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LIFELONG LEARNING IN THE CONTEXT OF BALANCED DEVELOPMENT
R. Gerlach
A broader justification of lifelong learning seems unnecessary. It has been done many times and is still being done in numerous publications, national and international reports as well as during scientific conferences and seminars, emphasizing that a characteristic feature of the contemporary world is its changeability and uncertainty. One can say that nowadays the only sure thing is that nothing is certain. And if this is the case, lifelong learning understood as a process of learning throughout the whole life should be treated not as a privilege but a necessity, and one of the basic tasks of compulsory education is to prepare the youth to learn throughout the period of professional activity and even longer during the, so called, third age. The principle of continuity is commonly considered to be basic in education.
Not going into a wider discussion it should be stated that, in the times when slogans of knowledge-based economy; information, post-industrial, technological, global, network society of knowledge or learning society cease to be the demands and turn out to be a reality accepted by the majority of countries, the lifelong learning becomes a norm.
The problems of lifelong learning have been analysed from different points of view. Here, I would like to address this issue in the context of balanced development strategy.
Lifelong learning as a challenge of the 21st century
The need to learn throughout life is certainly due to the changeability of the surrounding world. This concerns the area of economy but also unprofessional life. R. Pachocinski wrote: "The changes which are taking place around us are mostly visible in the form of:
• fast development of information technology - it becomes faster, cheaper, easily accessible, versatile and user-friendly;
• globalization of production (goods and services), finances, markets, expectations especially those who have nothing;
• new challenges concerning the role and sovereignty of countries, strengthening the relations between domestic and international structures;
• wave of innovation and enterprise on the world scale overcoming the traditional barriers of time, borders and even language.1
1 Ibid, p.7
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It seems important to notice that education for all throughout the whole life is one of the essential tasks for governments, the whole of society, the private sector, but most of all for each citizen. It should be a real challenge. Is there any chance to make it so? Or rather as F. Mayor puts it - we will become "witnesses of segmentation of education for everyone throughout the whole life, as a result of which, a minority of chosen ones would have access to paradise of knowledge, whereas others condemned to ignorance would be destined for the hell of new ghettoes, while a mass of average people - to ineffective purgatories.”1
In order to avoid such situation it is necessary to create a learning society, where every individual will have a possibility not only to access education throughout the whole life but also to choose the institution supporting learning as well as forms, content and course of this process. Thus, legitimate are the statements of I. Wojnar who says: "Education is more and more considered equivalent to a conscious process of selfdevelopment, human growth [...]. It is no longer true that a person learns only at school [...] educational situations are intensified and the process of education, to a greater extent, becomes self-education.”1 2
One should also be aware that becoming a learning society, which closely correlates with the slogans of European union concerning the creation of knowledge based economy and society, requires an increase of expenditure on education not only of children and youth but also of adults during the whole period of their professional activity.
Summing up this part of discussion it should be assumed after A. Toffler that people who will have to live in superindustrial societies must learn the skills in three basic fields: education, establishing contacts with other people and making choices.3 Thus, the role of widely understood education is to create the possibility to acquire such skills.
Balanced development and lifelong learning
Lifelong learning, which, as it has been tried to prove, is necessary for an individual to function in the knowledge based society and economy, should also be regarded as an important element of reaching a balanced development. In a resolution of the Polish Sejm of March 1999 it was emphasised that "the notion of a balanced development means that satisfying the current needs of the society and the needs of future
1
F. Mayor, Przyszfosc swiata, Warsaw 2001, p. 34
2 Cz. Banach, Wartosci w systemie edukacji,
(www.wsp.krakow.pl/konspekt/konspekt7/banach7.html)
3 A. Toffler, Szok przysztosci, Przezmierowo 2007, p. 357
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generations shall be treated equally.” It was also stressed that the Strategy of a Balanced Development of Poland “...shall combine, in a harmonious way, the concern for preserving the natural and cultural heritage of the nation with the civilisation and economic progress affecting all groups of the society.”1
Not going into much detail on the Strategy it is worth noting, among others, that:
• in the activities for a balanced development it is necessary to integrate economic development, social development and ecological development;
• the economic and civilisation development of the present generation must not happen at the expense of destruction of the natural environment and using up of the natural resources;
• a balanced development does not act as a brake on progress but more as its stimulator, it is also a way of life, a form of ethics, which gives a possibility to choose a form of production and consumption;
• a balanced development is not a goal or borderline which we have to reach in a given time, but a process spread over many years or even generations.1 2
Therefore, a question should be asked about the role that lifelong learning can and should play in the process of realisation of the assumptions of a balanced development. The limited framework of this paper does not allow to discuss this issue more deeply. That is why, just indicating the problem, one should refer to only a few rules of a balanced development adopted in the Declaration on the Environment and Development during the Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro in June 1992. The activities promoting a balanced development recommended in the Polish Strategy, which refers to the above mentioned Declaration, include three dimensions: social, economic and ecological.
