Lifelong Learning and the new German Coalition

The party leaders announce their coalition agreement (hint: the Greens aren’t wearing ties)

Germans are used to coalition governments, but this one is different. It’s not uncommon to have three parties sharing power at state level, but at federal level it is new. And the three parties have quite divergent underlying ideologies, with the Free Democrats (FDP, often known colloquially as Die Liberalen) believing fundamentally in strong individual freedom and a limited role for the state while the Social Democrats favour greater intervention and regulation and the Greens have their roots in civic movements and environmental action.

This makes for interesting times. Much media attention outside Germany has focused on possible tensions over the economy, where the FDP will try to promote fiscal conservatism; and foreign policy, where the Greens and FDP are likely to take a strong line on human rights. Further, while all three parties are broadly pro-European, the FDP is hostile to tendencies towards a Euro-super-state, and the SPD is more inclined to share Macron’s vision of a grand project of Europeanisation.

Relatively little light has been shone so far on the coalition’s plans for education. This might not be a surprise; after all, education is constitutionally a matter for each state to determine, so why would the federal government build into its plans something it has limited responsibility for? A quick look at the formal coalition agreement shows that, on the contrary, education – and particularly lifelong learning – is very much part of the new agenda.

A simple word search tells us a lot about the new government’s priorities in lifelong learning. There is no mention of lebenslanges Lernen.The word Erwachsenenbildung, or adult education, only appears once, but as it is a section heading it isn’t exactly marginal. Rather impressively, though, the word Weiterbildung (further education or continuing education) appears 37 times. So on this simple measure there is plenty of interest in both general adult education and in particularly in the more work-related forms of adult learning.

First, let’s look at the section on Erwachsenenbildung. it comprises four paragraphs which start by proposing investment in digital infrastructure for public adult education centres and support for adult literacy, moves on to the simplification and acceleration of recognition for prior learning, includes the strengthening of political education, and promises to promote education for sustainable development at all levels of education. Most of this is uncontroversial, and is in line with the coalition parties’ shared belief that Germany under Merkel has been a slow adopter of digitisation. The emphasis on sustainable development and citizenship education is likely to reflect pressure from the Greens.

Bettina Stark-Watzinger, the new Federal Minister of Education and Research

The idea of continuing education is threaded throughout the coalition agreement, usually in connection with economic modernisation. It first appears on page 5 in connection with targeted investment in upskilling to support modernisation and growth, and is repeatedly used in association with digitisation. The coalition agreement also promises further development of the National Strategy for Continuing Education, with specific reference to mid-career retraining, and It contains sector-related proposals for continuing education in health and social care and early years education, as well as investment in digital competences for teachers, and in knowledge transfer training for researchers. There is even a reference to upskilling tax officers to investigate work in the black economy and financial crime.

As well as the various specific mentions, the agreement devotes a section to Weiterbildung, the opening paragraph of which begins: ‘In times of digital and demographic change, a targeted National Strategy for Continuing Education is an important precondition for reaching our economic and social goals’.

Specifically, this section promises a review of training assistance schemes with a view to to extending statutory financial support for those upgrading work-related qualifications and introduce ‘life chances’ savings accounts that promote participation by the low-skilled; it promises a stronger role for the Labour Agency in ensuring upskilling and providing guidance as well as supporting enterprises in coping with structural change; and it proposes further development of the national online continuing education platform, along with financial incentives for unemployed adults to upskill.

Then there are also a few proposals relating to the initial vocational education system. This interested me, as the Social Democrats tend to be fairly satisfied with the dual system of apprenticeship, while the Free Democrats think it rather rigidly tied into a dated social partnership model and the Greens tend to worry about equity and access. The Free Democrats’ influence is probably visible in the general commitment to simplify the system, especially for small and medium-sized enterprises, and promote digitisation of its administration, as well as increase permeability between academic and vocational education. Green Party influence can be seen in proposals to improve access to Master Apprentice training, as well as provide support for people with migrant backgrounds and women to enter skilled trades.

