                          8.  TOWARD LIFELONG LEARNING
        
               Adult education in the year 2000 will be shaped by two
        trends: first, in the general social development of North
        American society, and secondly, in the evolution of formal
        education.  Canada and the United States are undergoing a major
        transformation that affects their economies, political systems,
        cultures, and social structures.  
        
               This transformation, Henchey (1991) wrote, is the result
        of the following factors: (1) the changing role of knowledge in
        society; (2) an ongoing revolution in communication technology;
        (3) increasing global economic competition; (4) ecological limits
        to development; (5) growing cultural pluralism; and (6) greater
        difficulty in finding meaning in a changing world.  He stated
        that the major goals of education are now priorities and
        performance.  As advanced societies recognize their economic
        priorities as dependent on skilled resources, economic
        competition and restructuring set educational priorities.  To
        reorient education toward these priorities and to improve
        performance, education systems rely largely on quantitative
        change within the framework of existing structures and
        assumptions.  The concept of lifelong learning, from his
        perspective, does not appear to have caught on.  Society
        continues to believe in a series of assumptions about schooling
        and education that need to be questioned.  The vision of learning
        and education systems needs to be enlarged to include integration
        of learning policy into broader social and economic policies and
        creation of a learning culture.  The 1990s seem to be a strategic
        moment for fundamental rethinking of learning for the 21st
        century.
        
               The landscape of higher education is being changed by
        increasing numbers of adult students, most of whom are part time.
        
        By 1992, Kerka (1992) predicted that 48 percent of all higher
        education enrollments would be part time and half of all college
        students would be over the age of 25.  Causes of the trend
        include shrinking numbers of traditional-age students, greater
        emphasis on mandatory continuing education, and more jobs
        affected by technological change.  Although adults may be
        motivated by job/career change, career enhancement, or personal
        enrichment, education is only one of many competing priorities. 
        Part-time study may be an adult's only option, because the
        university climate does not cater to this clientele.  Some of the
        barriers to part-time study for adults include the following:
        inability to resolve home/work/study conflicts or to organize
        study time; embarrassment, anxiety, and ambivalence about
        returning to school; inconvenient scheduling and access
        to campus services; lack of financial aid; time limits for
        completing course requirements; and campus rules and regulations
        designed for traditional-age students.  These trends and barriers
        bring out four areas needing attention by the adult education
        
        establishment: academic assistance and personal advising,
        financial assistance, access to services, and flexibility.
        
               Continuing with this notion, Onushkin (1990) predicted
        that the crisis in education that faces the nations of the world
        at the end of the 20th century requires not only a new approach
        to the development of education as a social institution, but also
        the restructuring of the traditional systems of planning and
        management of education.  The democratization of educational
        planning is called for, in which a flexible and open system would
        involve all persons and groups of people with a stake in the
        system, not just educational administrators and bureaucrats.  A
        new system of educational planning and management must put
        individuals at its center, not some social or economic problem to
        be solved at the moment.  Education must be seen in terms of
        fostering lifelong learning.  His predictions were consistent
        with what Knowles and the others described as the principles and
        practices of andragogy, ultimately leading to LLL.
        
               For Glines (1991), the emerging global and societal
        conditions demanded more than the rhetoric of restructuring,
        reform, change, and innovation.  He stated that "educators must
        adopt the spirit of astronauts to confront the issues directly,
        create a desirable future for learning, and overcome the inertia
        of the existing school system."  His description of the proposal
        for the Minnesota Experimental City (MXC) presented an exciting
        educational alternative.  Planned for a community of 250,000
        people, the MXC features waterless toilets, a geodesic dome,
        centralized/decentralized living, electronic technology, people
        movers, and no cars.  Most importantly, it is designed with no
        schools; the city itself will be a lifelong learning laboratory. 
        Although the city has not yet been constructed, creative
        educational architects can adapt the concepts and weave them into
        the local district transitions needed to move into the 21st
        century.  School leaders can begin by designating one existing
        facility as a district-wide MXC space center for education or by
        creating school-within-a-school experiments throughout the
        district.  Glines indicated that the idea of research and
        development in education must be restored.  Year-round schooling
        offers creative possibilities, but the Coalition for Essential
        Schools is focused on improving what already exists, promoting
        20th century notions such as school-based management, teacher
        development, and interventions for disadvantaged students.  
        