The activities in the first of the mentioned dimensions, as far as Poland is concerned, should involve among other things:
• guaranteeing an access to education not only on the primary level and, for the most gifted individuals, on higher levels but also, in the conditions of knowledge based society and economy, to lifelong learning for everyone up to their needs and abilities;
1
The strategy of a balanced development of Poland, Ministry of the Environment, Warsaw 1999
2 Ibid.
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• guaranteeing an access to employment by creating workplaces, supporting small and medium-sized enterprises, and also providing access to training and courses improving qualifications or enabling to change them.
As far as the economic dimension is concerned it is worth emphasising the need to improve the level of education of the society and thus, increase its participation in making decisions and bearing responsibility for these decisions as well as promoting activity, enterprise and an increase of efficiency. It is also essential for the state to support scientific research and development of ecological education as well as adjust the programs of teaching new technical and managing personnel towards making the production processes more ecological. The latter issue is connected with another important dimension - ecology.1
These are only examples. However, it seems that even indicating them allows to assume that the role of lifelong learning, especially in creating the ecological consciousness of the society, cannot be overestimated.
I mentioned only some issues in which lifelong learning plays a significant role. One has to remember, however, that to realise the assumptions of a balanced development it is necessary to have the awareness of and acceptance for the undertaken tasks among individuals, groups, communities, organisations and countries. One can talk about education for a balanced development, which, by changing the way of thinking, "will enable people to create a safer, healthier and prospering world and at the same time improving the quality of life. Education for a balanced development can shape critical thinking, develop awareness and improve qualifications, thus making it possible to explore new visions and ideas as well as develop new methods and tools of implementation.”1 2
The educational activities which enable the realisation of the assumptions of balanced development should concern not only children and youth but also adults. That is why it is justified to claim that education for a balanced development is included in the scope of lifelong learning understood as a process of learning throughout the whole life.
To end this part of discussion it is worth referring to two notions included in the declaration from Rio de Janeiro. The first one, which described a man as a subject of a balanced development and, resulting from it, the right to a healthy and productive life in accordance with nature
1 Ibid.
2
The Strategy of Education for Balanced Development, (adopted At the meeting of high rank representatives of Ministry of the Environment and Ministry of Education - Vilnius, March 2005), Warsaw 2008
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and the fifth one, which emphasised the need to prevent poverty. Assuming the subjectivity of every individual it is essential to provide them with unlimited access to education at different stages of their lives. On the other hand, poverty is connected with exclusion and marginalisation, which are perceived as one of the most important social issues of our times that occur within particular countries, regions and the whole world. Thus, it can be acknowledged that education is one of the basic factors in limiting exclusion and marginalisation. However, one should remember that knowledge and skills are not given to anybody once and for all. That is why, the development of lifelong learning allows individuals to stay outside the circle of excluded and marginalised but it also allows anybody within this circle to leave it.
Final reflection
The development of lifelong learning is not only a privilege nowadays but a real necessity. Discussing this lifelong learning from the point of view of a balanced development it has to be emphasised once again that it enables the realisation of the adopted tasks. Referring to the Strategy of Education for a Balanced Development, the dissemination of which has been recommended by the European Economic Committee UN, it is worth noticing the need for an improvement of the primary education, reorientation towards a balanced development, encouraging a systematic, critical and creative thinking as well as reflection both in the local and global contexts, supporting informal education as an important complement of the formal education, treating this education as a lifelong process.1
Summing up this discussion one can quote K. Obuchowski who says: "In order to function normally a man has to be knowledgeable about the events taking place in the surrounding world as well as those that may happen. He should be able to recognise, understand and predict them.”1 2
Education should turn out to be helpful in this respect, especially education for a balanced development, which, by emphasising the balance of economic and social goals as well as taking into consideration the natural resources, becomes an essential element of lifelong learning.
1 Ibid.
2
K. Obuchowski, Man, aspirations, sense. Selected thoughts. Bydgoszcz
2001, p.20
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