e Irish Journal of Adult and Community Education e Irish Journal of Adult and Community Education

156 Pages·2017·1.07 MB·English

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AONTAS
The National Adult Learning Organisation
2nd Floor, 83-87 Main Street, Ranelagh, Dublin 6, D06 E0H1
Ph: 01 4068220
Email: [email protected]
Website: www.aontas.com
ADULT LEARNER
2017

The Irish Journal of Adult and Community Education
ISSN No. 0790-8040
The views expressed here are those of the authors and
not necessarily those of AONTAS or the Adult Education
Officers’ Association.
©2017
Design by Language, www.language.ie
Contents

7 Editorial comment
rob mark, editor
11 Contributors
Section 1 – Perspectives on Community and Lifelong Learning
15 Rhetoric and reality: The Irish experience of Quality Assurance
camilla fitzsimons
33 Towards a Quality Framework for Adult Learners in Recovery:
Ensuring Quality with Equity
patricia doyle
43 Pedagogical Leadership of VET within a confused FET Context
lynn russell
58 In pursuit of an authentic educational relationship: An examination
of dialogue in Freirean adult literacy practice
alex mckillican
73 Later Life Learning: A post-retirement perspective from
Northern Ireland
freda mccormick
86 Learning to mother over coffee and cake: Naming our
informal learning
sarah coss

Section 2 – Case Studies on Improving Practice
103 Examination of quality in a community family
communication course
eimer cadogan, liam mccarthy and mary mangan
113 Holding the line: A slow movement towards a critical professional
development for community educators
Jerry o'neill and susan cullinane

Section 3 – Book Reviews
130 A new skills agenda for Europe: Working together to strengthen human
capital, employability and competitiveness
133 Community education and neoliberalism: Philosophies, practices and
policies in Ireland
137 I nside Education: The art of good learning
141 Reframing partnerships in education: Uniting the power of place and the
wisdom of people
147 Call for Papers 2018 Edition
Editorial comment
In the past decade, there has been a growing focus on the issue of quality and
its management across the broad field of adult learning. Concern stems partly
from the need to increase competitiveness in a global economy, but also from
the demand for public services to demonstrate accountability and ability
to achieve results. The relative importance of quality is demonstrated by the
place it is given in policy documents such as the European Community report
on Quality Indicators of Lifelong Learning (2002). The report represented the
work of representatives from thirty-five European countries, the OECD and
UNESCO and outlined specific quantitative and qualitative data which might
be used as indicators to evaluate, promote and support planning in the field
of lifelong learning. This report and the ongoing focus on quality reflects the
breadth and complexity of the lifelong learning process itself and the need to
have mechanisms for quality assurance, evaluation and monitoring to ensure
constant progression towards quality improvement and striving for excellence.
The emergence of quality as a key issue in education has also led to the
development of a plethora of custodians legitimised by policies that are handed
down from politicians, policy-makers, administrators and heads of institutions
to teachers, learning support staff, learners etc. In a short space of time, a quality
industry has grown up creating an ever-increasing bureaucratic load on those
responsible for the actual delivery of education and training.
The 2017 call for contributions for the Adult Learner welcomed articles with
a focus on quality in adult learning and we are delighted to be able to publish
articles which focus directly or indirectly on this theme. The articles are divided
into two sections. In section 1, there are six articles which present different
perspectives on critical debates in adult learning and in section 2, there are a
further two articles which are case studies of practice.
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The first two opening articles focus overtly on quality as an issue in adult
learning. In Rhetoric and reality: The Irish Experience of Quality Assurance,
Camilla Fitzsimons traces the growth and development of quality management
in Ireland, venturing to define what quality might mean. She examines
the tensions which exist around the quality debate noting the inconsistent
moderation and incongruence between the wider values of quality and a
government-led employability discourse. The article reports on a study of
educators who participated in an on-line, anonymous survey noting that
adult educators do care about quality whatever that means to them. The
survey uncovers philosophical tensions in how quality assurance should be
approached. Finally, she returns to the question of whether our understanding
and measurement of quality is really linked to a neoliberal, market-oriented,
utilitarian agenda?
In the second article, Towards a Quality Framework for Adult Learners in
Recovery: Ensuring quality with equity, Patricia Doyle describes a participative
approach to curriculum development for adults in addiction recovery across
the European Union and efforts to conceive of a quality-learning programme
with equity for adult learners in recovery. This links the question of quality to
the concept of inequality and raises the question of whether indeed discussions
on quality can be had in isolation from discussion on inequality and the need
for our practices to take this into account.
A third article in Section 2, offered by Eimer Cadogan, Liam McCarthy and
Mary Mangan takes a look at what quality might actually mean in a community
family communication course. The writers examine how participants
benefitted from a course, both on a personal and interpersonal level. They note
that the measurement of quality may go beyond dominant discourses related
to quality through developing ways of measuring quality which are consistent
with andragogy and the principles which underpin the concept.
Other articles while not overtly focusing on quality as an issue, do raise issues
which are inevitably linked to the broad framework of quality management.
Lynn Russell’s article on leadership looks at the pedagogical leadership within
the further education Vocational Education and Training (VET) context while
Jerry O’Neill and Susan Cullinane remind us of the need for critical professional
development for adult and community educators, also a key issue in promoting
quality in across the field of lifelong learning. Alex McKillican’s contribution
raises questions about the need to embrace radical dialogue in Freirean adult
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