At the conclusion of my brief intervention earlier today, I said that I considered the present debate in Seanad Éireann to be particularly opportune because it enabled me, as Minister for Education, to have the views of Senators, particularly as they would have been given in advance of final decisions being made in relation to the drawing up of a future comprehensive programme in this area.
Adult education obviously is not new in this country. Many voluntary bodies and agencies have been engaged in it. Appendix B to the interim report contains a directory of such organisations. One of the recommendations of the final report is that Aontas should be given the task of publishing an annual directory of adult education services.
There are however additional considerations associated with the promotion of a greatly expanded programme of adult education in the context of changing circumstances and concepts, and a revised understanding of the place of education in community development. Attention is drawn to these new features in many parts of the report and in the documents and studies being made available from various educational and cultural bodies and from the international governmental organisations. It is in the circumstances to which I have referred that the views of groups and associations with practical experience in the field or those who may have made a particular study of the requirements related to their own needs that these are of vital importance. There is no question of a Minister sitting at a desk and drawing up a blue-print for an adult education programme. Formulation of such a programme would involve discussions with various interests: vocational education committees, school authorities, teachers, RTE, voluntary and statutory organisations, universities, et cetera. It would also have to be worked out within the resources which can be provided on a graduated scale in accordance with the provisions of a scheme of programme budgets, and in the context of the facilities which are, or may be made, available, and of the demand for services.
While I agree with the points made by many Senators, who mentioned large sums, we must be realistic in this matter, realising that the demand for expansion of the social services will, of necessity, given the limitation of the taxpayer's patience, mean that all we would wish in our wildest dreams to have for these purposes will not, unfortunately, be available.
The Committee on Adult Education took as a launching pad in its investigation a definition of adult education as follows:
The provision and utilisation of facilities, whereby those who are no longer participants in the fulltime school system, may learn whatever they need to learn at any period of their lives.
In this definition no distinction is drawn between formal and informal education, and the emphasis is placed on the process of adult education as serving the needs of people in every sphere of human development. It is also stated in the report that its primary concern was with education as it relates to those who had broken, for one reason or another with fulltime education. Adult education should clearly be considered within the context of the aim of the policy of educational opportunity for all. It may be conceded now, I think, that an undue optimism which prevailed during the 1960s as to the extent to which this could be achieved within the span of formal education has given way to a more sober estimate of the difficulties to be overcome. Sober estimates are always better, in my judgment.
This further reflection on the inherent difficulties of the situation inevitably brings into focus the part which adult education must and should play in the process. Fundamental considerations in this regard are mentioned in chapters 2 and 3 of the report: Resources and Needs, and the recommendations made merit very careful consideration.
I feel very strongly with Senator Higgins, who concluded, that reference was made to many bright people, like Toffler and others, who have given us their view of society. I am particularly taken by the pyramid structure here on page 60, based on A. H. Maslow's Motivation and Personality, New York, 1954, page 69, where the needs of society are based on a pyramid rising from physiological or survival needs, through safety needs, care and affection and belongingness needs to esteem needs and then the need for self-fulfilment. Then there is the statement that adult education, both formal and non-formal, can service each level in this hierarchy of needs. I must confess that I am not too clear where this gets us.
I would echo the opinion of Senator Higgins, that we should treat many of these outside observers and experts with a sober degree of the critical faculty with which we are advising our adult education dissidents to practice.
The committee have rightly laid great stress on adult education as an integral part of the general education system within the concept of permanent or recurrent education. In this regard, the recent Ministers for Education meeting under the auspices of the Council of Europe held in Berne last year, was interesting in that it chose as its subject for the next meeting in 1975 in Sweden the theme of permanent education. I hope to return to this matter later. It is stated that a system of permanent or life-long education enables the individual to avail himself of resources for learning and personal development recurrently, though not necessarily at consecutive periods throughout his lifetime.
The report considers that the launching of the community schools concept offered additional possibilities for the full implementation of all that is meant by permanent education. I welcome this commendation of the role of community school in this regard but I would not wish anyone to read into it the implication that only community schools should be considered as offering the necessary possibilities in this respect. In this regard I take Senator Martin's point about the secondary schools run by religious orders as offering possibilities. I, too, consider that the traditional secondary schools should be brought more into the picture in this regard than in the past and that the part traditionally played by the secondary schools run by vocational authorities should be further encouraged and expanded.
