This study investigates the purposes and corresponding preconditions of member education practices in three Finnish political parties using the theory of practice architectures. To accomplish this, it examines the educational endeavours of three Finnish parliamentary parties—namely, the Centre Party of Finland (Suomen Keskusta), the National Coalition Party (Kansallinen Kokoomus) and the Social Democratic Party of Finland (Suomen sosiaalidemokraattinen puolue). The study draws on the theory of practice architectures, which provides a framework for examining the arrangements comprising the preconditions underlying practices—that is, purposeful endeavours based on established human courses of action. The research questions addressed in this study are as follows. What are the main purposes of education within the studied political parties? What preconditions enable or constrain the educational practices related to those purposes? The findings reveal that the Centre Party of Finland aims to foster expertise among its entire membership in a consistent and impactful manner, emphasising educational planning and supporting political ambition. Moreover, the National Coalition Party’s political education aims to foster members’ expertise and success, as supported by individualisation, while the Social Democratic Party of Finland’s party-political education focuses on engaging members and renewing the party, which are pursued through offering open educational opportunities and considering both local preconditions and historical knowledge. In conclusion, the identified purposes seek a balance between ensuring equality and supporting hierarchy among the party membership, while the identified preconditions indicate understandings of the political party as either a collective actor or an arena in which individual political actors operate.

The objective of this paper is to highlight the potential contributions of the post-critical perspective to social movement learning (SML). To achieve this aim, the study employs a thematic analysis of findings derived from a systematic literature review on deconsumption (an umbrella term understood as rejection of consumerism together with materialistic values prevalent in the Western consumer societies, encompassing movements such as voluntary simplicity, freeganism etc.). Identified themes are presented within the framework of post-critical pedagogy and analysed through its lens. This approach allows the researcher to demonstrate the implications and insights of the post-critical perspective in SML and adult education. This article argues that integrating the post-critical perspective into SML can yield a novel understanding of pertinent issues within this subfield. Such an application not only broadens the scope of adult education but also expands post-critical pedagogy itself.

The article uses insights from the capability approach as a theoretical framework. It investigates the potential of higher education to provide fertile advantages regarding young adults’ participation in nonformal education and whether this potential is bounded by people’s individual characteristics and the wider social context in which they live. Applying descriptive statistics and multilevel modelling, we conducted a secondary data analysis of the Adult Education Survey for 29 European countries. The findings go beyond previous research by clearly demonstrating that the fertile advantages of higher education regarding participation in adult nonformal education are not absolute and straightforward. They are bounded not only by certain important individual characteristics (such as individuals’ social background and household income) but are also context-dependent. More concretely, they differ among countries and depend on various country-level factors, such as level of innovation and economic growth.

Swedish municipal adult education has many providers. The overall responsibility for this service still lies with the municipalities, entailing the enactment of national policy with respect to providers. This study puts focus on the discursive enactment of policy concerning quality in adult education. Five discourses on quality are identified through interviews with school leaders, teachers, and students, namely that quality is about formal demands and processes, that it is a matter of student focus, that it is about teachers’ competence and working conditions, that it is about teaching, and that quality depends on the student group. School leaders focus on formal and organisational aspects of quality, while teachers and students focus on actual processes in the classroom, connecting to their own work and lives. Compared to national policy, the local discourses are limited mainly to studying, teaching, organisation, and short-term outcomes, while long-term aims in national policy are less prominent.

Numeracy is a critical competency needed by adults to navigate their way through tasks in their personal and professional lives. Hence, it is critical that efforts are made to identify and address challenges that prevent adults from developing the numeracy skills needed to engage in society. In this research we identify the challenges facing adult numeracy eduction across Europe. A survey, which sought to investigate the main challenges faced by adult educators and policy-makers when delivering numeracy programmes, was distributed to leading figures in adult numeracy education in EU states. Twelve countries responded and challenges identified related to the lack of a standardised definition of numeracy, the lack of a standardised framework to support adult numeracy education and the need for professional development for adult numeracy tutors. In this paper we look at how these challenges manifest themselves in different jurisdictions and offer suggestions for overcoming these challenges in future.

