CONTEXT/BACKGROUND: --------------------------------- The project tackles two key challenges in Europe and how adult education and learning (ALE) can pro-actively help to change them. Europe experiences a shift away from democratic systems which is based on at least two elements: 1. Democracy as consumerism or post-democracy (Crouch 2000) and uncertainty (Bauman 2007). 2. Lack of basic skills, in particular digital skills. The project partners firmly believe that adult education has a role to play in supporting societies and individuals to cope with these challenges; that said, they recognize the difficulty among adult education organisations and providers (including trainers) in doing it effectively and strategically: - Adult education organisations are often compelled to be reactive rather than to be pro-active and change-oriented. - Adult education staff and trainers are often themselves not prepared for changes in societies. AIMS ------- This project will provide adult education organisations, staff and trainers with the resources; the space for discussing with and learning from each other; the knowledge, expertise and tools to become more pro-active in order to develop innovative, change oriented provision which will have, on a medium-term, an extremely positive impact on low-skilled learners and the society as a whole. In particular the project aims to collect, reflect upon and design new ways of working in adult education in order to increase people's digital skills and their adaptability in an increasingly digitised and automated world. It will also propose new ways of promoting democracy and European values. At the same time, through the same bottom-up and practice-oriented approach partners will develop very concrete recommendations that will allow policy-makers to support the AE sector in the challenges above as well as to draft policy initiatives on digitalisation and democracy more coherent and impactful. OUTPUS ---------- The concrete results of the project will be: - A collection and analysis of resources on change-oriented practice in the fields of digitalisation and democracy which will be a source of inspiration not only for AE organisations, staff and trainers, but also to policy-makers at different levels; - Two online courses (which include live and interactive webinars) on digitalisation/democracy and adult education addressed to AE organisations, staff and trainers; - Two hands-on methodologies for change-oriented workshops on digitalisation and democracy; - Two workshops on the FutureLabAE themes; - Two regional events (Central-Eastern and Southern Europe); - Reports on the two thematic workshops, which will contribute to extending their impact and continuing the initiated reflections; - Project conclusions and recommendations for policy-makers and stakeholders (on European, national, regional and local levels); - Guidelines for AE organisations and staff on how to work with the topics, in order to successfully reach out to and support people with low ICT and civic skills; - A final conference to present the project results (Brussels, June 2021). EXPECTED IMPACT ---------------------------- The project will improve the competences of adult educators to work with these challenges and introduce new methods, new approaches and new provision. At the same time it will enable adult education organisations to reflect upon those issues in a more forward-looking and proactive way and thus to contribute more and better to policies and practices on digitalisation and democracy. Policy-makers will receive concrete suggestions on how to foster their citizens’ digital and democracy capabilities (especially the low-skilled) and thus help to solve the major challenges Europe is facing. They will also gain a better understanding of how adult education could contribute to the up-skilling and social inclusion of people from a disadvantaged background and be willing to cooperate more with AE organisations. PARTNERSHIP ---------------------------- The project consortium is very well balanced geographically and in terms of level of representation: 6 countries (FR, IE, FI, SK, PT, AT) will participate more predominately, but many more will be reached through the EAEA (representing members from 44 countries). Partners represent all European regions (Southern, Central Eastern, Western and Nordic regions) and thus all understandings of adult education will be taken into account in the development of the project activities. At the same time, partners are a combination of European, national and local organisations dealing with different aspects of adult education: being (umbrella) national organisations, INFREP, EAEA, AONTAS, AIVD and KVS are working more predominantly on adult education advocacy; EPATV and VHS Wien are instead adult education providers; and UEF is one of the most recognised adult education research institutions in Europe.
The FutureLabAE project tackles two key challenges in Europe and how adult education and learning (ALE) can pro-actively help to change them. 1. Europe experiences a shift away from democratic systems towards consumerism or post-democracy (Crouch 2000) and uncertainty (Bauman 2007). 2. Citizens lack basic skills and in particular digital skills. The project partners strongly believe that adult education has a role to play in supporting societies and individuals to cope with these challenges. That said, they recognize the difficulty among adult education organisations and providers (including trainers) in doing it effectively and strategically. Indeed, adult education organisations are often compelled to be reactive rather than to be pro-active and change-oriented and adult education staff and trainers are often themselves not prepared for changes in societies. This project provides adult education organisations, staff and trainers with the resources; the space for discussing with and learning from each other; the knowledge, expertise and tools to become more pro-active in order to develop innovative, change oriented provision which will have, on a medium-term, an extremely positive impact on low-skilled learners and the society as a whole. In particular the project aims to collect, reflect upon and design new ways of working in adult education in order to increase people's digital skills and their adaptability in an increasingly digitised and automated world. It also suggests new ways of promoting democracy and European values. At the same time, through the same bottom-up and practice-oriented approach partners developed very concrete recommendations that allow policy-makers to support the AE sector in the challenges above as well as to draft policy initiatives on digitalisation and democracy more coherent and impactful. The project's outputs are now available here: https://eaea.org/project/future-lab/. They include firstly, a collection and analysis of resources on change-oriented practice in the fields of digitalisation and democracy. It has been designed to be a source of inspiration not only for AE organisations, staff and trainers, but also for policy-makers at the local, national and European level. Two online courses (which include live and interactive webinars) on digitalisation/democracy and adult education addressed to AE organisations, staff and trainers have also been created. Live sessions happened and the courses are now available online. Two hands-on methodologies for change-oriented workshops on digitalisation and democracy have been designed and tested in workshops organized in the frame of the project. Guidelines for AE organisations and staff on how to work with the topics, in order to successfully reach out to and support people with low ICT and civic skills have also been designed. Finally, a document which gathers conclusions and recommendations for policy-makers and stakeholders (on European, national, regional and local levels). Five dissemination events have been organized by partners in order to share all those positive results. It is expected that this project will improve the competences of adult educators to work on democracy and digital challenges among other topics, by introducing new methods, new approaches and new provision. At the same time it will enable adult education organisations to reflect upon those issues in a more forward-looking and proactive way and thus to contribute more and better to policies and practices on digitalisation and democracy. Policy-makers will receive concrete suggestions on how to foster their citizens’ digital and democracy capabilities (especially the low-skilled) and thus help to solve the major challenges Europe is facing. They will also gain a better understanding of how adult education could contribute to the up-skilling and social inclusion of people from a disadvantaged background and be willing to cooperate more with AE organisations. The project consortium gathered seven partners from six different countries (FR, IE, FI, SK, PT, AT), which represent all European regions (Southern, Central Eastern, Western and Nordic regions) and thus all understandings of adult education will be taken into account in the development of the project activities.