Transcript Slide 1

International Research and Researchers Network Seminar
Thursday 19 June 2014
Higher Education and Lifelong Learners: the
case of Ireland in international context
Maria Slowey
Director, HERC (Higher Education Research Centre)
Dublin City University
Preliminary comments: socio-economic
factors shaping higher education globally
1. Lifelong learning and higher education
across 14 countries- core mission or
‘someone else’s business’?
2. Higher education in Ireland- challenges
of access and admission for adults as
lifelong learners
3. Culture change in higher educationwhat might an ‘Age Friendly University’
look like?
For SRHE interest…
• First- drawing on two different bodies of literature
(HE and AdEd) to develop conceptualisations
• Second- adopting a quasi-longitudinal approach,
examining the same country cases over 3 different
time periods (1987,2000,2012)
• Third- developing typologies from these country
cases
• Fourth- potential ‘translational’ implications for
practice in HEIs
1. Lifelong learning and higher education
across 14 countries- core mission or
‘someone else’s business’?
2. Higher education in Ireland- challenges
of access and admission for adults as
lifelong learners
3. Culture change in higher educationwhat might an ‘Age Friendly University’
look like?
Lifelong learning- (recent)
evolution of a concept
• Role of international agencies- UNESCO, OECD,
World Bank…European Union
• Narrowing to skills agenda
• ‘Policy borrowing’ at national levels
• UNESCO (Faure report)
Learning to do
Learning to know
Learning to be
European Universities Charter on Lifelong
Learning(2008)
• Universities have a particular role in providing
‘research-based higher education for lifelong
learners’
• The impetus to develop more inclusive and
responsive universities is not a call for revolution, but
rather for evolution…In reality the key challenge is to
find ways that open up a wider range of educational
services to new learners and to returning learners,
and to ensuring continuing opportunities for learners
throughout their lives.
But…international comparative data on
participation in higher education: missing the
lifelong learners?
• Focus on Age Participation Rate (APR)
• Focus on full-time undergraduate entrantsexcluding much part-time, distance, postexperience and non-credit programmes
• Greatest HE expansion in non-university
institutions- polytechnics, community colleges,
further education colleges etc…
Higher education in the broader landscape of lifelong learning (Slowey and Schuetze
2012)
Conceptualising adult learners in
higher education
Life stage of student
Mode of study
Types of programmes
Organisation of provision
(1) Countries with relatively high levels of participation by adult
learners and demonstrating a relatively high degree of flexibility in
relation to entry criteria and study patterns: eg Sweden and the
United States.
(2) Countries where there were significant, but lower, proportions
of adult learners across the system as a whole, and where adult
students were frequently located in open universities or dedicated
centres of adult or continuing education within ‘mainstream’
institutions: this category included Australia, Canada, New Zealand
and the UK.
(3) Countries with low levels of adult participation in higher
education: this category included Austria, Germany, Ireland and
Japan.
Typology of lifelong learners in higher education
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
Second chance learners
Equity groups
Deferrers
Recurrent learners
Returners
Refreshers
Learners in later life
(Slowey and Schuetze 2012)
1. Lifelong learning and higher education
across 14 countries- core mission or
‘someone else’s business’?
2. Higher education in Ireland- challenges
of access and admission for adults as
lifelong learners
3. Culture change in higher educationwhat might an ‘Age Friendly University’
look like?
Phase 1: Historical foundations
• 1592 Trinity College established by charter from Queen Elizabeth
•1821 Royal Commission on primary education in Ireland
•1831 National school system established under British rule
•1845 Initiative to establish three secular Queen’s Colleges
•1852 Papal Bull to establish a Catholic University in Dublin- J.H.Newman appointed
Rector
•Reforms in 1880s
• 1908: Establishment of National University of Ireland (subsequently 4 constituent
colleges)
Phase 2: (Late) moderanisation
•1960s: OECD Review of secondary education
•Introduction of free secondary education
•Establishment of 2 National Institutes of Higher Education- subsequently DCU and UL
•Establishment of national system of Regional Technical Colleges- subsequently
Institutes of Technology
Phase 3: Expansion and policy focus on university research (‘knowledge economy’)
Universities on the island of Ireland
Institutes of Technology in Ireland
Despite reservations about the crudeness of international
rankings, by 2011
* eight Irish institutions featured in the top 500 in global
rankings out of more than 15,000 universities worldwide.