How much of this will be translated into specific policy interventions remains to be seen Rarely in anything in Germany simple and straightforward, and in the case of education – including adult education – much legal power lies with the states rather than the federal government. In the case of vocational education, the social partners – employers’ associations, trade unions, chamber of commerce – also have significant say in what happens. And then there’s the fact that the federal minister, Bettina Stark-Watzinger, an economist who spent several years in the City of London, is a member of the smallest party in the coalition, the FDP.

I’m no specialist on German politics, so I’d be wise to avoid firm predictions. What does seem clear is that while there is a very marked emphasis on lifelong learning as a vehicle for economic modernisation in general and digitisation in particular, the agreement also contains clear commitments to support for public adult education institutions with their broad remit, as well as specific commitments to adult basic education, citizenship education, and education for sustainable development. So the next few years should be full of lessons to those in other countries with an interest in adult learning.

Adult education and municipal enterprise: Learning from the 80s

Reading Helen Jackson’s political memoir has been both a joy and an inspiration. It is essentially the story of her political life before becoming an MP, when she rose from activist to senior councillor at a time when local government was an exciting space for experiment and innovation as well as an important source of much-needed public services. Until, that is, the Thatcher government decided that local government needed its wings clipped.

Sheffield, where Helen taught, worked, and raised a family, stood at the centre of several significant developments. Before the mass unemployent of the early 1980s, the City Council was one of a number of radical local authorities that sought to protect and expand public services such as housing and education, and led a number of radical new policies such as South Yorkshire’s much-loved policy of freezing bus fares (I have happy memories of taking my daughter into town at the princely sum of 12p each way).

As unemployment hit hard at the region’s traditional (male) industries in the early 80s, the Council shifted to using its position as an employer and purchaser to promote local employment, promote equality of access to work, and to improve the quality of jobs on offer, while woeking in partnership with an initially reluctant business community to support enterprise and attract new jos. And it was striking how strong a role adult education played in this process.

Helen is well-placed to comment on these developments. As an increasingly vocal champion of women’s rights and advocate of racial justice, and as an influential elected office-holder responsible for the large direct works department, as well as being an educator herself, she is able to give an authoritative account of the part played by adult education in Sheffield’s municipal socialism.

Three of these initiatives are particularly worth mentioning. First is the opening of Northern College, the first residential adult college in the north of England, which stood out for its commitment to a broad conception of social justice which linked class, gender and ethnicity to its educational work, and continues to do important work with adults to this day. Keith Jackson, the College’s first deputy principal, was then Helen’s husband.

While the College partly emerged from the strong tradition of trade union education and industrial day release schemes in South Yorkshire, Helen also points to other important influences in the Workers’ Educational Association and some of the innovative community development work launched by the Home Office in 1969. She notes that the College was an early adopter of free childcare for students, initially funded by an outside grant and later absorbed into the ongoing budget.

Second, Helen describes the pioneering work of the women who challenged gender stereotyping in traditionally male manual crafts. It’s easy now to forget how innovative – and controversial – it was for women to train as garage mechanics or builders, and then work successfully in their new trades. Women from this group went on to train others through further education and through new training programmes for women, as well as helping influence the Council to adopt gender monitoring in its own employment practices.

The third pioneering initiative was the Take Ten scheme of paid educational leave for the Council’s manual workers. As the name implied, Council workers could take a day a week off to attend a tailored course for ten weeks; against expectations, some 270 attended in the first year alone, with priority going to the low-paid and those with no previous qualifications.

There were others. For example, the Council established a Community Work Apprenticeship Scheme, recruiting people from disadvantaged backgrounds to train as community workers rather than relying on the largely white middle class graduates who would otherwise have taken these roles. There’s also the informal learning that informed Helen’s gender politics, among other areas. But that’s probably enough to give a flavour of the book’s account of adult eduction’s contribution to municipal enterprise in the conditions of the 1980s.

It’s striking to work out how much of this thinking and experience was carried over into the early Blair years after 1997, when Helen became Parliamentary Private Secretary to the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland. Particularly while David Blunkett was Secretary of State for Education, the early Blair government supported and promoted lifelong learning as a vehicle for employability and social justice, in ways that have still to be systematically evaluated; but it is also striking that the Labour governments subsequently back-pedalled on much of this work.

