciousness of adult education in the 1990's,
as well as a connection to the consciousness raising work of the past, now at a
global level being mediated by the
present voice of the day and this gave hope in light of the present state of
affairs on a national level.
Brookfield seemed a tune to this helping to articulate the
questions and potential means of finding answers. He of course was not alone
and several others could provide an example of the leaders of the day, but the
few sources used in this point to his work as a good representation.
Additionally, this new brand of leaders did not want to embrace their power,
but were recognizing the need to find the appropriate evaluative and
information gathering methodologies to employ in this world were knowledge and
power can easily manipulate the outcomes, and thereby continue to marginalize
people. The need to for qualitative versus quantitative analysis would give a
voice to those being studied and level the playing field for educator and
learner and become yet another tool in critical reflection.
The Internet and the New Media
In the early days
of the internet, 1992, before the commercial network and the our modern web
browser David Clark a member of the Internet Engineering Task Force declared: "We
reject: kings, presidents and voting. We believe in: rough consensus and
running code." In 1996 John Perry Barlow's Declaration
of Independence in Cyberspace revealed
the revolution that marked the spirit of the age:
Governments of the Industrial World, you weary giants
of flesh and steel, I come from Cyberspace, the new home of Mind. On behalf of
the future, I ask you of the past to leave us alone...You have no sovereignty
where we gather... so I address you with no greater authority than that with
which liberty itself always speaks... (Cybertelecom.org
?)
It is ironic that such wild idealism speaks both the truth
and lies in the very same breath. Today the digital divide is great with only 14.6 of the worlds 6.4
billion having access to the internet. Yet during the 90's adult educators were
recognizing this challenge in the day and age of such revolutionary fervor. To
some ideas that have been shared in this overview of the 90's by Cunningham
(2000), and Finger (2005b) may seem extreme in their "socially conscious"
quest for adult education, but such insight then towards the day we live in
today should give pause.
A New Generation
Remembering what
was forgotten or abandoned can reconnect adult educators with vital elements of
their past and better prepare them to tomorrow. A return to the Critical Theory
of Habermas can help to recover some of the vital elements lost in simply
equipping people for jobs instead of facilitating critical reflection to find
meaning for themselves and in their communities. Employing qualitative
methodology over quantitative research methods can help adult educators better
address the challenges of globalization, multiculturalism, and marginalized peoples
as well as critically examine themselves. In so doing they can join in the
greater story of the history of adult education who wrestled with similar
challenges to find their answers. There is something about third and fourth
generations that is not understood by the second generation. What the second
generation chooses to forget in their quest for establishing themselves or
their theories, the following generations wants to understand, and needs to
make sense of anew in order to meet the demands before them. They are more
aware of those connections between the past and their present realities, and
more aware of what that means for the future. And their children will help
their parents to remember as they are required anew to pass their legacy onto
their grandchildren.
Here is a good conclusion for
a new generation from others who could also be added to the list of leaders through the decade of the 90's and
into today:
As Cunningham (1988, p. 141) has noted, much
program planning is based on an individual deficit model rather than an
examination of "the oppressive structures in which people live."
Programs are thus designed around learner deficiencies that may or may not be
of concern to the learner. What is necessary, Cunningham and others assert, is
for socially responsible adult educators to become aware of the "social as
well as personal dimensions of learning and the capacity of education to
respond" (Cunningham, 2000, p. 574). If one conceptualized any nation as
composed of the state (governmental sector), civil society (voluntary sector),
and the market economic sector), then how these sectors are related and how
education serves these sectors become critical questions in understanding the
relationships between adult education and society" (p. 574). Nevertheless,
"adult education is given public support when the public can see the
connection between education and the solution to a threatening situation"
(Griffith & Fujita-Starck, 1989, . 172) (as sited in
Merriam et al 2012, p.91).
