Introduction

Chapters 4 and 5 focused on the formal institutions of education from preschool through to post- compulsory education and the widening participation (WP) movement that seeks to open the university sector to under- represented groups. It was also suggested that the one- sided promotion of higher education (HE) was to the detriment of vocational education and training (VET) in the Technical and Further Education (TAFE) sector. In those two chapters, I suggested that many school leavers with an unpromising record of academic achievement were better off enrolling in the TAFE sector rather in HE. This does not mean school leavers lacking academic skills should never consider enrolling in a university course; pathways to the HE sector should always be available as a second- chance option to students, young and old, with the motivation and wherewithal to succeed. Furthermore, as this chapter will explain, the idea of lifelong learning (LL) has come of age described favourably as a new social movement (NSM). Like the WP movement, the LL movement has its critics who see it as a neo- liberal approach to a ‘learning society’ sponsored by the OECD (Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development) and the European Union (EU) that puts the onus for investing in LL on the individual.

It also has its enthusiastic cohort of scholars promoting LL and its various offshoots, a movement that presents a confusing smorgasbord of choices complicated by definitional disputes over what is the most acceptable terminology to be used. Thus, the various components of LL and adult education (AE) discussed in the International Encyclopedia of Education include adult basic education (ABE) for literacy and numeracy, technical and vocational education and training (TVET), continuing professional education, university adult and continuing education (in the extra- mural tradition), community education, popular education, labour education, citizenship education and immigration education; and not to forget various informal learning sites such as social movements (SMs), public libraries, museums, art galleries, book clubs, science institutes, men's sheds, art galleries, film clubs, University of the Third Age (U3A) venues and community groups of many kinds.

It is also evident in the literature that AE and learning is frequently used interchangeably with lifelong education (LE) and LL. Because of these multiple associations with AE, it is impossible to define AE precisely.