Issue II: Public and personal goals

The goals, values and purposes of adult basic education programs and services are often unclear, incongruent and only implied through programming and funding decisions. Those goals held by service-providers are often quite dissimilar to those held by participants. Goals and values for women are often different from those for men and this results in inequities within the system.

Background

In the available literature there appears to be a series of goals and purposes which are common to adult basic education programs in many countries. The order in which these are viewed as priorities is generally different for the service- providers and the participants. The order in which they are listed does not reflect any particular set of priorities.

1.

Adult basic education programs are to provide remedial skills to those destined for

occupational training programs; to improve the employment potential of participants; to enable them to reach the educational level for entry to an occupation; to enable them to improve their current status; or to provide them with greater job security (i.e. against potential lay-off because of inability to communicate or compute or lack of credentials). From the governmental view-point this goal tends to be expressed as: to increase the pool of trained workers; to cope with unemployment; or to provide an alternative to unemployment.

This goal is the major priority of many service-providers (40% of all governments surveyed in one Unesco study); but is regarded as a relatively low priority by participants in adult basic education programs (the range is from 14% to 35% in various studies) (1). The only groups of participants which consistently views this as a top priority are those in programs leading directly to occupational training programs (eg. BTSD, BJRT, etc.).

In terms of outcomes, this goal enjoys mixed success. If the participant begins at grade 7 of higher and only requires grade 10, she will probably be successful. If the participant is already employed and is looking for job security, she will probably be successful. To offset these gains, if the numbers of illiterate adults drops drastically, the available supply of undereducated, cheap, unskilled labour, a standard component of our current economic system, will be reduced and chaos would follow. If the numbers of adequately educated, potential employees is drastically increased, employers will simply raise the educational qualifications necessary for lower level jobs as a means for weeding out the least acceptable employees. This will guarantee failure of this particular goal. In fact, any educational goal which is dependent on employment or economic conditions is bound to fail.


(1). See for example: J. Chabaud, The education and advancement of women, (Paris: Unesco, 1970)

D. L. Boggs and others, "Ohio citizens eligible for adult basic education". Paper presented to the Adult Education Research Conference, San Antonio, Texas, 1978.

E. Anderson and E. Woeller, "An adult basic education program in a community setting" in Teaching adult basic education: A program of videotapes and written material for teachers and administrators. A project sponsored by the Industrial Training Branch of the Province of Ontario; the Canada Department of Manpower and Immigration; the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education; and the Ontario Education Communications Authority, undated.


Back Contents Next