Last week's NIACE Policy Committee was very useful on an number of fronts. In particular, the general concern from all those participating around the position facing part-time adult learners. This concern covered both university and FE level provision and Dick Taylor (our Chair of Trustees) spoke strongly on the serious issues facing the funding of adult learning in Higher Education.
It made me realise that the structures, contracts and cultures within which we have to work are obscuring a situation where part-time adult learning at all levels is becoming disconnected from the drive to full-time provision for younger people in FE and HE. This is accelerating in the changes coming in the Machinery of Government proposals and in the changes in funding regulations in Higher Education.
At the meeting, Alan Tuckett, the NIACE Director presented a paper which he has now written as an article appearing in today's 'Guardian'. 'click here'.
These issues and Alan's 'shopping list' are timely in relation to the WEA's own thinking on its strategic direction. In particular, they are a reminder that we need to argue for the continuation of part-time adult education opportunities for all adults from a range of providers and at all levels. The survival of the WEA would be little consolation if it were an exception within an overall collapse of lifelong learning opportunities that individuals can chose without reference to their employer.
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