Adult education is an important factor contributing to economic well-being and social inclusion in Europe. In many cases regional and national umbrella organisations as well as professional associations, universities and large education providers take on the task of providing adult education staff with sufficient high quality opportunities to maintain and extend skills they need to support and bring about these positive economic and social developments. Those efforts are usually directed at (free-lance) teachers as well as pedagogical, administrative and executive staff in the organisations. These institutions thereby attend to the important tasks of quality assurance and professionalization of staff in adult education and they contribute to the development of the field of adult education as a whole. To provide these organisations with the opportunity to exchange good practice, the project "Train the Provider" aims to facilitate and promote the exchange between such institutions across Europe. The overarching goal is to learn from each other to further improve the quality of centralised staff training programmes in adult education. This goal is pursued via four interlinked objectives: A1. Reflexion, formulation and exchange of structural educational problems: Structural problems such as difficulties in reaching target groups, difficulties in extrapolating relevant new topics, low numbers of participants, low course implementation rates will be analysed and linked to individual educational, economic, political and social contexts. A2. Comparison of existing staff training programmes and identification of good practice: Through this second step the project partners gain insights into established educational practices across Europe in order to approach their identified problems from different perspectives of similar institutions across Europe. The focus here is to find possible solutions to overcome the problems identified by considering the partners' practices for one's own purpose and by collectively working on those problems on the basis of good practice. A3. Identification of relevant topics and target groups: The insight into the partners’ staff training programmes offers the opportunity to uncover gaps in one's own training programme concerning topics or target groups. The partners will establish a European canon to identify issues of regional, national and European importance. A4. Formulating benchmarks: The exchange facilitated by the project shall enable the partners to set benchmarks together, which allow comparison, such as course implementation rates, costs and numbers of participants. This list is to be substantially extended throughout the project and will form a principal result for uptake by both consortium members and other similar organisations across Europe. The project work heavily relies on the exchange of practical experience between the project partners. It will be based on approaches to transcultural comparison and therefore on changing perspectives in order to solve concrete problems the partner organisations face in their day-to-day work. Furthermore, the project will follow some methodological considerations stemming from quantitative educational research. The participating institutions have been selected to bring in the respective skills and to form a representative group in terms of the type of organisation, adult education systems, adult education participation and EU-membership: 1. Lower Saxon League for Liberal Adult Education (Germany): regional umbrella organisation responsible for centralised staff training programme 2. Hellenic Adult Education Association (Greece): national professional organisation implementing train-the-trainer-programmes and developing key competences 3. University of Pitesti (Romania): university active in adult education staff training 4. Folkeuniversitetet Øst (Norway): adult education provider with internal staff training programme The project has an immediate positive impact on the staff that is involved in regional or national staff training processes within their organisations. This positive effect on staff training programmes will then trickle down to improve the overall quality of adult education in the respective regions so that individual learners will benefit from the project. Through coordinated dissemination efforts, the project will reach organisations similar to those involved in the project across Europe, who will benefit from good practice examples, problem solving approaches and benchmarking. "Train the Provider" will prove to be an extremely sustainable project since the results will crucially influence the partners' regular work. Furthermore, the partners and their networks will continue to make use of and spread the basic parameters, methods and benchmarks developed in the project.
Adult education is an important factor contributing to economic well-being and social inclusion in Europe. In many cases regional and national umbrella organisations as well as professional associations, universities and large education providers take on the task of providing adult education staff with sufficient high quality opportunities to maintain and extend skills they need to support and bring about positive economic and social developments. Those efforts are usually directed at (free-lance) teachers as well as pedagogical, administrative and executive staff in the organisations. These institutions thereby attend to the important tasks of quality assurance and professionalization of staff in adult education and they contribute to the development of the field of adult education as a whole. Train the Provider afforded staff training providers the chance to address some of their most prominent issues, search for solutions and exchange good practices with peer organisations from other EU countries. Main participating organisations: 1. Lower Saxon League for Liberal Adult Education (GER): regional umbrella organisation responsible for centralised staff training programme 2. Hellenic Adult Education Association (GR): national professional organisation implementing train-the-trainer-programmes and developing key competences 3. University of Pitesti (RO): university active in adult education staff training 4. Folkeuniversitetet Øst (NO): adult education provider with internal staff training programme In addition, partners invited professionals and experts from the field of AE to their project meetings to gain further insight into strategies and practice from different angles. The transcultural approach offered partners the chance to gain new perspectives on the most pressing issues from their day-to-day working contexts. These included lack of national standards, high cancellation rates, low motivation among trainers to get further training and designing more relevant programmes for target groups. The discussions resulted in four short papers published via the project site (see below) as well as a short journal article published at https://www.futureacademy.org.uk/files/images/upload/EDUWORLD2018F004.pdf Four papers correspond with the Work Packages: A1: Reflexion, formulation and exchange of structural educational problems Partners compiled a collection of central challenges they are facing in their day-to-day work and for which they were looking to brainstorm for solutions. Additional input was given by experts from regional organisations active in AE (LUH, Bildungswerk Ver.di, Landesverband der VHS in NDS). A2. Comparison of existing staff training programmes and identification of good practice Partners derived common ‘main topics’ from A1 and embedded them in the individual national AE systems they work in. Through the comparison, differences emerged in terms of standardisation and quality control, types of providers, target groups as well as ways of identifying their needs, evaluation of training results. Partners identified which mechanisms promote and which mechanisms hamper quality work in their institutions. Additionally, the consortium designed an online survey to gain further insight into these topics from a wider range of AE agents. An article outlining and contextualising the results was published as an OER (see link above). A3. Identification of relevant topics and target groups Partners identified good practice examples from their current programmes, naming formats, methodology, target groups and learning outcomes and compiled the data into a table for consultation by third parties. These examples address the challenges outlined in A1 and give partners (as well as other AE agents) inspiration for their future programme development. The resulting cannon of good practice serves as reference to other AE staff training providers interested in expanding or improving their programmes. A4. Formulating benchmarks Partners identified success factors for their best practice programmes, outlining how others could adopt approaches they deem successful. This allows for comparison between partners’ approaches, programmes and target groups. The document can be consulted by other agents in AE to compare their programmes against and find inspiration for their development. The results have had and will have considerable influence on the partner organisations involved which have all found topics and approaches they are planning to adopt and try (see document for A4). Thus, lessons learned during the project will impact the quality and implementation of future programmes, creating staff training that is more focused on applicability and trainers’ real needs. Furthermore, the results have been distributed through partners’ networks and thus benefit the AE staff training sector as a whole. All results are available for download via https://www.aewb-nds.de/themen/eu-programme/train-the-provider/