The development of quality in adult education

One of our most important activities is supporting the development of quality in adult education, especially public adult education. This allows us to support all adult citizens of Slovenia in exercising their right to quality education, and the right of the public to be informed about the implementation and results of this activity.

We achieve our main purpose when it comes to ensuring quality in adult education by:

• ensuring research and development activities to support the development of quality in adult education at a systemic level, and at the level of individual providers;
• developing internal and external approaches to define, evaluate, and develop quality;
• developing a professional basis for systemic placement of activities related to quality;
• counselling and training professional adult educators to implement self-evaluation and improve the quality of their own work;
• providing professional support for the development of quality in educational organisations and encouraging the sharing of knowledge and good practices;
• developing IT and communicational support for the processes of quality development;
• developing professional literature in the field of quality in adult education;
• monitoring all solutions that are implemented in practice, and implementing improvements based on evaluations;
• ensuring that knowledge is shared through international connections.

Encouraged by our previous results and the achievements we have seen in this field so far, we have prepared the following vision and related mid-term goals for the future. In the future, we will:

• contribute to further normative placement of the quality in adult education into the underlying legislation and systemic documents by providing a professional background and making professionally-driven suggestions;
• further invest in the development of professionals who work in quality in adult education;
• offer professional support and counselling to providers of formal and non-formal education, who want to establish and develop internal quality systems;
• strengthen the activities of the national network of quality counsellors in adult education;
• expand the Green Quality Logo network;
• further develop the ICT technologies to support quality processes;
• enrich professional literature in this field;
• plan and execute new projects and activities to develop and improve different aspects of quality in adult education;
• place activities in the context of international networks. 

 

In developing a quality system in adult education, we want to encourage the following principles:

• responsibility of personnel at educational organisations and responsibility of all other important stakeholders in the field of adult education when it comes to ensuring the quality of the processes, results, and effects of education;
• taking into account the interest-based and relative nature of quality during the entire process of evaluation and development of quality in adult education;
• inviting internal and external stakeholders to evaluate and help develop quality in adult education;
• clear separation of purposes and goals of internal and external measures for the evaluation and development of quality in adult education, even when both types of measures are combined;
• professional independence and consequently independent decisions about internal measures used for the evaluation and development of quality in adult education;
• constant development and a culture of learning and quality;
• social networking and reciprocity as a source of knowledge for organisations, teachers, and other professionals in the field of quality development in adult education;
• transparency of processes and results of learning;
• process-based approach – evaluating results and effects based on the processes that lead to them;
• planned and methodology-based processes for the evaluation and development of quality.

All activities in the field of quality in the past years have been planned using the quality development cycle. All developmental solutions are based on in-depth theoretical and practical research. Combining practical research and different epistemological concepts of quality leads to new developmental models and measures. These are then implemented in practice and educational and counselling support is offered. We also develop study materials and professional literature to support their implementation. The implementation of new solutions is also supported by ICT technologies. All solutions implemented in practice are regularly monitored. Evaluation of efficiency of the newly implemented solutions is followed by a reflection on any necessary improvements and new developmental activities. Such reflection generates the ideas for new developmental measures.
 
We have grouped the important milestones in the field of quality in adult education into the following categories:

Some of our key achievements are:

• Systemic placement of activities for the evaluation and development of quality in adult education into the Slovenian Act on Adult Education
• Developing an approach to the evaluation and development of quality in adult education
• Established and active national network of quality counsellors in adult education
• Developed training and improvement programmes for people working at educational organisations responsible for quality of adult education 
• Developed professional ICT support and counselling for educational organisations who want to establish or improve their internal quality systems 
• Developed professional literature and study materials on the evaluation and development of quality in adult education