This paper investigates the characteristics and both material and emotional costs of upward social mobility through university education in Spain and the Dominican Republic. A comparative qualitative study has been carried out, based on biographical-narrative interviews, with a sample of 6 Dominican students and 9 Spanish students coming from an economically disadvantaged background. The results show the social mobility experiences and expectations of the participants and their families, with different nuances in the two contexts. The need to combine study with work is one of the main costs of university. The primary coping strategy in both countries is material and symbolic family support, but additional coping mechanisms to persist in studies are also evident. The conclusions highlight both the perspectives developed by the participants and the critical role of structural dimensions (social background, national context, recent history, economy, social values, culture, religious beliefs) in understanding their experiences in the university context.

Accessing higher education is a biographical learning experience for all students, which can promote transformations in individuals’ identities. This article aims to investigate the implications of biographical learning experiences on the students’ identities. We will explore African students’ biographical learning experiences in Portuguese higher education and how they shaped their identities. Biographical learning and identity theoretical perspectives were adopted. This is a qualitative study that used biographical interviews with 22 African students enrolling at Portuguese higher education. The content analysis carried out has been organized into 2 themes: biographical learning experiences and identity transformations. The results of the study show that African students gained new knowledge and skills and became more independent and autonomous. They develop their self-confidence and open-mindedness through a new way of seeing the world. Thus, African students’ experiences in higher education contributed to the formation and transformation of their identity.

This article considers an arts-based project, Learning Returns (2023), that seeks to capture the experiences of adults who have returned to arts study after some time away from formal education. The aims of the project are twofold: firstly, to evaluate the combination of narrative inquiry and digital film-making hosted on YouTube as a method of investigating adult learning and secondly, through an analysis of the Learning Returns content, to discover what themes the participants considered important to communicate to an imagined, virtual audience. The findings suggested that the aesthetics of the videos/films interconnect with the lived experiences of the participants. The participants were able to give an account of their experiences spontaneously, and at the same time communicate messages of hope to prospective adult returners. It was also discovered that the editing process offers a means of analysing the content of the films that is analogous to the approaches associated with qualitative research.

With this text, we try to understand if – and if so, how – mature students are represented by and in the governing bodies of higher education institutions. With a theoretical framework that values above all the institutional dimension, we carried out thirteen semi-structured interviews with students and faculty members who are part of the various governing bodies with student representation of a Portuguese higher education institution. The data show that (i) the functioning of these bodies tends to be known only by the students who participate in them, (ii) the bodies usually react to, rather than prevent, the problems that arise, (iii) mature students are perceived as a source of ‘difficulties’ and ‘needs’, and (iv) student representation in governing bodies does not seem to fairly and equitably represent all students, and some specificities of mature students (among other underrepresented groups) seem to be made invisible.

Historically it could be argued that issues of access were apparent in the late nineteenth century with the University Extension Movement in the UK and Ireland which offered education to working class men. And later in Scandinavia with the Folk High Schools as well as the work by Rubenson (1979) in the 1970s on recruitment to education. Early research in the 1980s and 1990s in the field of access focused on the process of adults accessing and participating in education and much of the literature centred, and continues to centre, on higher education (Williams, 1997), at that time educators and researchers used the term "second chance" but is rarely used now. This mirrored policy concerns on the need to widen access and participation by policy makers at national and European levels. There was little research on the lived experience of adult learners once they enter the system as the key concern was to get adults to return to learn, largely for economic reasons to enhance the skills of the workforce in a competitive global world. This tension was connected to the rise of the neoliberal paradigm that oriented the uses and meanings of the lifelong learning endeavour in an instrumental and linear direction (Barros, 2012; Milana, 2012) . Once adult learners had accessed higher education, for example, it was assumed that they were on an equal footing with younger students, research at this time mainly looked at how adults managed to overcome the barriers both at the beginning and during their learning itinerary (Cross, 1981) . Over the years research and literature on adult access broadened in scope and moved beyond access issues as some researchers began to ask the question 'access to what?'. Research interest, therefore, began to explore the learning and educational experiences of adults in various educational settings such as community education, adult education and further education, although the focus was very much on higher education