If in the past the voluntary secondary schools did not play the part in the general life of the whole community by way of provision of adult education classes and other activities which we may now sometimes feel they should have done, we might ask ourselves why this was so and whether the responsibility for any deficiency in this regard should be placed only at the door of the school authorities in question. What financial aid was available to them to enable them to undertake such additional functions? Were they approached officially and suggestions made to them as to how they might place their premises at the disposal of community groups for the purpose of community development programmes? If local groups sometimes approach the authorities of the schools for facilities of any kind, were any offers made in relation to meeting the additional costs which would arise in respect of heating, maintenance, insurance and so on?
These are aspects of any future development programme which need to be borne in mind in connection with the use of school premises for purposes not falling within the usual formal education programme. In mentioning these schools I am not forgetting, too, the primary schools run by our parochial communities in every part of the country. Already there is evidence in connection with applications being received for school building grants that the authorities of our voluntary secondary schools are planning for adult education programmes as a feature of their future service to the community.
Adult education can play a major role in bridging what is sometimes referred to as the generation gap between parents and children. Example is always a potent influence. The example of parents still participating in educational activities may exercise a great influence for good in young people. Senator Martin made the point that the frequency with which people go to our public houses may be simply an expression of their desire to get in touch with other people and to act as a community. I think he was right. On the other hand if the parents were to go to education classes rather than going to the other establishments, would there be an influence on the children of that particular family? If so, would it be different in kind and in result?
I would emphasise however that courses for adults should be suitably structured for their circumstances and needs. I agree with the point made in the course of the debate concerning the creative role which the student can play in adult education that he does not want a cultural handout and that he brings his own sensibilities, his own passions and his own politics to any system of adult education.
This reference to the particular characteristic of the adult student brings me to another point. In some instances parents may desire to have refresher courses of the formal education programme being pursued in school in order to enable them to understand and be of assistance to children with their homework. I do not, however, agree with statistical calculations sometimes presented that a certain percentage of the population are in need of further courses in education, on the simplistic basis that they left school some 20 or so years ago without a particular parchment to indicate a certain level of academic attainment. A great many of these people will subsequently, by way of their experience and development within the context of their work and opportunities, have passed and progressed intellectually far beyond others with supposedly higher certified attainment standards. The adult education courses to be provided should be suitable, flexible and acceptable. The success of any programme will be the measure of voluntary support for it.
I am not enamoured of the term "education for leisure". Education and work properly understood are leisure. Education is for life. We take advantage of any opportunity available to us to find enjoyment and satisfaction through educational pursuits. Education in this connection should cater for a wide range of diverse attitudes and future educational planning must take cognisance of such diversity. I have in mind in this respect such basic structures as library and museum facilities, sport, community centres, village halls, local arts and crafts, music and drama, in the same way adult education provision must form part of all our plans for community development, youth and recreational programmes.
This is not equivalent to saying that any activity which deserves public financial aid must somehow be brought within a definition of being educational or cultural. To act in this fashion is merely to create confusion in relation to the use of the words and already the word "cultural", in particular, has suffered too much in this respect. There will however almost always be a place for and the requirement of a suitable programme of adult education in connection with any worthwhile programme of community development. In general adult education should contribute to a useful employment of their time for both young and old.
It may be that the emphasis which it was necessary in the past to place on basic education and fundamental economic needs may give way to a concern to help our young people in particular to find their place in a changing society. We should seek to have our youth maturing into adulthood in an Ireland which will be technologically advanced while at the same time retaining a high sense of social values.
I anticipate a growing need and demand for adult education in the years ahead. Apart from the requirements deriving from changing circumstances generally, and in particular the complexities resulting from technological advance, the demand will grow with the increasing percentage staying on to complete secondary education. The following extract from the report of the committee is relevant in this connection:
The findings of the committee on the characteristics of those who participate in adult education activities in Ireland generally correspond with the results of research in other countries i.e. that the general characteristics of those who participate are:
21-45 year age group;
have at least two years of post-primary education;
are members of upper socioeconomic groups.
The following quotation from a report published by the Council of Europe Today and Tomorrow in European Adult Education makes the same point:
Investigations into the slow growth of popular response to adult education have, over the past 15 years, brought out the fact that this response diminishes sharply among those who have had only the minimum of initial education prescribed by law and who are usually to be found among unskilled and semi-skilled workers in later life.
It is further stated:
Generally speaking the recent and continuing trends in adult education are largely concerned with increasing its outreach to a much wider and more responsive proportion of the people, with altering the financial basis and legal framework so that adult education is more centrally situated in national educational systems and has a prestige consistent with the important tasks that lie before it, with making a response to the multiplicity of emerging social and cultural needs, with alterations in the curriculum, particularly to include work which corresponds with the economic needs of students, employers and governments.
