Title of Book: Participation and the Pursuit of Equality: essays in adult learning, widening participation and achievement.

Author(s) or Editor(s): Edited by Alan Tuckett

Publisher: NIACE, Leicester.

Year published: 2007

Price: £22.95 or €36.50

ISBN number: ISBN 978 1 86201 256 1

Reviewer: Carmel Dennison, February 2007

Alan Tuckett describes this book as a ‘festschrift’ to the researcher and adult learner champion Veronica McGivney, who recently retired from NIACE. In tribute to her long-term and outstanding work on behalf of adult learners, 11 academics, researchers and practitioners in the field of lifelong learning and widening participation were each invited to add a chapter to the publication. This provides readers an excellent opportunity, not only to reflect on McGivney’s radical contribution in the field of adult learning, but to look back over the past 20 years or so, to see what progress has been made in the struggle for greater equity for marginalised groups, particularly in the UK.

Ursula Howard begins by telling a number of stories about individuals and their desire to engage in learning. She poses the question ‘In what circumstances does a learner flourish?’ and suggests that in the UK we often treat adults, who know themselves what they want to learn, as if they were children about whose learning other people know best. She suggests the need for a different mentality to the rather bi-polar and old ways of classifying adult education: intellectual versus technical; vocational versus academic; formal versus informal; and so on. This sort of categorisation determines policy-makers’ decisions on ‘what counts’ versus ‘what doesn’t count’, but we can’t afford to ignore the complex realities of learners’ lives by using sweeping generalisations and stereotypes which help little. She reflects on the richness of the history of informal learning and how adults’ learning journeys are often circuitous, and that we need less defined boundaries between education, community development and social justice. Later in the book, Maria Slowey takes up the theme, highlighting the complexity and diversity of adults’ journeys, and the lack of real support for part-time learners. Judith Summers harkens back to the Kennedy Report of 1997 and its key recommendations to recognise the importance and value of informal routes on the adult learning journey.

Julia Preece opens up the debate to include consideration of lifelong learning in the Global South. Traditional societies always practised indigenous pedagogies which embraced lifelong learning but the dominant discourses of old colonial powers still have tendency to displace these. She questions the notion of ‘development’ derived in the West which fail to address gender issues, and which promote programmes which are inappropriate to people’s daily lives and where issues of power are not addressed.

Jane Thompson reminds us of feminist perspectives of the 1980s. Learning can be about liberation/emancipation and ‘skills’ do not equate to ‘education’. She suggests New Labour’s flirtation with the concept of lifelong learning was short-lived and that nowadays the government listens more to employers than educators and has a tendency to use the ‘deficit model’. This blames the individual for his/her lack of skills when often the problems are systemic/structural in nature.

Wilma Fraser, Chris Scarlett and Annie Winner also pose questions about the government’s emphasis on ‘economic efficiency’ rather than the encouragement of adult education as ‘critical reflection’. Richard Taylor suggests there is little other than rhetoric in the government’s commitment to education for its own liberatory sake and that their emphasis on 17-21 year olds defies demographic trends. He suggests that intellectual rigour, critical expertise and the democratic spirit should be the hallmark of the widening participation experience, not the dreary mantra of ‘skills training’. Stephen McNair reflects that the post-war ‘baby bulge’ generation has always challenged dominant assumptions in society and will challenge discrimination against the older workforce, whilst Peter Lavender examines the role of the volunteer over the past 30 years and how they have been used but not valued by successive governments.

John Field concludes by focusing on the concept of social capital and the benefits (and also non-benefits) of strong social networks on adult participation. He emphasises the value of outreach, partnerships and community-based learning ‘Getting it wrong may mean that without due care, providers and policy-makers may inadvertently help to reinforce existing inequalities rather than challenge and help overcome them’ (p168).

This publication carries a strong message for practitioners, theorists, policy-makers, administrators, and all who have an interest in promoting adult learning and widening participation, and will be a valuable resource for them. Reflecting back over the past 20 years helps us to focus on what is needed for the future. In Alan Tuckett’s words ‘ The case needs to be made afresh that adults who have benefited least from earlier education, need access to a rich mix of formal and informal learning opportunities, they need flexible progression routes, and they need a system that respects what they bring to their studies’ (p14).