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The opening up of higher education and the development of higher education insti-tutions as institutionalized and organized settings for lifelong learning has been focused in educational policy and scientific discourse for more than ten years. Consequently, research at the interface between further education and higher education research at international, European and national levels has been intensified in order to disclose framework conditions, forms and challenges regarding current and expec…
The article provides a systematizing overview of contemporary methodological approaches and results of research on guidance and counselling. As well qualitative as quantitative approaches will be explored and concerning its insight located. Different but also complementary findings become visible. At the end, it will be argued in favour of a further elaboration of research on guidance and counselling in adult education. Therefore, it should be looked for a mutual relation between studies and a …
In the last years the issue of adult literacy has gained international and national importance – not least due to the comparative surveys IALS, ALL, and PIAAC, conducted by the OECD. The result was a series of developments in education policy, in particular regarding the promotion and financing of adult literacy programmes. Based on country reports, the present article provides internationally comparative insight into the discussion regarding the promotion and financing of adult literacy progra…
Stepped courses of studies and professionalization of adult education Reflections against the background of first experiences at the Ruhr-University Bochum The contribution takes the occasion of the dynamics of reform, with the transposition of the study into two cycles, to show policy-making decisions which need to be made for the study offers in the area of adult education. One important point of reference is the question, as to what extent the reform counteracts the efforts concerning pr…
"Further education for all" as a theory problem On pedagogy and its partial areas The policy metaphor "further education for all" poses a challenge for further education processes in adult education and the special education. It puts aspects of disability and disadvantage from the edge into the centre of the theory problems. The question is how further education and special education (can) deal with the altered public problem horizon. It is analysed how the two pedagogical partial areas cho…
Internationality is increasingly gaining in importance for the domain of further education. However, its tangible added value is of a size which has hitherto been difficult to define for adult-pedagogic practice. This tape presents the results of an evaluation of around 100 international cooperation projects which were promoted within the framework of the EU SOCRATES programme. Numerous examples reveal the possibilities which currently exist and limitations of European cooperation. Deductively,…
This article is concerned with the discourse and policy of lifelong learning in Europe after 1973. It deals with the question whether the 1980s have to be seen as a period of diminishing interest in lifelong learning or as a formative phase of so called neoliberalism. Applying a corpus lingustic approach, it analyses the official documents of the European Communities as archived in the database EUR-Lex. The results are interpreted as the expression of a new European governance regime called “te…
The DIE publishes recent research findings from empirical studies on the continuing education system and its educational institutions under the label "DIE Survey. Data and reports on continuing education". The publications are directed at stakeholders in education policy, practical continuing education, as well as national and international research. The volumes are published in loose sequence and provide transparency in the complex field of continuing education. Thus they provide an academical…
This article explores the inherent normative nature of what on the surface appears to be neutral empirical research. Direct and indirect normative influences exercised by empirical research are demonstrated using the example of the PISA studies: (1) their desire to provide knowledge which can help steer policy, (2) the normative nature of their didactical concepts and educational theory, (3) the idea derived from the sequence of studies of adapting classroom instruction to conform with the conc…
