Research
We explore how adult education can be made inclusive, digital and effective.
Services
Digital tools, specialist portals and data – for teachers, researchers, students and interested parties.
Institute
We offer research, transfer and infrastructure for lifelong learning.
Working at companies in old age – problem or opportunity? Company strategies for dealing with demographic change Demographic change usually confronts companies with a double challenge. Enterprises have to work with ageing staffs, while a veritable “war for talent” is underway to attract young skilled staff. This article explores the different strategies German enterprises are adopting to meet this challenge. At the same time, it distinguishes between tried-and-proven staff strategies whic…
The scope of literacy courses. Results of a representative survey among adult education centres As part of the EQUALS project, the German Adult Education Association (DVV) collected statistical data on literacy courses at adult education centres; this article presents the data and compares it with figures from 1994. The number of courses has risen, as has the number of participants, but fewer institutions than before provide this service. Compared with 1994, the participants are older and t…
Very old people in particular live in a »mode of bidding farewell«. The »dictates of death« gains increasing importance in this phase of life compared to the »dictates of life«. The author shows how activation and a resource-oriented approach can even help persons suffering from dementia or dying persons to experience their existence as something that they can actively shape. This yields important educational insight in the training of medical specialists, voluntary workers and family members.
Positive learning experiences in childhood, adolescence, as well as during employment have a favourable effect on learning in old age. From a gerontological perspective, the significance of school education and of professional qualifications attained later in life for educational behaviour in the post-employment phase can be explained with the continuity theory. To evaluate the relevance of one’s educational biography, a representative survey was conducted. 500 individuals at the age from 50 to…
A good two-and-a-half years after the EU's lifelong learning education programme began, the German National Agency has drawn up an interim balance and reflects current trends of the 2009 applications in the programme. GRUNDTVIG for general adult education. There is increasing demand for established forms of funding, affecting both learning partnerships and continuing education funding for individual workers in the field. Since 2009 the EU has put forward various new funding programmes. There ha…
Regulations relating to training release (training leave) now exist in eight EU states. Where they exist, insufficient transparency and counselling, resistance in companies and fear for jobs have been ascertained in those eligible. There is frequently a lack of political will to make training release more effective for lifelong learning. In a Socrates project (1998–2000) with partners from Belgium, France, Italy and Germany the question of whether training release can be a strategy for the pr…
The study Competencies in Later Life (CiLL) provides, for the first time, information about central basic competencies of older adults. In doing so, two research approaches are combined. First, CiLL extends the OECD Programme for the International Assessment of Adult Competencies (PIAAC) to the age group 66 to 80 and analyses correlations between socio-demographic factors and basic competencies assessed with the PIAAC instrument. Second, a qualitative research part shows subjective opinions of …
The contribution shows that, why, and in which way adult education in clerical sponsorship deals with joy. Though in the biblical tradition, ideas of a fulfilled life occur, they are always completed by the promise of the salvation to come. The present occupation with joy in educational practice consciously and vigorously distances itself from a tendency of fleeing from the world. Because “joy“, as brain research and philosophy emphasize, is not thinkable without sensual quality. The contributi…
