In a historic unanimous vote on May 20, 2015, the Rhode Island Council on Postsecondary Education welcomed College Unbound as a degree-granting postsecondary option in the state, designed to serve the more than 110,000 Rhode Island adults who began but did not complete bachelor's degrees. The college is the adult-learning initiative of Big Picture…

Prior learning assessment and recognition (PLAR) is the practice of reviewing, evaluating, and acknowledging the information, skills, and understanding that adult learners have gained through experiential or self-directed (informal) learning rather than through formal education (Thomas, 2000). As our current economy and workplaces experience rapid…

Purpose: As two doctoral students and adult learners, the authors strongly believe that story telling can be a great tool for educators working with adult learners. The purpose of this paper is to increase awareness of how effective storytelling can be for adult learners. Design/methodology/approach: The approach of this paper is one of gathering…

Quinn presents a radical new perspective on the interrelationships between education and culture. Rather than viewing education in isolation from major cultural debates, she demonstrates how culture shapes education and education shapes culture. Cultural perspectives and rich empirical data from a wide range of research with learners in…

The key message of NIACE's 2011 survey of adult participation in learning is that recession is bad for lifelong learning for anyone over the age of 25. The survey highlights the central importance of workplaces as sites of adult learning--and the challenges posed to a learning society when opportunities to learn reduce. It shows that the gap…

E-learning researchers face considerable challenges in creating meaningful and generalizable studies due to the complex nature of this dynamic training medium. Our experience in conducting workplace e-learning research led us to create this guide for planning research on e-learning. We share the unanticipated complications we encountered in our…

The Higher Education Opportunity Act (E2SHB 1795), passed by the Legislature in 2011, identified prior learning assessment (PLA) as an innovative means for improving degree and certificate attainment and improving cost effectiveness and efficiency within Washington's higher education system. The Act defines prior learning as "the knowledge…

A new Labour government was elected in May 1997 and wasted no time in signalling its enthusiasm for the education of adults. Secretary of State for Education and Employment David Blunkett gave his first speech in office at the launch of Adult Learners' Week 1997 and announced the creation of a National Advisory Group for Continuing Education and…

The purpose of this article is to provide researchers and, in particular, practitioner-scholars of e-learning curricular designs and instructors with one conceptual model that supports more involvement and interaction within on-line courses. The "On-line Curriculum Interaction Model" posited by the author is informed by the foundational…

This article describes the virtual-team process used by graduate students with a faculty guide at the University of Calgary over a 16-month period. Using a narrative-story technique, the article describes the four stages of work that were completed by the virtual team and identifies the unique strengths, pitfalls, and strategies that the team…

"Focus on Basics" is the quarterly publication of the National Center for the Study of Adult Learning and Literacy. It presents best practices, current research on adult learning and literacy, and how research is used by adult basic education teachers, counselors, program administrators, and policymakers. "Focus on Basics" is…