What conclusions do I draw from this? First, the book provides a coherent account of adult learning’s role in promoting social change and civic engagement as well as economic regeneration. Second, it shows how local government can serve as a test-bed for broader strategies – something worth remembering given the devolution of adult education budgets to the English regions.

Third, and most important, it made me wonder why the 1997-99 innovations were so easily overturned. On Helen Jackson’s account, the Sheffield adult education measures were popular as well as effective, so that opposition was eventually overcome. But that wasn’t the experience at national level.

With the benefit of hindsight, I’m not convinced that after 1997 we – the adult learning community – did enough to generate enthusiasm and build support for the new policies. Consequently the Treasury found it easy to persuade later ministers that adult education was all cost and no benefit, and could cheerfully be dismissed as a luxury rather than a national necessity.

Commercial adult learning: mountain skills

I spotted this poster in the men’s room at my favourite outdoor shop. Tiso’s in Glasgow has a cafe, making it a good place for a break on the drive over to visit family in Dunoon. It has offered outdoor skills training since 2000.

Tiso’s developed the courses as a by-product of its main retail trade. They are held across climbing and skiing sites across Scotland. A one-day course will set you back £85-£95. The main instructor is an experienced mountaineer who holds a Mountaineering Instruction Certificate, an award of Mountain Training UK.

If you want to know more, check out the details on https://www.tiso.com/courses

Adult learning in spy fiction: John Le Carré

Le Carré at the Zeit Forum Kultur, 2008, Hamburg

There’s a brief but telling mention of adult education in John Le Carré’s latest novel. Describing a character who has a left-wing father from a mining background, Le Carré adds that

His mother spent whatever free time she had from work at adult education classes until they were cut.

Le Carré is describing here a politically engaged self-improving working class milieu which he believes no longer exists, due in part to the erosion of public civic spaces of learning.

Agent Running in the Field is entertaining enough, but it’s unlikely to be judged one of Le Carré’s better novels, though its plot may resonate with the beliefs and fears of some Remainers. For the purposes of this blog, though, I will confine my comments to his very brief mention of adult education.

First, the author presents the weakness of UK adult education as a given; and while I think he is wrong about it, I understand that a lot of his readers will share this view.

Second, I’m encouraged that an author of his stature has actually noticed that UK adult education is not in great shape, and can assume that this observation will resonate with his readers. Maybe someone should be signing Le Carré up as patron of a campaign for adult learning (while gently pointing out to him that it isn’t quite dead yet).

Education and the Brexit saga

One thing seems to be consistently clear in the debate over the UK’s relationship with the EU: our participation in the EU’s education and training programmes is set to continue. That shouldn’t surprise anyone, as all the main UK parties have said repeatedly that they would like our participation to continue. And now the political declaration attached to the latest withdrawal agreement confirms it.

What exactly this will mean in practice is another matter. Given its track record, the question of whether the U.K. Border Agency is capable of distinguishing between students and illegal immigrants at point of entry is a good one. And I have no idea whether we are reaching the end of the beginning in the never-ending story of Brexit.

Still, it seems clear to me that those who value international exchanges now have work to do if they are going to shape the scope and scale of future U.K. participation – especially if they are involved in areas other than the well-represented and lobby-rich sectors like schools and higher education.

What is new about Germany’s national strategy for continuing education?

Well, the first thing that is new is the fact that it exists at all. Under the German federal constitution, responsibility for education lies with the individual states (Länder) and the federal government (Bund) is cast in a largely supporting role. The new strategy is the first of its kind, jointly produced by the Bund, the Länder, employers, and labour unions.

“Sharing knowledge, shaping the future, growing together: National Strategy for Continuing Education”

The rationale offered for this spirit of cooperation is digitisation. One much-cited study claims that a quarter of German employees work in occupations at high risk of replacement through the new technologies, and that report is duly mentioned in the new strategy.  The focus here is on workplace skills as a means of tackling the challenges of digitisation for individuals and enterprises alike, with a particular focus on small and medium sized firms and on the least skilled workers.

