POLICIES, PRACTICES AND LIVES IN ADULT EDUCATION AND LEARNING
In the last two years, adult lives and learning have dramatically changed, individually and collectively. Face to face meetings have stopped for a long time and the fear of the other has increased. Educational and cultural agencies – schools, universities, museums, theatres – have significantly revised their practices. The Conference of the European Society for Research on the Education of Adults dealed with the experience of the pandemic, but we want to make it a positive reflexive moment to look at the future, to mobilize the best energies of adult education research and intervention, and interrogate the controversial, non-linear effects of the ongoing ecological, economic, and social changes. The ecological metaphor in the title is meant to suggest the relevance of climate justice and the need for adult education research around it. The material and social environments are not separated; outside and inside worlds are interconnected in human experience. New emerging landscapes – physically and metaphorically – are bringing more challenges to the humankind, especially for the vulnerable and dispossessed.
Are there any seeds for transformative resilience? What is the contribution of adult education and learning, and the role of research in it?Will they also bring new opportunities?
The conference celebrated the 30th birthday of ESREA connecting older and newer generations of researchers, as well as ESREA’s research networks, to remember the past, reflect on the present, and re-design the future together.
Katarina Popovic, Secretary General of ICAE moderated the Round Table – Diversity, belonging, inclusion and equity. Researching learners’ struggles and hopes in a superdiverse world. How can research show and nurture the seeds of resilience and transformation at a micro and mesolevel? Interventions from 6 ESREA networks: Access, Learning Careers and Identities; Education and Learning of Older Adults; Gender and Adult Learning; Transformative and Emancipatory Adult Education; Life History and Biography; Migration, Transnationalism and Racisms.
Gina Ebner, Secretary General of the European Association for the Education of Adults, chaired the Round Table – Regaining hope. How can AE research help to understand and transform policies, sustain ongoing societal changes, and tackle crises? Where is the macrosystem going? Where are the new seeds for a better society? Interventions from 6 ESREA networks: Active Democratic Citizenship and Adult Learning (ADCAL); Adult Educators, Trainers and their Professional Development (ReNADET); Between Global and Local/Adult Learning and Communities; History of Adult Education and Training in Europe; Policy Studies in Adult Education (PSAE), Working Life and Learning.
