News & Events | 09 Jun, 2022

Lifelong Learning for Inclusion and Sustainability Conference 2022, 06-09 June

Professor David James shared about Lifelong Learning and the fourth industrial revolution and its link to education models and technological change.  The Standing Conference on University Teaching and Research in the Education of Adults (SCUTREA) and the Universities Association for Lifelong Learning (UALL)  was held from June 6th – 9th 2022 and was hosted by the University of Glasgow’s Centre for Research & Development in Adult and Lifelong Learning (CR&DALL).

Two key discourses of our time, lifelong learning (LLL) and the fourth industrial revolution (4IR), have been linked to offer a compelling narrative of the coupling of education models and technological change to enable individual empowerment, social inclusion and shared prosperity. We identify tensions and difficulties with both concepts and their application, and our analysis of how they have been brought together shows a persistent technological determinism. However, we also suggest that the 4IR can provide an impetus for thinking about LLL in new ways: these transcend the individual employment-focused discourse and point to a progressive conceptualisation of LLL, which we argue is a necessary response to the changing nature of work and indeed more fundamental issues for humanity.

Visit the conference webpage for more information on the conference and conference materials.