This article was originally presented as a position paper at the Symposium on Information and Communication Technology (ICT) for Social Development held in Jakarta by the ASEAN Foundation Collaboratory (May 2006). Its main premise is that, while there is growing use of open and distance learning (ODL) in formal and nonformal education and training…

Explores the concept of community and the difficulty of defining the term. Explains how adult education is a vital component of community structure. Suggests that community is best defined as a natural setting for formal, nonformal, and informal adult education, providing the basis for lifelong education. (SK)

Describes behavioral patterns and learning processes that illustrate the function and nature of learning during the inventive process. Presents a learning process that describes this adult learning project. (JOW)

In Clardy's study, 56 employees described 109 vocationally oriented self-directed learning projects undertaken. Projects were categorized as induced (spurred by imbalance between job expectations and capability), voluntary (fueled by personal motivation), or synergistic (combined motivation with the spark of workplace circumstances). Willis'…

In the Asia-Pacific region, innovations in nonformal adult education rarely become mainstream policy and practice. Effective adult education policy advocacy requires assertion of a lifelong view and a common position of advancing learning for the most marginal groups. (SK)

Certain challenges are inherent in collecting data to evaluate nonformal education programs and settings. One challenge relates to the complexity of the educational system in which nonformal learning takes place. Separating the learning effects of a nonformal education program on participants from the effects of other essential elements of their…

The opportunity that evaluators have to be educators is well known. Patton emphatically states, "Every interaction with an evaluation client, participant, stakeholder, and user is a teaching opportunity." This article discusses two ways in which evaluators can help educate the staff of nonformal programs: helping them articulate the theory that…

The main objective of environmental education (EE) is that citizens develop a responsible environmental behavior. Environmental awareness constitutes an important factor for the shaping of a responsible environmental behavior. The mass media can strengthen the degree of environmental awareness of the public, through the dissemination of…

This article revisits and reinterprets my previous paper. It is a snapshot of the lifelong learning system building in selected Asian countries, reflected in the mirror of the Asian Financial Crisis in the 1997s and the aftermath of that event. I reconsidered the arguments (1) the economic recession had delivered a global dimension of lifelong…

In 2004, the United States Agency for International Development (USAID)-funded Educational Quality Improvement Program 2 (EQUIP2) began investigating community-based schools as a mechanism for reaching the underserved populations. The team identified nine models that successfully organized schooling in regions least served by the formal education…

Finds fault with Illich's fundamental notion that schools engender a confusion of schooling and learning. (EH)

The need for appropriate approaches to educational technology research in developing nations is discussed, and two examples of such research, adapted to local technological capabilities, are given. (RAO)

Argues that the questioning and answering interaction provides a setting whereby adults can socialize naive children into communal views of reality. It is suggested, however, that this tradition acts both as a brake and as a springboard to the acquisition of new knowledge. (MS)

Contrasts the modern definition of education (schooling) with the traditional indigenous view that focuses on education as a natural process occurring during everyday activities. Argues that traditional indigenous education ensures cultural continuity and survival of the mental, spiritual, emotional, and physical well-being of the cultural unit…

Nonformal continuing education may be one of the major challenges of the decade. This points out the critical need for formal training for adult educators, requiring leadership from governments and national associations. (SK)