Promoting Adult Learning
This publication provides policy guidance in an area that has been given little policy priority until recent years. It brings together key lessons from 17 OECD countries, providing evidence on the strategies in place to improve adults’ participation in learning. It addresses potential barriers to learning as well as the policies to remedy them. Among these are policies for increasing and promoting the benefits of adult learning to make them transparent and easily recognised. Other policy levers include economic incentives and co-financing mechanisms that can raise the efficiency of adult learning provision, while delivering quality learning that is adapted to adults’ needs. Finally, policy making can be improved via co-ordination and coherence in a field that is characterised by a wide variety of stakeholders, including ministries of education and ministries of labour.
- Click to access:
-
Click to download PDF - 1.30MBPDF
Improving Delivery and Quality Control
This chapter provides an analysis of different institutional arrangements in place for learning, including programmes based at the firm and workplace levels, which remain the principle locations of learning for most adults of working age. Overall, experience from the review countries highlights the importance of delivering flexible learning arrangements that are targeted to the specific needs of the populations concerned. Furthermore, adults are more likely to participate in adult learning programmes if the learning supply is one of quality. Poor-quality programmes and lack of knowledge of programme results, on the other hand, can easily reduce investment as well as participation. Thus, quality control and programme evaluation should be considered integral components of adult learning systems. Throughout the chapter, special attention is put on programmes for low-skilled adults.
- Click to access:
-
Click to download PDF - 463.36KBPDF