Implications
Summary of the
History of Adult/Community Education
Areas
|
Summary
|
Social Background
|
·
Globalization (Education for
All)
·
Governmental Emphasis of
Vocational Training
·
The Internet and the New
Media
|
Highlights
|
·
The
Advent of Distance Learning
·
Re-emergence
of the Idea of Lifelong Learning
·
A
Return to Critical Theory
·
A
Shift in Research Emphasize from Quantitative to Qualitative Research
|
Influential factors
|
·
Leaders/Institutions
·
The
Debate Over the Mission of Adult Education
·
Push
for and Push Back Against Professionalization
|
Implications
|
·
Remember the Story - By connecting with
theories and ideas of the past (reclaiming what was lost) to meet the needs
of the day.
·
Live
the Story to Reclaim its Mission- By engaging in new methodologies and
practices that authenticate the story of adult education and substantiate the
legacy.
·
A New
Generation - Embrace the challenges of the day and leave a renewed legacy.
|
References
Bhola, H. S. (1998). World trends and issues in adult
education on the eve of the twenty-first century. International Review of
Education, 44(5-6), 485–506.
Brookfield, S. (1995). Adult learning: An overview. International
Encyclopedia of Education, 375–380.
Cybertelecom :: Internet History 90s. (n.d.).
Retrieved September 16, 2014, from
http://www.cybertelecom.org/notes/internet_history90s.htm#96
Cyr, A. V. (1999). Overview of Theories and
Principles Relating to Characteristics of Adult Learners: 1970s-1999. Retrieved
from
http://proxy.bsu.edu/login?url=http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=eric&AN=ED435817&site=ehost-live&scope=site
Griffith, W. S., & Fujita-Starck, P. J. (1989).
Public policy and the financing of adult education. Handbook of Adult and
Continuing Education. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.
Haddad, W. (1990). Meeting basic learning needs: a
vision for the 1990s. Inter-Agency Commission (UNDP, UNESCO, UNICEF, WORLD
BANK) for the World Conference on Education for All.
Hake, B. J. (1999). Lifelong learning in late
modernity: The challenges to society, organizations, and individuals. Adult
Education Quarterly, 49(2), 79–90.
Heaney, T. (1996). Adult Education for Social Change:
From Center Stage to the Wings and Back Again. Information Series No. 365.
Retrieved from http://eric.ed.gov/?id=ED396190
Kerka, S. (1996). ERIC - Adult Education: Social
Change or Status Quo? ERIC Digest No. 176., 1996. Retrieved September 16, 2014,
from http://eric.ed.gov.proxy.bsu.edu/?id=ED402472
Maehl, W. H. (2004). Adult degrees and the learning
society. New Directions for Adult and Continuing Education, 2004(103),
5–16. doi:10.1002/ace.144
McGee, P., & Green, M. (n.d.). Lifefelong Learning
and Systems: A post-Fordist Analysis.
Merriam, S. B., & Brockett, R. G. (2011). The
profession and practice of adult education: An introduction. John Wiley
& Sons.
Merriam, S. B., Caffarella, R. S., & Baumgartner,
L. M. (2012). Learning in adulthood: A comprehensive guide. John Wiley
& Sons.
National Center for the Study of Adult Learning and
Literacy, B., MA. (2002). The First Five Years: National Center for the
Study of Adult Learning and Literacy, 1996-2001. Retrieved from
http://proxy.bsu.edu/login?url=http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=eric&AN=ED471275&site=ehost-live&scope=site
Schied, F., Mulenga, D., & Baptiste, I. (2005).
Lifelong learning in a global context: Toward a reconceptualization of adult
education. In, RJ Hill and R. Kiely. In Proceedings of the 46th Annual Adult
Education Research Conference (pp. 395–399).
Torres, R. M. (2000). One decade of education for all:
The challenge ahead. Adult Education and Development, 141–154.
Wright, U. T. (2003). Institutional ethnography: A
tool for merging research and practice. Midwest Research-to-Practice Conference
in Adult, Continuing, and Community Education. Retrieved from
https://scholarworks.iupui.edu/handle/1805/353
As the challenges and the newness of starting class gave way
to the routines of online discussion, and the realization of all the course
projects and deadlines looming ahead, it seemed that the choices to me made about
group blogs were upon us before we knew it. 
And even more so, why was I freaking
out!!?? And then I remembered what Captain Jack said. It had nothing to do with
the computer, the syllabus, the class, or the professor. It was simply my
attitude. I knew that I needed to enjoy the journey and to not let the journey
freak me out.
