Saturday 23 and Sunday 24 November 2024

The conference will be held online. It will include participatory sessions activities, presentations and experiential workshops.

Keynote speaker, leading thinker Stephen Brookfield

Conference outline

Quality is a constant concern for everyone involved in educational and training activities: program designers, adult educators and trainers, learners, and the staff of educational institutions that support the learning process. It also draws the attention of those indirectly involved in implementing educational projects, such as public bodies that design education policies or guidance counselors. Additionally, quality in education is of interest to those who have a general stake in educational matters, such as family members and the broader community. 

Quality in education, like any significant concept, evolves over time, takes on different characteristics, shifts its focus to various aspects, and is shaped by the social context.Not all stakeholders perceive quality in education in the same way. Formal institutions often associate it with measurable effectiveness, accreditation, and the currently popular "learning outcomes." For 'quality assurance' experts, it is achieved through the standardization of procedures and the compliance of training providers with these standards. Meanwhile, critical educators believe that true quality is rooted in the adoption and application of participatory and experiential education principles and methods that foster meaningful and holistic learning for individuals.Educational quality, therefore, is frequently mentioned but remains a complex concept that is challenging to define and implement.In the field of adult education and training, in particular, it is commonplace that in our country the quality level of a large part of the education and a large number of actions, particularly those implemented under funding from the European Union, is low. Improvement efforts made in the first decade of the 21st century with interventions such as the certification of training providers by the the National Centre for the Accreditation of Lifelong Learning Providers , the training of adult educators, the development and certification of vocational the improvement in the methodologies for the development of teacher content development and other measures, which have been effective for a short period of time, declined in the second decade and up to the present day. 

The problem of quality of adult education and training is returning with a vengeance to the in the spotlight. At the same time, the recent disappointing results of the International Programme for International Student Assessment/PISA have reminded us that there is an acute need for quality problem also exists in school education. Reflecting on the teachers, as critically thinking professionals (Shön, Illeris), on the their educational practice, is an integral part of the conference's theme.It is in this context, the Hellenic Adult Education Association is devoting the 9th Conference on Adult Education to the quality of education and invites interested researchers, adult educators, teachers and trainers, and postgraduate students to contribute with their knowledge and experience to a deeper understanding and critical exploration of the various aspects of quality in education.

The conference will address questions such as:

- What are the main challenges for quality in adult education and training, and formal education, in Greece today?

- What are the most serious quality problems compromising education, how are they caused and how could they be addressed?

- What factors facilitate or hinder the achievement of quality?

- What kind of experience has been gained from the various attempts at quality improvement in different educational settings? Which lessons have been learned?

- What good practices of quality education have been developed?

- What theoretical assumptions and practical applications would help to improve the quality of educational activities?

Disclaimer: EPALE is a community platform with user-generated content. All user-generated content is provided as-is. The European Commission and NSS Greece does not endorse any views, opinions or advice expressed by users to this platform.