Informal Adult Learning – Shaping the Way Ahead
A final NIACE Response to the Department for Innovation, Universities and Skills’ Consultation
Published: June 2008
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Executive Summary:
NIACE warmly welcomes the Government’s initiative to consult on the role of informal learning in post-compulsory education and training, and in a wider public policy agenda. It provides a much-needed opportunity to articulate the work of structured adult education classes with the wide range of learning opportunities available through new technologies, and through voluntary and community organisations. NIACE welcomes too, the prospect of better harmonisation of the wealth of initiatives in different Government departments that promote learning for social cohesion and active citizenship.
However the consultation comes after a period of rapid restructuring of public support for adult learning, an overall drop in participation in learning adults choose for themselves, and in particular a reduction of provision in the areas of first steps learning and ‘other further education’. To maximise public confidence and secure the best benefit from this positive re-framing, NIACE believes Government should seek to secure change that will leave learners in structured, and self-directed informal learning feeling better supported. NIACE further believes that can be achieved with modest injection of £50 million of new resources to secure the appropriate infrastructure as well as imaginative pooling of existing budgets.
NIACE also recommends the creation of an Informal Learning Innovation Fund (similar to the previous Adult and Community Learning Fund - ACLF), to stimulate participation and allow best practice to flourish. As with the ACLF, NIACE would be willing manage the innovation fund at a distance from Government. By using an NGO partner it would be easier to foster a culture of risk beneficial to any innovation strategy.
A new approach should have at its heart a coherent and comprehensive outreach strategy offering the highest quality of provision to those with the greatest educational need. This strategy, in particular, should be shared and developed across the many Government departments providing informal learning opportunities as part of their operations and activities and should see widening participation in learning as a priority.
This will require both a cross-governmental initiative with ministerial champions in a range of Departments and also a new concordat between local and central government to re-vitalise and reform the role of authorities in providing the local focus of an informal adult learning infrastructure.
The workforce development of paid and voluntary staff in the system must also be a priority for development.
This submission outlines NIACE’S own experience, offer definitions and a version of how an informal learning service can foster a culture of lifelong learning, address the challenges in the consultation paper and make a number of recommendations.
