UCD’s adult education strategy is at a crossroads, says the director of the newly established UCD Centre for Access and Lifelong Learning, Anna Kelly. “Some months ago, UCD decided that is was time to reenergise and refocus our access strategy,” says Kelly, whose centre draws together four previous services; adult education, disability support, mature students and services for students from disadvantaged communities; under one roof.
According to Kelly, access activity is still not integrated into the mainstream work of UCD’s constituent schools and colleges. “The arts faculty have done some pioneering work, especially when it comes to delivering flexible, part time options for adult learners. For this reason, there are many adults learners in arts. We need to develop this trend across the university,” says Kelly.
Former Pogue, Cait O'Riordan
with UCD Registrar, Dr Philip
Nolan
UCD’s Education Strategy contains nine goals for the university. One of the policy objectives is focused on the creation of greater opportunities for adult learners, and the targets are set high. “We are aiming to bring our full-time population of adult learners to 20 per cent,” says Kelly. “This will be achieved, we hope, by mainstreaming access activity across the university, but also by broadening the range of flexible modes of delivery for all students.”
The drive to push adult education forward is underwritten by the HEA, which has committed to funding 1500 adult students in part-time programmes this year. It was a source of great disappointment that the Green paper on Adult Education did not move part-time programmes into the free fees scheme; this latest commitment is a small but significant step in the right direction.
Director of Adult Education, Bairbre Fleming on applying to the Access programme at UCD.
- For more information please visit UCD Adult Education Centre or telephone 01 716 7123
The recent decision of the Taoiseach’s office to maintain the position of Minister of State with Responsibility for Lifelong Learning, currently held by Sean Haughey, is another positive signal for the sector.
Bairbre Fleming,
Director of Adult
Education
No matter what services and supports are provided, however, the adult learner has to overcome his or her own personal reservations. Mother-of-three Nicole Kennan from Blackrock has just successfully completed a degree programme in French and Italian at UCD. Without even a Leaving Cert behind her, taking the plunge into university was major leap of self-belief. “I saw my daughters signing up for university courses and I was jealous,” says Kennan. “I looked into a degree course in French, because I knew the language, but I could not access the programme directly. So I did an access course, just for the sake of it really, and it turned out to be a very important decision.”
Nicole says that degree level study is very challenging, especially if you have had no experience of it before. “The access programme got me accustomed to writing essays, reading academic literature and so on. Without it I don’t think I would have made it through the degree programme.”
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Four years on, and Nicole describes her experience at UCD as “fantastic and rewarding”. “There were times when it was very tough to balance family and study but it was well worth it. I took up Italian from scratch and learned a great deal more about French and French literature than I ever thought I would. I have the learning bug now. I’m going back to study for a masters in Italian.”
The boom years saw a rapid diversification of programme types and delivery methods: those who have worked through the boom and lost jobs are coming back to find the educational landscape transformed. Now that many adults find themselves at an unexpected crossroads, we can only assume that the next twenty years in adult education will be even more interesting.