Division for Lifelong Learning (DLL)http://hdl.handle.net/10566/2392024-03-28T12:21:07Z2024-03-28T12:21:07ZEquity, access and success: adult learners in public higher educationBuchler, MichelleCastle, JaneOsman, RuksanaWalters, Shirleyhttp://hdl.handle.net/10566/49492021-09-15T09:31:37Z2007-01-01T00:00:00ZEquity, access and success: adult learners in public higher education
Buchler, Michelle; Castle, Jane; Osman, Ruksana; Walters, Shirley
Unlike research into access and success for school-leavers entering higher education (HE) in
South Africa, very little research has been conducted into adult learners in HE. Apart from
generalized, albeit extensive, socio-economic studies on poverty and inequality, including
changing patterns of participation in education more generally (for example, Gelb, 2003), there
is little information, at the systems level, on ‘deeper’ questions, such as the push/pull factors for
adult learners entering higher education, the barriers they face and experience once in higher
education institutions, their success and completion rates, and their reasons for entering HE
institutions. These issues have taken on a much greater significance than before in post-1994
higher education policy developments that call for the widening of the social base of higher
education to include, inter alia, adult learners.
In this context, the broad purpose of the research was to find out whether a higher education
system that facilitates access, equity and success for adult learners exists or is being formulated
in South Africa. One aspect of the research was to investigate the participation rates of adult
learners in the higher education system, in general, and to attempt to identify variables (apart
from age), such as gender, class, race, marital status and family obligations, employment status
and sectors, and funding sources, which may characterize adult learners as a distinct group. The
second aspect of the research was to study the ways in which three public institutions – the Vaal
University of Technology (VUT), the University of the Witwatersrand (Wits) and the University
of the Western Cape (UWC) – engage with adult learners as a ‘special’ category of student. This
aspect of the study was designed to identify systemic and contextual factors that facilitate or
hinder the participation of adult learners, and to provide insights into the nature and quality of
adult learners’ experiences of particular institutions and programmes. The questions that framed
the research were:
• Who are the adult learners in public higher education? How are they defined and
characterized? How are these understandings of adult learners reflected in programme
design?
• Which programmes do adult learners access? What is the nature and quality of these
programmes?
• Are institutions responsive to adult learners, and to policies advocating an increase in
their participation? Why, or why not?
2007-01-01T00:00:00ZLifelong, life-wide and life-deep learning: utilizing the lens of HIV/AIDSWalters, Shirleyhttp://hdl.handle.net/10566/49482019-10-08T00:00:51ZLifelong, life-wide and life-deep learning: utilizing the lens of HIV/AIDS
Walters, Shirley
In this presentation, I use a discussion on pedagogies of HIV/AIDS as a lens to sharpen and clarify ways of thinking about adult and lifelong learning, particularly in and for the majority world. HIV/AIDS highlight some of the most difficult social, economic, cultural and personal issues that any adult educators have to confront. I adopt a critical participatory action research methodology to reflect back on the approaches we have developed over several years. From these experiences, our observations are that working with people infected and affected by HIV/AIDS bring into sharp focus the need for pedagogical approaches (i) to include male and female, children and adults across generations, for all ages (i.e. lifelong learning); (ii) to recognize the importance of sustainable livelihoods and systemic issues in a life-wide approach (i.e.
life wide learning); and (iii) to work with deeply personal issues relating to death and sexual relations which tap into the cultural, spiritual, and intimate aspects of people’s lives (i.e. life deep learning). I use theoretical frameworks from feminist popular education, post-colonial theory and adult and lifelong learning. The paper is a ‘work in progress’.
This paper is a work in progress. While it is available online it is not a published version. I think it has been published in a different form with a different title together with Heather Ferris. It is available at this website: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/238723042_LIFELONG_LIFE-WIDE_AND_LIFE-DEEP_LEARNING_UTILIZING_THE_LENS_OF_HIVAIDS_1
Building a learning region: Whose framework of lifelong learning matters?Walters, Shirleyhttp://hdl.handle.net/10566/49472019-10-07T05:51:39Z1992-01-01T00:00:00ZBuilding a learning region: Whose framework of lifelong learning matters?
Walters, Shirley
This chapter is part of a book that aims to provide an accessible, practical and scholarly source of information about the international concern for the philosophy, theory, categories, and concepts of lifelong learning. In this chapter, the author examines the development of ‘learning regions’ in various parts of the world as a means for understanding how lifelong learning is enmeshed in the socio-economic and political approaches of a region. The development of indicators in one learning region in the Western Cape Province of South Africa, is used to demonstrate how complex and contested lifelong learning is. It is also used to identify a range of paradoxes, which are at the heart of lifelong learning.
This may need to be bought or sources online. http://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007%2F978-1-4020-6193-6_16
1992-01-01T00:00:00ZReflecting on the global report on adult learning and education in the “post-truth society”Walters, ShirleyWatters, Kathyhttp://hdl.handle.net/10566/47712019-08-06T00:01:30Z2017-01-01T00:00:00ZReflecting on the global report on adult learning and education in the “post-truth society”
Walters, Shirley; Watters, Kathy
This article contextualizes and reviews the third global report on adult learning
and education (ALE) released by UNESCO in 2016. The authors suggest that it is a
visionary document, which is articulated through the bringing together of data from
a range of areas that are usually kept apart. They recognize the report as a bold
attempt to project what role ALE plays, or could play, within a holistic philosophy
and approach to lifelong learning. They argue that given the ambitious nature of the
task, and the inevitable tensions and contradictions that exist within a report of this
nature, the report both fails to present a robust picture of ALE and succeeds as
an advocacy document toward achievement of the Sustainable Development Goals.
They recognize that the political and pedagogical work undertaken by the third Global
Report on Adult Learning and Education is at an early stage. Alongside this work, they
argue for the importance of the broader nonformal and informal ALE, including
popular education, as a means of challenging the “post-truth society.”
2017-01-01T00:00:00Z