| 7.
Support structure |
| 7.1
Turning national policy into local action calls for an
alignment of structures and operations at intermediate
levels. Action is required by those with a primary
interest in community education but also by those for
whom community education is either a minor but
significant concern or who need to use its methods to
achieve their objectives. |
| 7.2 As an
approach, community education should be increasingly
evident in many fields, most of which, like libraries and
the arts, sports development or economic development,
already make commitments which the Group would recognise
as having a community education approach. There will be a
mutual gain from encouraging them to take further
advantage of the practical experience available to them
from current community education providers and by
encouraging the latter to work with a wider range of
partners. In maximising good practice with all age
groups, the re-defined community education will continue
to give priority to working with organisations which
identify with adult education, youth work and community
work, but will not have an over-arching role. A balance
should be struck between the coherent promotion of good
practice across these fields and avoiding the old
confusion of seeing them as the constituent parts of
community education. |
| |
| National organisation |
| 7.3 The
aims which the Group has set out imply extensive
collaboration at local level among agencies working in
communities. This prompts the question of how structures
at wider levels can best work to encourage such mutual
support as well as the extension of community education's
way of working. While this can be asked of any field with
an interest in the local community, it is particularly
significant for those which have traditionally been
closest to community education. |
| 7.4 The 3
functions (promoting personal development, building
community capacity and investing in community learning)
now defined by the Group as the core of community
education might imply that a national agency for
community education should work in ways that would be
quite different from the support of forums for adult
education, youth work and community work which SCEC has
provided in the past. Alternative versions of some or all
such groups might be appropriate if they were constituted
to facilitate the coherent promotion of community
education practice as one, albeit a key, element of the
field in question, and were not accountable in the same
way as at present to the national agency. The agency's
continuation of a different but no less active role
through forums might maintain existing relationships and
provide a blueprint for further developments. |
| 7.5
Continuing policy development and implementation depend
on effective communication, a challenge for a field which
is undoubtedly complicated. There may be a need for a new
configuration of support for the voluntary sector, new
ways of working by SCEC and organisations representing
interested sectors, short life groups dealing with
particular developmental concerns. SCEC should forge
significant relationships with fields, such as FE,
libraries, community arts, the police or health
education, with which it shares common concerns. |
| |
| Partners |
| 7.6 The
Working Group's remit did not include fields which have,
in the past, not seen themselves as "part of
community education", but its re-definition of
community education means that community education should
now be seen as "part of them". Examples would
include sports development, community arts or economic
development. Key interests should be invited to consider
this perspective and to work out the most useful
positions they can adopt to secure the benefit of the
individual learner and of learning in communities. |
| 7.7 Many
further education colleges are deeply involved in
community education, either as individual providers or in
partnership in the delivery of education programmes in
community locations. Whether these programmes carry
certification or not, it may be hard, and it is probably
pointless, to say that what is being provided is further
or community education. What is required is clear
understanding of the roles of the college and the other
community education provider or providers. There are
several good models in operation. With the advent of the
Scottish Further Education Funding Council and with
consideration being given to overall strategies for
further education, this is a good time for further
education policy on community education to be developed. |
| 7.8 There
is extensive common ground between the interests of
community education and social work with the latter, for
example, carrying out community work as part of its
responsibility to promote social welfare and working with
young people leaving care. There are local examples of
good collaborative work and social work representatives
have taken an active role in community education
developments, for example in relation to professional
training. There is, however, room for a concerted effort
at national level to clarify the common ground, some of
which may be obscured by terminology. More could be done
to maximise the use of scarce resources, achieve a shared
focus on priorities and secure inter-disciplinary
co-operation at all levels. |
| 7.9 Two
separate fields in which admirable levels of co-operation
have been achieved by community education at national
level and in a range of local areas have been with the
police on community safety and with various agencies in
relation to health interests. The Group notes that the
Green Paper on Health advocates a community development
approach and recognises that the lead in this may not be
taken by health workers, an openness that is fully in
tune with the Group's own thinking. It would be valuable
to compile statements of good practice in both fields,
involving appropriate partners, in order to promote
further development and widespread implementation. |
| 7.10 Relationships
between community education providers and schools differ
widely. Some voluntary organisations and some statutory
services work closely with schools while others have
limited useful contact. While it is the school's
responsibility to be a good school, community education
should be able to offer significant opportunities to
parents and pupils, helping school staff to promote a
culture of learning. The Group looks to the development
of New Deal Schools and community schools to promote an
integrated educational approach. |
| 7.11 Since
local government reorganisation, several local
authorities have put community education and recreation
services together and in the voluntary sector there are
extensive common interests. Recreational interests
already use approaches which are compatible with or the
same as community education to develop programmes which
contribute greatly to local and individual development.