*per capita, Ireland had the 8th highest number of
high-ranking institutions
“…and we are ahead of the UK
and the US (on a per capita basis) on this metric”
Minister of Education, DES, 2011
This- despite the fact that investment per student
was below international comparator averages.
In the case of TCD for example,
it was estimated that investment per student enrolment
was “…less than a sixth that of universities in the US
with comparable outputs (Hazelkorn 2011)
While there has been considerable expansion of
higher education opportunities in recent years, this
expansion has mainly been in the provision of fulltime opportunities focused primarily on entrants
from upper second-level education. Irish higher
education students have the narrowest age-range
across all OECD countries reflecting the current
unresponsiveness of Irish higher education to the
skills needs of adults in the population.
OECD (2004) Review of HE in Ireland
… the period of this strategy demands that Ireland’s
higher education system become much more
flexible in provision in both time and place, and that
it facilitates transfer and progression through all
levels of the system. There remain significant
challenges in this area: successive reports have
recognized the relatively poor performance of our
system in the area of lifelong learning, while the
requirement for upgrading and changing of
employee skills and competencies is becoming ever
greater.
National Strategy for Higher Education in Ireland(2011)
Dublin Region Higher Education Alliance
(supported by the Strategic Innovation Fund of the Higher Education Authority)
Views on the changing nature of the student body
Disagree
Neutral
Agree
Level of classroom
engagement by
students has
increased
37.2
25.6
37.1
Student attendance
levels are declining
28.8
22.0
50.2
Increased diversity
has had a positive
impact on the
classroom learning
environment
10.4
36.8
57.7
Students are
increasingly well
prepared for third
level learning
71.4
16.9
11.7
1. Lifelong learning and higher education
across 14 countries- core mission or
‘someone else’s business’?
2. Higher education in Ireland- challenges
of access and admission for adults as
lifelong learners
3. Culture change in higher educationwhat might an ‘Age Friendly University’
look like?
David E.Bloom (2012)
10 Principles for an AFU-adopted by partner HEIs
1. To encourage the participation of older adults in all the core activities of
the university, including educational and research programmes.
2. To promote personal and career development in the second half of life and
to support those who wish to pursue “second careers”.
3. To recognise the range of educational needs of older adults (from those
who were early school-leavers through to those who wish to pursue
Master’s or PhD qualifications).
4. To promote intergenerational learning to facilitate the reciprocal sharing of
expertise between learners of all ages.
5. To widen access to online educational opportunities for older adults to
ensure a diversity of routes to participation.
6. To ensure that the university’s research agenda is informed by the needs of
an ageing society and to promote public discourse on how higher
education can better respond to the varied interests and needs of older
adults.
7. To increase the understanding of students of the longevity dividend and
the increasing complexity and richness that ageing brings to our society.
8. To enhance access for older adults to the university’s range of health and
wellness programmes and its arts and cultural activities.
9. To engage actively with the university’s own retired community.
10. To ensure regular dialogue with organisations representing the interests
of the ageing population.
Student on Intergenerational Learning Programme (ILP) meets with
Enda Kenny Taoiseach (Irish Prime Minister) at launch of DCU Age
Friendly University
Two concluding troublesome questions…
First, re conclusion from a north-south study of
Ireland over a decade ago
There is no obvious reason why the education
and young and full-time people should be
guaranteed whereas the education of
disadvantaged adults should be discretionary
and subject to the prevailing economic
circumstances, except perhaps that it has always
been so. If the new creed is lifelong learning, the
entire rational for funding post-school education
needs to be re-examined
P. McGill and M. Morgan (2001) Ireland’s Learning Poor: Adult Educational Disadvantage and
Cross-Border Co-operation, Armagh: The Centre for Cross Border Studies, pp.47-49
Second troublesome question- from a compartive European
study 15 years ago
It may seem fanciful to conceive of adult students
as agents of subversion, especially so when so often
they are the most rewarding of students to teach.
Yet the complexity of their social and economic
character and of their life-roles…helps to dissolve
what is distinct and, to so many, all precious about
traditional university or college life into a wider
stream of activity much closer to the rest of social
and cultural life.
E. Bourgeois, C. Duke, J.L. Guyot and B. Merril (1999) The Adult University
European HEA (2012) Existence of student status other than full-time