It is in the context of the growing need for an expansion of the programme for adult education that I should desire to refer to the suggestion made during this debate by Senator Horgan originally that adult education should be made totally free for whomsoever it is provided. The recommendation is in such uncompromising terms that I feel that I should refer specifically to it even at this stage before final decisions have been made in relation to the lines on which the future programmes of adult education will be developed.
The first observation which I should like to make is that a programme of adult education costs money and that the money has to come from somewhere. There are expenses in connection with the provision of buildings, equipment, heat, light, maintenance, and so on and teachers have to be paid salaries in respect of their services. The education is being provided for adults and it is the adult population which in one way or another must provide the financial resources. I do not see anything wrong in principle in adults paying directly for a service provided for them whether that service is educational, cultural, commercial or something else, provided the charge is reasonable and the person is in a position to meet the charge.
There are also reasons of a more immediate and practical nature why payment of fees as appropriate in the case of adult education courses may not be dispensed with and that to do so would inevitably result in a contraction and not an expansion of the programme.
The sources of financial support for the existing programme of adult education—a reference was made to this by Senator O'Toole and others—are given at pages 57 to 59 and page 135 of the report of the committee. They include students, participants and community members' fees. The committee have also stated that the perception and value of adult education as outlined in chapter 1 of the report necessitates financial resources far beyond the present provision. In other words, we need to expand and not to contract the possible sources of revenue for future development. I am of course in full agreement with any proposal that the fees charged should be such as will not hamper the development of suitable courses in adult education for all sections of the community. In this regard however I include also those groups who can afford to pay the economic cost and for whom courses could not be provided on any other basis because of the limitation of total revenue available.
What we need to do is to exercise our intelligence and ingenuity in finding additional sources of revenue from all sources to enable us to mount a programme of expansion characterised by its flexibility and adaptable to the varying circumstances and not to interfere with the process of growth by restricting the range of sources of financial support. The local community should be very fully involved in the provision of the adult education service for the area. It is the people themselves who know best the type of programme they need and who are in the best position to evaluate the service provided. The flexibility required in the matter of the provision of services will be facilitated by an appropriate delegation of responsibility and by the promotion of co-operation between voluntary and statutory organisations. The programme brings together parents, teachers, school authorities and administrators in a spirit of enthusiasm and participation in a common endeavour.
The committee's terms of reference included a request to indicate the type of permanent organisation to be set up in order to serve the needs of the community in the matter of adult education. It sets out its conclusions at chapter 4 of the report. The committee however recommend inter alia regionalisation of the education system as a means of promoting a programme of adult education.
Senators are aware that prior to the presentation of the report to me in November, 1973, I had already initiated discussions in October, 1973, with representatives of the recognised educational associations on the proposal for regionalisation. I am at present giving consideration to the views put before me by the representatives of the associations during the discussions which took place and I am also having the matter examined in the light of the observations made at the annual general meetings of the teachers and managerial associations. I am hopeful that following further discussions it may be found feasible to arrive at agreement on new structures which would be the most appropriate to the needs of future expansion of the educational system and which would enable the best provisions to be made for both formal and informal courses of education. In this regard I note that Senator Horgan, in opening the debate, came down very strongly on the side of regions, rather than counties. I quote from him as he is reported in the Official Report at column 114 of volume 78 of the 10th May. 1974, when he said:
I know that county feeling is a very strong thing in this country and a very valuable thing in many respects but in terms of real decentralisation, in terms of creating regions which are big enough and important enough to stand up against central authority when necessary and to have the financial fire power to enable them to support creative and innovative experiments within their own areas we have to look beyond the county. We should really be thinking more in terms of regions or the counties tied in with them as much as possible. I feel that this heavy insistence on the county committees as the fundamental unit for educational administration is based on a misunderstanding of the whole principle of devolution and the whole principle of regionalisation.
I appreciate that the matter of the size of the unit to which devolution of authority can be made from the Department of Education might engage the attention of Senators at some point in the near future so that I might have opinions from them following on that given by Senator Horgan regarding the size of the unit which they might think would be the most suitable in the circumstances.
I am very grateful, indeed, to the Senators who have spoken here today and on the previous day for raising again for public discussion this matter of the adult education report. It would be difficult to do justice to the input of each Senator who has spoken and if I refer to some points it is not by way of showing any less regard for the contributions of other Senators. However I would like to say that, when Senators Dolan and O'Toole referred to the desirability of having a university degree for our primary teachers, I was glad to be able to intervene to say that this has now been brought to the point where, all going well, the products of our three-year course starting in September will emerge with a university degree. This is a matter which gives me personal satisfaction. I am grateful to all those in various positions of authority who responded so readily to my suggestion made in Wexford in April, 1973, that this was the direction in which our policy should develop.