There is a strong case for joint national statements
which clarify the role of community education within
recreation and which help the latter to develop their
community based activities. |
| 7.12 The
work of several library services is likely to increase
the adoption of community education approaches over the
coming years. Such work includes the development of IT as
a community resource, increasing local access to
information and the development of libraries as local
learning centres. There would be value in drawing
together information on such developments so that both
libraries and community education providers have a full
picture of the possibilities for collaborative effort. |
| 7.13
Higher education has a variety of links with community
education but in most colleges and universities these do
not constitute an overall strategy. The main foci of
interest are the work of continuing education
departments, training of professional staff and research.
There are several topics in which, from a community
education perspective, development would be helpful.
These include the status of non-award bearing courses,
the funding of work-based degree courses in community
education, and access to research capacity. An
appropriately backed clarification for HEIs of what would
constitute a strong institutional stance on community
education, with good exemplification, would be useful. It
would then be for individual institutions to respond to
this with explicit statements setting out the form of
their commitment. |
| 7.14 In
different parts of the country, and nationally, a variety
of good relationships have grown between community
education providers and the private sector. These include
direct involvement in relevant activities, such as those
supported through Scottish Business in the Community.
There is, however, no easily accessible record of this
relationship and it is too easily assumed that the
private sector link only means sponsorship in one form or
another. It would be in the interests of both sides to
see this rectified. |
| |
| Training |
| 7.15 The
shift to a definition of community education as primarily
an approach rather than a sector does not suggest the
lack of a set of competences which comprise a discrete
professional discipline. For the foreseeable future, a
core group of staff will be required to provide key local
support for the development of community learning, for a
variety of employing organisations. Since the 1977
report, Professional Education and Training for Community
Education (the Carnegy Report published by HMSO) and the
establishment in 1990 of CeVe, a distinct pattern of
training in community education up to degree level has
emerged. Trained workers are now finding employment in an
expanding range of agencies, many of which may not see
themselves as specialising in community education. The
professional discipline can expect to have both a central
focus and pervasive influence. |
| 7.16
Training is also being established for staff in related
fields and other professional bodies are now approaching
CeVe to have relevant elements of their training
endorsed. While the Group believes that further
development of training will be called for by this
report, it acknowledges the strong and growing base which
training currently provides. A key question for the
future of professional training is whether the
expectation that competence will be demonstrated in
different settings should continue to refer only to adult
education, community work or youth work. The logic of
this report is that settings in other fields could be of
equal relevance. Furthermore, training for other fields
which can, or could, include community education
competences, should be considered for joint recognition.
The present understanding of generic and specialist
training may need to be reviewed. |
| 7.17 With
regard to qualifications, the Group wishes to see an
extension of inclusive and flexible routes into training
and recognition. Training should emphasise strongly the
fact that there is common ground with related
professional groups, reflecting a more collaborative
approach to the provision of lifelong learning, and give
practical demonstration of this in course structures.
This should include fields such as social work and
libraries as well as the established references to adult
education, community work and youth work. Any
consideration of proposals for joint training of school
and college staff should be extended to include community
education workers. |
| 7.18
Volunteers and part-time staff, whose training needs may
or may not coincide, carry much of the responsibility for
face-to-face work and the support which they receive will
also require review. These are also full-time but
unqualified staff whose needs require attention. Given
the continuing development of the voluntary sector and
volunteering, the impetus given by such innovations as
lottery funding and Millennium Volunteers, as well as the
changes proposed in this report, there is a strong case
for a review of the national support available for
training in those parts of the voluntary sector which use
community education methods. |
