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Commentary - May 2008

Spreading the word

Adult Learners’ Week is upon us, a time not only to celebrate the achievements of adult learners but to challenge employers and politicians to do more to support them, writes RACHEL THOMSON

Early last December, I was lucky enough to attend Latin America’s first festival of learning, in Montevideo, the beautiful capital of Uruguay. Organised by the Ministry of Education and Culture, in partnership with REPEM, the continent’s popular education organisation, and the International Council for Adult Education, the festival was an extraordinary success.

I arrived the evening before the celebrations and the ministry team were up against it with their preparations – banners to collect and distribute; flyers to revise; additional guests; news of no-shows; uncertainty about whether anyone would turn up. It could have been a scene from NIACE’s office in Leicester in the run-up to our Adult Learners’ Week in May – apart from the uninterrupted views of the southern Atlantic from the office windows.

The inaugural ceremony was held in 30-degree heat in a marquee on the steps of the epic City Hall. It was packed with film crews, learners, advocates and passers-by. Over the 32 hours that followed, simultaneous events took place along the city’s main thoroughfare. There were acrobatic lessons in the boulevard’s trees, lectures in non-fusty institutions and theatrical performances. People learned table tennis in the sunshine and joined in circle-dancing at commuter-packed bus stops. A group of 19 year olds made cement; people drummed; others visited arts and craft displays.

At 8pm, in the Explanada Municipal, the mix of people watching and taking part in the tango and flamenco dancing was community cohesion in action: tiny toddlers, men and women in their 70s, svelte, cosmopolitan 30-somethings and Antonio Banderas look-a-likes all joined in.

Those two days were full of spectacle – epitomising the value of that so dry-sounding ‘informal learning’. And as this year’s Adult Learners’ Week in the UK is upon us, I can’t help but reflect on the stories and activities we’ll be celebrating with the core support of the European Social Fund and the Department for Innovation, Universities and Skills.

The stories which will be told – in the press, on the radio, at award ceremonies, at local events – range from the 90 year old learning Russian, to the former bricklayer who is now studying at Cambridge University; from the group of visually-impaired adults learning art, to the man in his 70s who is shaping the written Jamaican language; from the three sisters with 19 children between them who are studying to be teaching assistants, to the woman who progressed from GCSE maths to a PhD in microbiology in six years.

Across the week, there’ll be literally thousands of opportunities for adults – young, old and in all their diversity – to take part in learning activities. A quick visit to the campaign’s online calendar – www.alw.org.uk/calendar – reveals that Shakespeare tasters at HMP Wormwood Scrubs, rock-viewing boat trips in Torbay, medieval martial arts workshops at Kenilworth Castle, film screenings across the West Midlands and rope courses in Reading will take place alongside more usual tasters in maths, ICT and literacy learning. And for this year’s opening to Adult Learners’ Week, NIACE has encouraged dance organisations to take part in Dance Off 2008 to celebrate Cultural Diversity Weekend and demonstrate the variety and wealth of opportunities available.

Some might say that it just isn’t right to be celebrating when, over the past two years, there has been a fall of nearly one and a half million adult learners on publicly funded courses. I’d disagree, whilst simultaneously lamenting the lost classes we’ve been contacted about – art, personal finance, conversational French, Pilates, video-editing, archaeology, yoga, to name but a few.

Adult Learners’ Week is at the core of NIACE’s mission to engage more and different adults in better quality learning of all kinds and – behind the fun and celebration – it’s important to remember that the campaign also affords serious contributions to the policy debate. The campaign encourages under-represented groups – including low-skilled, unemployed and low-paid adults and those with few or no qualifications – to participate and spread positive motivational messages about learning. The week also challenges providers to engage the most isolated and excluded adults in activities which develop social and employment skills, confidence and ambition.

The fact is, it works and it matters – especially if you believe that the cornerstone of a civilised society is how we treat the most disadvantaged. Fourteen per cent of callers to the learndirect advice line during Adult Learners’ Week 2007 had no qualifications and 58 per cent had done little or no training in the last three years. Yet 57 per cent of callers had enrolled on or started a course two months after the campaign. In the next week, ministers, parliamentarians, policymakers and the great and the good of the adult learning world will meet learners to hear first-hand about the challenges and achievements of participating in post-19 education and the findings of NIACE’s participation survey will show significantly who isn’t learning.

Now in its seventeenth year, Adult Learners’ Week is passing from adolescence to adulthood itself, yet the similarities between 1992 and now are striking. Join in the party and help make it as uplifting as the newborn Uruguayan festival.

Rachel Thomson is Senior Development Officer, Campaigns and Communications, NIACE

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