The strategy sets out ten ‘action goals’, and commits the partners (federal ministries for education and labour, Länder, employers, unions) to putting them into practice. These goals are:

1. Supporting the transparency of continuing education possibilities and provision.
2. Closing gaps in support , putting new incentives in place, adjusting existing support systems.
3. Strengthening comprehensive lifelong educational advice and skills guidance, especially in SMEs.
4. Strengthening the responsibility of the social partners.
5. Testing and strengthening the quality and quality evaluation of continuing education provision.
6. Making visible and recognising workers’ prior skills in vocational education.
7. Developing continuing education provision and certification.
8. Strategic development of educational institutions as skill centres for vocational continuing education.
9. Strengthening continuing education staff and preparing them for digital change.
10. Strengthening strategic foresight and optimising continuing education statistics.

if anyone wants more detail of these broad goals and their implementation, let me know.

Imp-lementation starts after the summer break. Responsibility for overseeing progress against these goals is being handed to a national committee of the partners, which is charged with producing a joint progress report in 2021. At the same time, the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development has been asked to produce a national report on continuing education in Germany.

Those who look for a broad and civic approach to lifelong learning will not find it in this strategy. Its focus is aimed entirely at change in continuing vocational education, with a view to reducing the rigidities of Germany’s skills system, and promoting greater labour flexibility flexibility in the face of tech change, and digitisation in particular. As a strategy for upskilling, though, it’s an enormously interesting development, and given Germany’s wider influence in Europe and beyond, it’s worth watching closely.

Germany’s National Strategy for Continuing Education

For the first time, Germany now has a national strategy framework for continuing education. In Germany’s federal system, responsibility for education policy lies with the Länder, who are understandably reluctant to cede ground to the federal government. To date, each Land has developed its own policies for adult learning and education, albeit in consultation with the other Länder as well as with other partners.

In this post, I am summarising the official press release announcing the new strategy. I’ll look at the strategy, and comment on it, next week. Meanwhile, I hope you find this outline useful.

Anja Kurbiczek, Federal Minister for Education and Research

The new federal strategy has been agreed, following protracted negotiations, between the federal education ministry, the Länder, trade unions, employers’ associations, and the federal labour agency. Decisive in creating the new consensus was the shared concern over Germany’s ability to seize the opportunities of the Fourth Industrial Revolution, and in rparticular to adapt to global developments in digitisation.

According to Anja Karliczek, the federal minister for education and research, the new conditions require a pervasive culture of continuing education. “Continuing education in one’s career must in future be part of everyday working life”. More specifically, the government plans to create a digital platform for vocational continuing education, improve the validation of informal learning, and raise significantly the state loans for learners.

The press release is available at https://www.bmbf.de/de/nationale-weiterbildungsstrategie-beschlossen—gemeinsam-fuer-eine-neue-8860.html

Financing adult learning in Germany: the changing balance between public and private

The Bertelsmann Foundation has published a report on the financing of continuing education in Germany between 1995 and 2015. The broad headline finding is that although the system has enjoyed rising overall levels of income, the balance between private and public funding has shifted steadily over that time.

“The state withdraws from adult learning”: changes in public funding by sector, 1995-2015

The report begins with a brief history of adult learning since 1945, in order to illustrate the new significance of adult learning in the contemporary knowledge society. They then propose that participation in adult learning is a prerogative of those who are profiting from modernisation and the knowledge society. At the same time, the costs of learning increasingly fall on the individual or their employer; and participation is seen as a virtue which then legitimates the rewards enjoyed by the successful.

The authors’ evidence for this broad social trend is not all new, but the report does provide a new analysis of funding data. This is no easy task; estimating public spending alone involves adding together figures from different sources (federal government, Länder, Gemeinde/communes) concerning learning support of different types, from local funding for adult education centres to loans and grants for training master craftsmen (apologies for the gendered language, but it’s in the original).

The report confirms that the lion’s share of public education funding is allocated to schools, followed at some distance by higher education. Interestingly for a Brit, the initial vocational training system receives slightly less funding than adult learning (€21.8bn in 2015 as against €26.9bn). Note, though, that the adult learning figures include continuing vocational training.

