Providers of Adult Education
| I know what you're thinking: Weren't providers of adult education just listed in the history section? Yes, they were, but frameworks for looking at providers were not. Looking at provider frameworks is just as important as understanding the various definitions of adult education -- it's also just as confusiong! Even Jerold Apps, an expert on the subject says, "Developing a framework for understanding adult education is no easy task. Those trying to dscribe adult education as a field of educational activity often have been frustrated" (1989, p.257). Not very encouraging. But all of this is going to be cleared up for you right now because Apps has simplified things for us by creating a list of possible frameworks. The information below, unless otherwise stated, has been take from: Apps, J. (1989). "Providers of Adult and Continuing Education: A Framework." Handbook of Adult and Continuing Education. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass. |
Possible Frameworks for Providers of AE
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Public Schools |
Libraries |
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National Public Programs (including agricultural extension and government vocational classes resulting from the Smith-Hughes Act of 1917) |
Colleges and Universities ( including extension and alumni programs) |
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Federal Emergency Programs |
Workers' Groups |
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Religious Bodies |
Parent-Teacher Groups |
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Museums |
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AE is organized around six areas of interest activity and need |
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Vocational Efficiency (including educational activity of corporations, private correspondence schools and hospitals) |
Better Human Relations and Community Improvement (cooperative extension, intercultural education) |
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Economic Understanding (labor management, labor and consumer education) |
Group Interest (education for later maturity and young adults) |
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Civic Participation and Responsibility (immigrant education, education for Native Americans, safety education) |
Personal Growth and Self-Realization (creative arts, recreation, health education and music as an educational and recreational field) |
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Six categories of institutional resources |
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Religious Institutions and Organizations |
Libraries |
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Public Schools |
Museums |
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Colleges and Universities |
Schools for Adults (e.g. Chautauqua) |
Knowles proposes five dimensions which go beyond only providers of adult education, but his ideas have helped others in creating their own models. His five dimensions are:
From: Knowles, M. (1964).The field of operations in adult education. In G. Jenson, A. Liveright, and W. Hallenbeck (Eds.) Adult Education: Outlines of an emerging field of university study. Washington, DC: Adult Education Association of the U.S.A.
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Type I Agencies to serve the educational needs of adults--AE is a central function |
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Type II Agencies to serve the educational needs of youth which have assumed the added responsibility of at least partially serving the needs of adults--AE is a secondary function |
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Type III Agencies to serve both educational and non-educational needs of the community--AE is an allied function employed to fulfill only some of the needs which agencies recognize as their responsibility |
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Type IV Agencies to serve the special interests (economic, ideological) of special groups--AE is a subordinate function employed primarily to further the special interests of the agency itself. |
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Other well known frameworks include Coombs' divisions of formal, nonformal, and informal learning and Peterson's distinction between deliberate education and learning and unintentional learning. Because these two frameworks deal more specifically with learning, they will be covered in the adult learning section. However, they are important to think about in terms of providers of AE because they allow room for self-directed learning.
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Knowles and Schroeder |
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Institutionalized, organized activities |
Institutional Agencies |
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Self-directed inquiry of individuals |
Voluntary Associations |
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AE as a social and cultural movement |
Individual Agents |
In 1980 Knowles and Schroeder each wrote a chapter in Peterson's Building an Effective Adult Education Enterprise where they looked at approaches to understanding AE.
1986 U.S. Department of Education
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Four-year Colleges or Universities |
Other Schools |
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Two-year Community Colleges, Junior Colleges, or Technical Institutes |
Private Community Organizations (incl. churches, synagogues, YMCA, Red Cross) |
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Vocational, Trade, or Business Schools (incl. hospitals and trade schools) |
Governmental Agencies (federal, state, county, or local) |
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Elementary or High Schools |
Labor or Professional Organizations |
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Tutor, Private Instructors, or Others |
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Notice what the DOE considers AE to be, "No attempt is made to obtain information about self-directed learning activities or even about participation in conferences, workshops, and the hundreds of other learning activities that are not courses" (p. 279).
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Type A institutions provide adult education as an exclusive function |
Type B institutions are schools and other educational institutions offering adult education as a secondary function |
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Type C institutions are community service agencies that provide adult education as a secondary function |
Type D institutions are private organizations that offer adult education as a secondary function |
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Type E institutions are voluntary organizations and groups that provide adult education as a secondary function |
Type F institutions are government agencies that offer adult education as a secondary function |
Tax Supported: Public Schools, Colleges & Universities, Cooperative Extension, Armed Forces, etc.
Nonprofit: Religious Institutions, Community-based Agencies, Professional Organizations, etc.
For Profit: Proprietary Schools, Consultant & Workshop Providers, HRD, Computer Software Publishers, etc.
Nonorganized: Mass Media, Family, Recreational & Leisure-time Activities, etc.
In chapter 5 of The Profession and Practice of Adult Education, Merriam and Brockett provide a sort of "meta map" of the field by creating their own way of sorting the many ways of organizing providers. Their "tripartite model" includes: Institutions, Content, and Clienteles. Most of the models on this page have to do with institutions.
"Content areas," write Merriam and Brockett, "tend to cut across institutional lines" (p. 112). Some examples of content areas would be: HRD, continuing professional education, remedial or compensatory education, citizen education, and even technology. The advantage of looking at content areas is that it presents a wider range of adult learning experiences.
Their third area looks at who delivers adult education and the target audience who receives it. One way of looking at deliverers is to imagine a continuum ranging from full-time professional adult educators to those whose work has some influence on adult education (p. 116). Those who receive adult education can be grouped in any number of ways: By gender, age, ability, ethnicity, profession, etc.
Apps' framework is helpful for understanding what he calls "the new field of adult education that is emerging" (p. 283). He points out that there are several issues we need to be aware of when considering the concept of "providers":
For-Profit Adult Education: This is now the fastest growing segment of AE--many adults are willing to pay for their learning and for-profit providers often give people what they really want. But, we need to ask ourselves if the growth of for-profits will create an even larger gap between the haves and have-nots. How will tax-supported education compete with the for-profits?
Nonorganized Learning: For many adults, this is the primary source of learning--as educators, we need to find ways to help adult learners take full advantage of this kind of learning.
Impact of Information Technology: Technology offers us many wonderful possibilities for teaching and learning, but we need to remain critical about what it can and cannot accomplish.
Quality Control: Will the market for learning keep the quality of programs high or do we need to control providers of adult education through some kind of licensing? Is the learner-consumer responsible for his or her own "safety" in the market, or do we, as educators, have a responsibility to protect them?