I am particularly interested in Senator Martin's definition of adult education. He drew a distinction between the formal education of the young, the acceptance of the structure of authority, and what he suggested was the different approach to adult education where the individual would be more appreciative of his own needs and would make with his own teachers a common assessment of his needs and of their fulfilment. I agree in general terms with this, but I would see a gradual phasing of one into the other.
One of the points made very strongly at the Conference of European Ministers last June was that the senior cycle from, say, 16 years to 19—16 to 18 in this country up to now—would be regarded as the first stage in recurrent or permanent education. This is the trend of the future. It was in this context that I recently suggested a year which might be regarded as the initiation of this first stage of adult education in my suggestion of a certificate of general education.
I should like to refer to this briefly. I suggested that students at age, say, 15½ or 16½ years might be given a year between the completion of the intermediate certificate and the commencement of the senior cycle in which they might undertake personal development in the context of community service. The subjects which might be included in this year would be religious knowledge—theoretically studied but also in the context of service to the community—and an introduction to logic and philosophy. In this connection I should like to suggest to Senators that one should not draw back in fear and dread at the terms "logic" and "philosophy". Suitably structured programmes can be devised to be of benefit to pupils at that age. There is one quality more than any other which I should like our students to develop and that is the development of the critical faculty, already referred to by Senator Higgins, as an antidote or corrective to the outpouring of propaganda which they will have to face in the future, not only from politicians but from commercial advertisers and all kinds of people. I think it was Hemmingway who referred to an "in-built crap detector". If we can develop this critical faculty in our pupils, it will save them from many difficulties in future life and might even be a small measure of amelioration of the violent tendencies in our society.
In this connection I have also suggested that we might have a subject called "media criticism". I was pleased to see yesterday at Westport that the Bishop of Ardagh and Clonmacnoise agreed that this was a desirable subject. I have in mind here that pupils should be formally taught the problems, objectives and difficulties that beset those whose profession is the media, whether it be radio, television, or newspapers. I have seen in the Communications Centre classes brought out there and subjected to the task of making a news programme. It was enlightening to find that they had realised much more clearly after that exercise the difficulties involved in the work of the media.
I have also suggested that a subject called "Appreciation of Art and Music" might be included. I suggest that those who have characterised these proposals as educationally unsound are themselves admitting in public that they do not understand what education is about. I say this to all those who either rushed in at the beginning to make criticisms before they had seen the full text of my proposals, or those who still continue to suggest that our year for the certificate of general education is not educationally well-founded. If we want to orient our pupils towards participation and continued education for the rest of their lives, what better way to do it than to start at this age with a flexible programme of personal development and community service which will orient them towards the community on the one hand, and enable them to discover their own persons, feel more clearly their needs and initiate them into adulthood in a year which will be, as I put it when speaking to the TUI, free from the academic and technical treadmill? I intend to see, with the help of educational advisers, that in those schools —and some have already opted for this—who are willing to make what one headmaster called "a move towards the most fundamental idea that has yet surfaced in this country in regard to education" it will be introduced this year in selected schools on a pilot scheme basis so that perhaps its very success may entice others to follow.
I agree with Senator Higgins's statement on adult education. This particular input will also have a beneficial effect on the intermediate programme and the leaving certificate programme.
A section of the report deals with needs. I have already referred to the pyramid here. Although reference is made to the place of Christianity in this country in regard to education, I should like to put it more strongly than that. One of the greatest needs in modern society for our people is the Augustinian realisation that there is a need for deep religious conviction and practice. I see a place for that in any structure of adult education which we may evolve.
I wish to thank the various Senators who have spoken and to express the hope that in the not too distant future we may have the opportunity on a motion of a more general kind to pursue some of the thoughts I have expressed in response to this debate and that we will not regard my contribution here as the final word or as exhausting all the answers which might be given on this important question. I am glad to have had the opportunity of speaking to the Seanad and would be delighted to come back at any time to pursue this matter further.
May I again appeal that Senators might either make known to me, through debate or otherwise, what particular type of structure they suggest is most useful when we come to set up a formal structure for adult education? First of all, is it to be devolved from the Department? Is it to be a county or a region? What number of schools? What number of teachers? What percentage of population should be involved in this? I should like to consult with the Seanad on these matters and to receive either private or public recommendations in this important field.
Finally, may I say to those Senators whose particular points I have not answered that if they wish to raise them privately with me I will be delighted to express my views on any matter I have overlooked.