Legislation and adult education in Canada: A comparative study

Thomas, Alan M.

doi:10.1080/0260137890080202

Cited by 4 publications

(5 citation statements)

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“…Furthermore, the federal government provides support for various kinds of adult education (essentially basic literacy and short-term job training) as well as student loans, research and funding for research, outreach and information. In practice, therefore, adult education is supported by a mixture of provincial and federal funds and the balance of federal and provincial responsibility influences nearly every aspect of adult education in Canada with, unsurprisingly, inevitable conflicts (Thomas 1989).…”

Section: Ale In Canadamentioning

confidence: 99%

CONFINTEA VI from a Canadian perspective

Rubenson

Nesbit

2011

Int Rev Educ

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The 12-yearly International Conferences of Adult Education (CONFINTEA) organised by UNESCO are significant events in the ongoing global dialogues about adult learning and education (ALE) and its role within society. Thus, the latest conference held in Brazil in 2009 offered a major opportunity to consider and review developments about ALE policies and practices worldwide and encouraged both national governments and non-governmental organisations alike to examine their approaches to adult education and lifelong learning. After a review of the process that Canada adopted in following the UNESCO guidelines for preparing its country report, this paper focuses specifically on the involvement of Canada's major academic adult education organisation and details its concerns with both the development and the substance of the report. Comparing it with the country reports of Finland, Sweden and the UK, the authors analyse the Canadian report and provide some explanatory reasons why, in their opinion, both the process and the result provided a less than complete picture of ALE in Canada and, in so doing, fell short of UNESCO's aspirations for CONFINTEA.

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Section: Ale In Canadamentioning

confidence: 99%

CONFINTEA VI from a Canadian perspective

Rubenson

Nesbit

2011

Int Rev Educ

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“…Other writers find strengths mirrored in what their colleagues view as weaknesses. Although the field's characteristically diverse range of research interests and methodological approaches has been seen as fragmenting research efforts (Garrison & Baskett, 1989), Alan Thomas (1995) suggests that what may be emerging is, in fact, a new research paradigm based on "learning" rather than on "education. "…”

Section: Future Possibilities and Strategiesmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Several possibilities are suggested in the literature. The most likely scenario is that the current situation remains unchanged, and the field continues, as Thomas (1995) describes it, in a "slow, a too slow, ascent to conventional power and respectability" (p. 110)-an ascent that is even more difficult, and unlikely, for adult educators in UCE than for those in traditional academic departments. A remote possibility, certainly in the short term, is that transformations within the field of adult education will impact positively on the training and research orientations of future generations of university continuing educators, assuming that staffing models within UCE come to recognize the value of such training.…”

Section: Future Possibilities and Strategiesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Research on University Continuing Education: Barriers and Future Possibilities

Percival

Kops

1999

CJUCE

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This paper examines barriers to research on university continuing education (UCE) in terms of two groups of factors: those that inhibit adult education research generally, and those that are specific to the UCE context and adversely affect research activity in this setting. Within UCE, the mandate, culture, qualifications of staff, the nature of work, and the nature of research that is conducted make traditional approaches to research problematic. The paper suggests that acceptance of a broader conceptualization of research by university continuing educators could enhance research related to practice.

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“…After conducting a survey of the literature, Wagner (1989a) has criticized the quantity and quality of research in French into literacy in Canada and claims that these problems are inhibiting the development of measures to combat illiteracy. Thomas, Taylor and Gaskin (1989) discuss the role of the federal government, as opposed to the provincial governments, in adult basic education, documenting the federal government's contention that they have provided much more leadership in this area than have the provincial governments, even though the provincial governments constitutionally have jurisdiction over education. This perspective complements the surveys of Cairns and Boucher and provides much more historical detail.…”

Section: Policy Overviews and Surveysmentioning

confidence: 99%

Adult Literacy Issues in Canada

Burnaby¹

1991

Ann Rev Appl Ling

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This chapter concerns adult literacy issues in Canada—adults being defined as people fifteen years or older and out of school—and focuses primarily on adults who are not (or are barely) literate in any language. Until the mid-1980s, educational support for adults who wished to develop or improve their literacy skills up to about the grade eight level was almost entirely a charitable endeavor. People with low literacy skills were perceived to be a marginal group consisting of elderly people who had not had the chance to go to school, people with disabilities who were considered to be untrainable, certain immigrant populations, and people who had failed in the school system through some individual weakness. In 1985, in the midst of national concerns about the productivity of the country's labor force, the government of Ontario launched a program of funding for three explicit purposes: 1) to assist literacy programs for adult learners, 2) to support literacy organizations, and 3) to fund a small amount of community based research on adult literacy. The federal government followed suit in 1986, establishing the National Literacy Secretariat in the Department of the Secretary of State for Canada.

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Legislation and adult education in Canada: A comparative study

Cited by 4 publications

References 0 publications

CONFINTEA VI from a Canadian perspective

CONFINTEA VI from a Canadian perspective

Research on University Continuing Education: Barriers and Future Possibilities

Adult Literacy Issues in Canada

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