When it comes to the balance between public and private funding, the sectors are very clearly differentiated. Adult learning in 2015 was 77% funded from private sources, compared with 43% for vocational training and 18% for higher education. Moreover, only in adult learning has public funding fallen since 1995, by 43%, though it has been more than replaced by funding from individuals and their employers.

The share of public and private funding, 2012: outer circle = public funding, inner circle = private sources

The authors remark on the contrast between public policy announcements on the increasing necessity of learning through life with the reduced public funding for adult learning. A broader and more inclusive approach to lifelong learning, which does not simply meet the immediate short term needs of the enterprise or individual career, requires both an increase and a rebalancing of public funding.

Germany has a relatively generous approach to adult learning, which remains stronger and better funding than in most European countries. Yet it too seems to be experiencing trends that are socially damaging and economically at odds with its policies around the fourth industrial revolution. The Bertelsmann report is a helpful intervention which will inform policy debate and has already attracted press attention but the significance of its analysis goes well beyond the case of Germany.

Finally, a brief note on language. The authors say in a footnote that they use the words Erwachsenenbildung (adult education) and Weiterbildung (continuing or further education) interchangeably. Some German colleagues would probably challenge the idea that these are synonyms, but that’s another issue.

The report is available at: https://www.bertelsmann-stiftung.de/fileadmin/files/BSt/Publikationen/GrauePublikationen/LL_Hintergrundstudie_Weiterbildungsfinanzierung1995-2015.pdf

Ofsted’s new inspection framework: adult learning for active citizens with British values?

Ofsted is consulting on its future frameworks for inspection, including inspections of further and adult education. The draft framework for further education and skills sets out a number of areas in which provision (and this explicitly includes adult learning) will be judged:

• Quality of education
• Behaviour and attitudes
• Personal development
• Leadership and management

I was very interested to see the more detailed discussion of these areas, as well as the interconnections between them. Of particular interest for me was the draft elaboration of ‘personal development’, which make it clear that providers are expected to develop wider capacities and qualities among their learners.

It further elaborates that learning should foster active citizenship and promote equality of opportunity and diversity, as well as instilling ‘fundamental British values’ and encouraging responsibility for one’s own fitness and health.

While talk of ‘ British values’ might raise some hackles, and some will bridle at individuals being responsible for their wellbeing, I don’t have a problem with any of this, at least as formulated in the draft framework. It goes without saying that the values listed are certainly not unique to this island, nor indeed to western Europe; and encouraging individuals to look after their bodies sensibly isn’t incompatible with a strong national health service.

I can, though, envisage circumstances in which a future education minister will spot political capital in this, and revise it to his or her partisan advantage. If recent political events have taught us anything, it is that the unthinkable is entirely possible. Meanwhile, I rather welcome this part of Ofsted ‘s draft framework as restoring a neglected dimension of further and adult education.

Yet more gongs for leaders in lifelong learning

Every time I publish a post on adult educators and the honours system, generous readers point out the names I managed to miss. Here is the latest crop:

Mary Stuart, vice chancellor of the University of Lincoln

Maggie Dawson, former chief executive of the WEA Cymru, following a long career in adult education in South Wales, has an OBE

Stella Hardy, active as a voluntary officer in the WEA South Eastern District and a member of the Advisory Council on Adult & Continuing Education, received an MBE in 1980.

Rob Humphreys, recently retired as Director of the Open University in Wales where he moved after heading up Dysgu/NIACE Wales following a career in adult education at Swansea University, has a CBE.

Ruth Spellman, who became chief executive of the WEA in 2012, was awarded an OBE in 2007 for services to workplace learning

Mary Stuart, Vice Chancellor at Lincoln University, who formerly worked in the Centre for Continuing Education at Sussex University, was recently awarded a CBE.

in addition, a number of national directors of the OU have been honoured (including Peter Syme in Scotland and Rosemary Hamilton in Northern Ireland) as well as Will Swann, the OU’s director of students.