For about 30 years, the European Union has been politically active in the field of Education and Training with a broad set of aims, measures and tools. All member states were involved in these politics, creating a kind of European profile. Adult education was an important pillar. A number of adult educators involved in various organisations at…

Through their history, adult education graduate programs have flourished and dwindled and sustainability always seems to be in jeopardy. This case study examines one program's growth, decline, and continuous rebirth in the competitive higher education market and academic stratification. Throughout its 55 years of existence, faculty have risen from…

Adult education has the power to change lives, and in Australia has always been made up of educators and providers capable of adapting to the changing environments around them. Today, however, there is declining support for adult education at a time when there is growing public disenchantment with the political system, an uncivil public discourse,…

The history of Adult Education (AE) graduate programs spans almost a century, yet many programs have experienced significant challenges in recent years to remain viable. The purpose of this paper is to understand the struggles AE graduate programs encounter in building, maintaining, and growing programs in North America. We conducted two separate…

This publication focuses on some of the unique characteristics and challenges concerning the provision of education in prison, including: the emergence of an informal curriculum; language tuition in prison; access to higher education; the availability of library facilities; digital literacy; civic engagement and social (re)integration; and prison…

The number of people attempting and passing the GED has plummeted. The Ohio economy is tough on low-wage workers with limited formal education. Without a high school diploma, it is virtually impossible to get a family-supporting job. But the GED has become a barricade, blocking Ohio workers from career goals, instead of a launching pad. Employers…

The number of people attempting and passing the GED has plummeted. The Ohio economy is tough on low-wage workers with limited formal education. Without a high school diploma, it is virtually impossible to get a family-supporting job. But the GED has become a barricade, blocking Ohio workers from career goals, instead of a launching pad. Employers…

This paper on the education system of Bulgaria is aimed at presenting its structure, current situation, problems and challenges that it faces, and on-going reforms leading to some positive trends in the development of the national education sector. At the moment of writing this paper in the year 2015, we will mark the 1160th anniversary of the…

Emerging from the 1960s and a focus on transformative learning, Walden University is a pioneering program for adult learners. The authors outline how Walden's doctoral program engaged mid-career professionals in student-designed inquiry and applied scholarship. They first discuss the founding of Walden University. Then they describe how the…

The potential benefits of OER have led many European governments to implement policies supporting their creation and use. This chapter aims to put these OER policies in context, discussing their focus and scope and highlighting challenges and bottlenecks. On the basis of the analysis of the current state of the art, it is argued that one of main…

Newbattle Abbey College, Scotland's only adult residential college, was founded in the 1930s by Philip Kerr, 11th Marquis of Lothian. This paper traces the debates concerning the college and the rationale for adult residential education until the 1950s, focusing on the difficulties that Newbattle faced in establishing itself as a central part of…

This article outlines the current problems facing vocational education in China in order to raise the question as to how deep-seated and intractable they might be. In order to address this question a historical analysis of vocational education from the turn of the twentieth century to the end of Mao's period of office is undertaken. The rise of…

Within the last decade, adult education has faced significant challenges in terms of its relevance to socio-economic development as it sought to define itself through many international conferences. In spite of these re-conceptualisations, adult education continues to be relegated to the periphery, and therefore lacks the needed funding to play a…

This conceptual paper contributes to the scholarship on life-long learning programs at public universities. It investigates the unique relationship between these institutions and their state, utilizing Ohio as an illustrative example. A review of several university mission statements illuminates the responsibility of these institutions to their…

This paper examines the question of why Africa has made such slow progress towards the goal of eradicating illiteracy, and why it remains an exceptionally disadvantaged region in this respect. The article surveys the history of the development of literacy in Africa from colonial times to the present day, focusing on the role of adult education in…