Professionals vs. role professionals: Conceptualizing professionalism among teachers of adults (original) (raw)
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Reflections on the Professionalisation of Adult Educators in the Context
The Role of Higher Education in the Professionalisation of Adult Educators , 2020
The context of adult education becomes more socially and culturally complex and poses many different options for the professionalisation of adult educators and adult education professionals. In this final chapter, we reflect on the meanings of the professionalisation of adult educators in the context of higher education and summarise the contributions of this book. There are empirical shreds of evidence that professional studies in the academic context and different academic programmes have a wider impact on personal satisfaction, self-esteem, a better understanding of the roles of adult educators, and affect the formation of their professional identity as well as learning and future professional choices.
The Professional Status of Adult Educators
Andragoška spoznanja
The paper reports findings from a research study carried out with adult education professionals working in Adult Education Centres (AECs) in Cyprus. It aims to explore how they experience their professional status in the programme as well as identify barriers that hinder their professionalisation and particular barriers caused in the course of the COVID-19 pandemic. The study harnesses qualitative methodology and adopts a bottom-up approach as it gives voice to adult educators and makes meaning out of their working experiences. It makes suggestions for the improvement of their professional status based on the idea of humanisation, a multifaceted process in which both the state and adult educators themselves should become communions.
Towards the professionalization of adult educators
2011
The European discourse regarding the adult educators has moved in the last decade from asking for 'innovative teaching', towards asking the Member States to implement systems of initial and continuous professional development (CPD) for adult learning professionals (ALP). Enlarging the focus from the prerequisite of ALP pedagogical competence to the wider training needs they have for ensuring the quality of education and training (E&T) is a positive approach to the more complex competency profile a professional in AE has to master. A big emphasis was put on identifying the competency profile of ALP. Also, a lot of smaller scale solutions have been developed, both by formal education and non-formal education (ex. by recognizing and integrating alternative pathways through the validation approach), being launched, in the same time, European tools for making transparent and comparable the qualification gathered in different contexts and countries. But, in spite of the intensive ...
Andragoške studije, issn 0354–5415, broj 2, Decembar 2015, str. 9–22 © Institut za pedagogiju i andragogiju; Pregledni članak UDK 374.71:658.3 Recent European-wide studies have shown that the adult learning sector is very diverse. This diversity can be seen in the various target groups of adult learning, subjects covered by adult learning courses, but also in the professional pathways to becoming an adult educator, the employment situation of adult learning professionals and furthermore, in the competences required for working in this sector. This diversity, however, makes it difficult to develop the sector in Europe as a whole and in particular as a dedicated profession. To partially overcome the 'hampering diversity' it is important to identify common elements in the work adult educators do and the key competences that come with carrying out their activities. Based on the results presented in relevant European studies, projects and reports, this paper suggests that in developing professional adult educators, compe-tences should be understood as a complex combination of knowledge, skills and abilities/ attitudes needed to carry out a specific activity, leading to results. Any set of competences therefore can be applicable for adult educators working in the sector, by abstracting from the specific context in which these professionals work. This means that not only the teaching activities, but also other activities (for example management activities and programme development activities) must be supported by a particular set of competences.
Refl ections on the Profession and Professionalization of Adult Education
The rich and varied fi eld of adult education is diffi cult to categorize. Lately, my faculty colleagues at the University of Georgia and I have been debating " what is the defi nition of adult education? " This is a particularly challenging question in an age of uncertainty. During one of these discussions, one faculty member asked, " why do we have to defi ne it? " Certainly there is power inherent in stating a formal defi nition: it excludes things and people. Yet, through these conversations, we decided that indeed it is our responsibility to defi ne " it. " We owe defi nition to our students who are engaged in adult education research and practice as those who will inherit the fi eld as practitioners and scholars and redefi ne it for the future. We are accountable to our institution to validate our existence. We are obligated to the fi eld, particularly when adult educa-tion's marginalization threatens programs and services. And, fi nally, we owe defi nition to adult educators who, whether they realize it or not, are engaged in the enterprise of supporting and facilitating adult learning in its myriad dimensions.
The Futures of Adult Educator(s): Agency, Identity and Ethos
"This edited volume contains a selection of papers presented in the 2nd ESREA|ReNAdET meeting that was jointly organised with the VET & CULTURE Network in the University of Tallinn, Estonia (9-11 November 2011). The theme of the volume is the future (or the futures) of adult educators and the papers that contain look upon issues of developing adult educators' identities and professional status, issues of networking and/or unionizing and collaborating among different "types" of adult educators and related staff in adult education in general, and issues of power and authority in the adult-educator interaction. A selected number of papers focus on the following themes: - Perceptions of adult educators: by adults-students, policy makers and in public. - Theoretical, political and practical discourses on adult educators: the future of adult education as an academic field. - Context and environment of adult education and different 'types' of adult educators. - Ownership of the adult educators? profession and professional borders: is there a professional future for adult educators? - Learning, becoming, being and growing as professional adult educator, including issues of ageing and gender." Available on ERIC Database (ERIC# ED535098)
Changes in the Activity of the Adult Educator
2011
This article aims at analyzing the influence of the specificity of the practices of recognition, validation and certification of non formal and informal learning on the functions and knowledge of the adult educators, work with adult low school education levels. From a theoretical point of view, we have based our research on the issues of adult education, experiential learning, and evaluation. Apart from an analysis of the functions and knowledge required to the trainers who work in the teams of the studied centres of recognition, validation and certification of non formal and informal learning we are going to examine the issues which they are confronted to in their professional practices.