Economic fears get more adults learning Friday, May 14, 2010 - 19:13

Economic uncertainty appears to have had a huge impact on the number of adults who are in learning or who are thinking about learning in the future, reports the annual Adult Learners' Week survey, published on Wednesday, 13 May 2010.

The proportion of adults who are currently learning, or have done so in the last three years, has risen by four per cent from 39 per cent in 2009 to 43 per cent in 2010, its highest level for 10 years. People in and out of work are reporting record levels of wanting to learn since these surveys started 20 years ago.

The UK-wide survey of nearly 5,000 adults - A Change for the Better - from NIACE, also reports that:

• current participation, having fallen to its lowest levels for a decade in 2009, rose by three percentage points to 21 per cent - lower than the highs experienced between 1996 and 2003, but reversing recent reductions;
• women (23 per cent current and 44 per cent current/recent learners) continue to take part in larger numbers than men (20 per cent and 41 per cent respectively).
• three in five (60 per cent) full-time workers plan to take up learning - a rise of 13 percentage points since 2009; 58 per cent of part-time workers plan to study - a rise of nine percentage points on 2009; and for people seeking work there is a jump of 17 percentage points, with 67 per cent planning to study;
• 56 per cent of ABs, 51 per cent of C1s, 37 per cent of C2s and 30 per cent of DEs report current or recent learning. There are rises of three to four percentage points for ABCs but a jump of six percentage points in DEs is unprecedented. In previous surveys DEs have never reported more than a single percentage rise, and have always reported within the 24-26 per cent range. Despite this ABs remain almost twice as likely to participate as DEs;
• the overall numbers planning to study has jumped in 2010 to almost half (47 percent), the highest number reported in a 20 year sequence of NIACE surveys. Almost as significant is the drop - from 47 per cent in 2009 to 34 per cent in 2010 - who say they are very unlikely to take up learning in the next three years;
• the proportion of people reporting no learning since leaving school has fallen dramatically from 37 per cent in 2009 to 31 per cent in 2010 (marking a total four percentage points below any previous survey) and making clear that the rise in participation is reaching adults previously untouched by adult learning; and

Alan Tuckett, Chief Executive of NIACE, said:

"This survey shows something of a sea change in adults' engagement in learning. After years in which the numbers in learning fell overall, and the gulf between the learning rich and the learning poor widened dramatically, there has been a major shift - not only in the proportion of adults who are engaged in learning, but also in adults' expectations of taking part in the near future."

"Perhaps the most striking result in the survey is the first statistically significant improvement in participation by adults from social class DE - the poorest cohort, comprising unemployed people, semi- and unskilled adults and retired people. For 20 years, the percentage of this group reporting current or recent study scarcely shifted, with just one in four participating, whilst more affluent social groups each in turn increased the numbers participating."

"This year's increases can only be just a beginning. If those who benefit least from their initial education are to get a fair share of the opportunities that training and wider learning can bring, this level of increase will need to be emulated in 2011. Yet just to maintain these gains will be challenging, when public finances are under so much pressure. Things may be moving in the right direction, but they have some way to go."