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Adult learning agenda 2020-2021

Person-in-charge:
Claudio Vitali

The 2020-2021 edition of the project diverges from the previous one, insofar as it specifically focuses on a limited set of priorities and lines of action. This is due both to the fact that some of the project’s goals have already been reached in previous editions (especially in terms of the knowledge we have reached of phenomena connected with adult learning), and to the necessity to use available resources for the improvement of sectors which have not yet been recipients of focused institutional attention. The most poignant need seems to be the improvement of governance methods, with a view to strengthening ties between different stakeholders and involving them in and eliciting their support to upskilling processes designed for the attainment of specific goals of the Agenda (especially those that are connected with the accessibility and quality of the offer), as well as for effective training of unskilled and scarcely-skilled adults.

There has been considerable progress in this direction over the last few years, as is demonstrated in the National Report on Upskilling Pathways: if there is a clear-cut distribution of responsibilities and competences between different institutional and social actors, cooperation between them is also growing fast and becoming increasingly evident in the territories involved and across Italian regions.

Equally evident is the necessity for intervention in order to facilitate professional upskilling of adult trainers and teachers. In this respect too, the project’s operativity is carried out in support of ongoing reskilling processes financed through SSF and other institutional fundings. For their effectiveness, the project avails itself of technical know-how derived from direct involvement in applying European policies and EU-programmes’ regulations in the domain of Adult learning, as well as techniques for a correct designing and planning of partnership initiatives on a local and trans-national scale.

Therefore, target groups for the project’s activities are political heads at a centralised, regional or local level, as well as teachers and trainers, in an effort to ensure that all plans of action be applied across the national territory. Such activities especially entail 1) governance-strengthening initiatives 2) initiatives aimed at raising public awareness of relevant issues, as well as at enhancing training and upskilling pathways for adult trainers.

As far as the first line of action is concerned, it is important to bear in mind that there are various agreements regulating cooperation between schools, public services, social actors, interprofessional fund managers and local administrative departments. Such activities are meant to facilitate the strengthening of this form of governance, by offering chances for debate and opinion-sharing aimed at extending all necessary support during interinstitutional round tables on lifelong learning, as well as aiding other organisational infrastructures that fall outside of the institutional realm (while being equally useful and potentially crucial for the effectiveness of initiatives within this domain).

As to the second line of action, intervention has been planned out in 18 different regions, involving 70 hours of updating for each of the ca. 400 adult trainers coming from CPIA, PES and other sectors across the educational realm (more precisely, participants will be divided into training groups, each one consisting of 24 trainees, across the territories of the 18 regions participating in the project).