               Taking a very simplistic approach, vanderZee (1991) wrote
        that the strategic issues in the development of a learning
        society prepared to face the 21st century and avoid the
        "obsolescence of mankind" are (1) broadening the definition of
        learning to include "cradle to grave" concepts; (2) making the
        goal of learning the growth toward human completeness (in
        Maslow's terminology, becoming self-actualized); (3) increasing
        collective competence; (4) fostering autonomy in learners; and
        (5) stressing a political approach to learning, or, the right to
        learn as a civil right.  vanderZee's principles closely parallel
        many of the suppositions presented in Part's 2, 3, and 4 of this
        paper.  The reader will note the collectiveness of his approach. 
        Given the nature of the new information age, his approach fosters
        the interconnectedness of all people, rather than isolating the
        individual learner from the mass of other
        human beings also struggling to become increasingly competent in
        the midst of social upheaval.  
        
               In "Teaching for the Information Age", Dahlberg (1990)
        reviewed assumptions about learners, learning and the learning
        environment in an information age economy and argued that one
        approach to encourage literacy and lifelong learning was to bring
        a learner's natural learning abilities, and especially problem
        solving, into the learning environment.  As the society continues
        to evolve away from a second to third wave or information age,
        problem solving, thinking, creating, and synthesizing will be the
        new three R's, and without them, man is doomed to obsolescence.
        
               The skills of knowing how to learn and apply information,
        which have been collectively grouped under the heading "learning
        management," are becoming increasingly important as society
        progresses farther into the information age, Harrison (1988)
        wrote.  Because adult learning is usually more self-directed and
        because adults are largely free to determine their learning
        objectives, they must learn to manage their learning even more
        than young people who are still in school.  Several courses in
        learning management have been developed to meet the growing need
        for instruction in this area.  Although most are based on the
        premise that learning how to learn can and should be an integral
        part of learning a content area, at least one undergraduate level
        course (part of the Cognitive Learning Strategies Project at
        the University of Texas at Austin) is devoted to learning to
        learn as an area of study apart from any other content area.  The
        latter course focuses on executive control and knowledge
        acquisition processes, active study skills, and support
        strategies (such as reducing anxiety and dealing with
        procrastination).  Harrison maintained that memorizing,
        understanding, and doing (MUD) are the primary keys to
        pedagogical learning.  Digressing from the premise of MUD, adult
        educators are urged to use few formal lectures, plan for group
        work, use nonassessed worksheets, and allow a pondering period in
        each class session.  Group problem-based learning was another
        method of enhancing learning management skills.  It was
        particularly well-suited to work site learning management
        programs.  Each of these educational strategies supported
        the goal of lifelong learning concepts, because the learners are
        being prepared not for amassing a personal body of knowledge, but
        learning how to learn regardless of what the area of interest or
        the problem that is facing them.
        
               Across the nation, experiments are being implemented to
        meet the challenges of lifelong learning in the context of the
        21st century.  In Livingston, Montana, a project in LLL was
        conducted in two parts.  The first part gathered data about the
        following: (1) what respondents had learned in the previous 12
        months; (2) their sources of information and how they rated them;
        (3) why they initiated learning activities; (4) economic costs
        and benefits; (5) what they might like to learn in the future;
        and (6) resources to which they would turn.  The second part
        generated additional information about learning networks and
        learning providers.  Data gathering relied on field research and
        field theory.  A stratified random sample using the local
        telephone directory generated names of 100 prospective
        respondents; 60 were interviewed.  Findings showed that positive
        and negative forces, both internal and external, led respondents
        to engage in learning activities.  Respondents identified 302
        learning activities with which they had been involved during the
        past year.  The most frequently mentioned resources were
        themselves, their own books, friends, family, and library books. 
        Respondents were more satisfied with human than nonhuman
        resources.  The most frequently mentioned reason for learning was
        necessity.  The average learner spent approximately $1,000 per
        year.  Respondents did not realize economic benefits in 68.42
        percent of their learning activities.  The most frequently
        identified category of learning for the next year was cultural;
        the most frequently mentioned resource was paid teachers. 
        Learning providers exhibited a wide range of teaching skills at
        various levels of proficiency.  These findings correlate with
        Tough's research in Canada, and other research being done in
        other countries cited earlier in this paper.  As the information
        age continues to crash toward the shores of civilization
        throughout the world, more and more people will undertake
        individual learning projects as part of their own individual
        growth and development.  It is interesting that even though there
        was no significant economic outcome to be realized in any of
        these projects, individuals continued to pursue them.  This is
        the essence of a third wave or lifelong learner; the person who
        chooses to pursue individual self-fulfillment and ultimately,
        self-actualization through the pursuit of learning projects.     
        
               Ohliger (1990) argued that knowledge has been narrowed to
        "facts" or "information", that there is a superstitious pervasive
        belief that education is a panacea for preparing individuals for
        the future, and that education lacks a coherent set of goals or
        philosophy.  He called for an increase in lifelong learning to
        focus more on understanding and less on knowledge gathering,
        more on being and less on doing, and more humor and less
        seriousness.  He emphasized the need to utilize modern tools of
        the information age like computers, FAX machines and other mass
        media.  He believed these tools will further accelerate the
        individuals ability to learn to cope with the information
        explosion.
        
               Supporting this position and focusing on understanding and
        the use of computers for learning in the information age, Johnson
        (1991) argued that the process of education, experiential
        learning, and facilitative teaching provide an answer to the
        educational challenge and malaise spawned by the information
        explosion.  He believed that experiential learning programs,
        internships, and cooperative education experiences would
        facilitate new approaches to dealing with the problems facing the
        individual bombarded with the overwhelming amount of new
        information.  
        
               Wolter (1988) researched the use of computer assisted
        instruction with adults.  A Canadian pilot project in
        computer-assisted instruction (CAI) was conducted to allow adults
        who have not succeeded in traditional education programs to work
        independently at their own level and receive regular constructive
        feedback.  The project was intended for learners requiring
        specialized training to get this training in their community and
        improve their chances of either becoming employed or raising
        their level of employment.  Computer systems were installed in
        all Keewatin (Canada) communities in August 1987.  The system
        consisted of a local area network of either five or eight
        computer terminal work stations, connected to a file server that
        stores the courseware, a printer, and a communications modem. 
        The instructional package purchased was Plato, courseware
        providing academic upgrading for grades 4-13.  Plato was to be
        used three hours daily as part of the adult basic education
        program.  Business application software was also used
        extensively.  The number of students attending the centers and
        applicants for the next year increased markedly.  The rate of
        learning significantly increased.  Learners gained job readiness
        skills through academics, job search, and life skills programs in
        Plato.  The learners' chances of getting employment increased,
        because of their new skills and employer perceptions of students
        who can use a computer.  Though this was just one project, there
        is a need for increasing research into the effects of CAI in the
        lifelong learning environment of the onrushing information age.  
        
               Computers will surely affect learning in first world
        countries, but Jalaluddin (1990) considered how computers may
        affect lifelong learning in developing nations.  He suggested
        computers might qualitatively change education and liberate
        existing systems from centralization and curriculum to
        information processing, thinking, creating, and synthesizing.  He
        expressed concern however, that modernization may widen the
        information gap between developed and developed nations if in the
        developing nations there is no emphasis on this type of lifelong
        learning.  
        
               Lifelong learning as a concept, and as a process will
        continue to be researched, reviewed, toyed with, debated,
        challenged, supported, and hopefully, once and for all accepted
        by the majority of educators around the world so that human
        beings will be successfully prepared to meet the new information
        age.  Looking into the crystal ball with prescience, the adult
        educator or facilitator will need to consider many nuances never
        before faced by humans involved in learning.  But given the
        availability of information from all over the world, using
        computers and other mass means of communication, people will
        learn, problems will be solved, and like the Sartre-ists, humans
        will be able to give meaning to their lives, all their lives-
        long.
