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MANAGEMENT AND IMPLEMENTATION TECHNOLOGY FOR CONTINUING ADULT EDUCATION AT UNIVERSITIES
G. S.Zhukova
In recent years, Russian society has faced the problem of a considerable mismatch between the professional education services market on the one hand and the labor market on the other. Solving this growing problem requires much effort, particularly in terms of modernizing the system of additional professional education (hereinafter APE) and adding to it priority characteristics such as the quality, advanced and continuous nature, the universality of knowledge, and practical focus. In the modern socio-economic context of the market economy, the additional professional education system should, without a doubt, be geared to the needs of particular learners who are interested in exhibiting and developing their professional and personal abilities and professional qualities. On the other hand, it enables those with basic professional education to learn a new occupation and even acquire the right to conduct a new professional activity. This contributes to the reduction of open and hidden unemployment, and to the development of professional and personal mobility of people.
The current condition of the APE system and requirements of the labor market set the task to introduce a new scientifically substantiated system of content and methodology for adult education which should ensure high-quality training of specialists in a chosen area of professional activity. Demands of the market economy for highly skilled and competitive professionals shift the focus in adult education from developing competencies in narrowly defined professional fields toward developing individual creative capabilities and the need for continuing self-learning and education throughout life.
It is well known from many studies in sociology, medicine, and psychology that the level of general educational, professional, cultural, and other knowledge of practitioners who do not engage in self-education on a regular basis gradually decreases over time. When developing the theoretical foundations for new APE content, we should keep in mind that personal meanings and values of education among adult learners have a rather complex structure which reflects the multidimensional nature of their status in the educational process. General pedagogical theories of designing the educational content, the basics of theory and methods of adult education, the theory and methods of professional education, and professional standards should be used as a scientific foundation for forwardlooking development of the APE content. Practice shows that an APE system should not only have programs with a sufficient amount of backbone knowledge, but also develop in learners new demands and requirements for general educational and professional information. What is worth a special mention is that these components of APE are not only about the transfer of a certain amount of universalized data, the more so that adult learners already have basic professional education and work experience. The essence of general educational and general professional components in APE programs for adults is, mainly, to focus on
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innovations and prospects in those scientific fields that are particularly important to a given category of learners in pursuing their professional activities.
The quality of APE is a comprehensive indicator that, in particular, includes a relation between the desired training goals and results achieved; the degree to which learners’ expectations are satisfied by professional educational services; the degree to which a system of knowledge, abilities, skills and competencies is developed (based on training received); and the direction of personal and professional development of an adult learner.
Solving the existing issues in organizing the high-quality professional education of adults, in particular, requires in-depth system analysis, forwardlooking forecasting, testing of new approaches, and hence modernization and management of the quality of continuing professional education. As is known, forecasting is a complex process of collection and processing of data arrays aimed at making forward-looking judgments using not only external data, but also mental constructs available in the individual’s memory, such as categorical, intellectual, and other schemes and interpretations, as well as results of reflections on the possible development of events being studied. Where training in an APE system is built using a forward-looking approach (oriented toward possible future change in the profession, socio-cultural environment, etc.), learners find themselves in a situation of constant anticipation and prediction of their own professional and personal prospects.
Qualimetric forecasting uses all assessment, diagnostic, and mathematical methods which produce data on future qualitative change in the object of forecasting, particularly on possible change in consumer requirements, technology improvement, organizational and economic transformations, etc. The qualimetric approach in an APE system is based on conceptual ideas of the theory of educational measurement, the large-scale and independent nature of expert evaluations, testing, methods of mathematical statistics, and interpretative analysis. It can ensure that data on the learner’s level of attainment and professional and personal development are clear, ordered, and objective. The qualimetric approach in an APE system allows for taking into account the specific characteristics of the adult audience consisting of people with professional education and work experience in a certain area, secures their right to receive high-quality education in line with the required level of qualification, and ensures the integrity of the educational process. All this enables us to speak of effective implementation of APE that ensures professional and personal development of every adult learner, taking into account their individual capabilities, interests, aptitudes, abilities, and career prospects. This implies that education should be variable and open-ended, and should use multiple methods, facilities, techniques and forms of managing learning and self-education activities of students.
Undoubtedly, the forward-looking function is one of the major functions for implementation of the qualimetric approach in an APE system. It involves discovering the professional and personal potential of specialists, designing strategies for their professional and personal development, providing support in career planning on the basis of objective analysis of the available professional education and personal and professional potential, as well as forecasting and managing the development of APE educational systems.
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The forward-looking potential of the qualimetric approach relative to modernization and management of the quality of continuing professional education is about high compatibility between the theoretical foundations of the approach and the logistic component, which basically uses the methods offered by the theory of logistics and the theory of managerial decision making. The forward-looking potential of the qualimetric approach in an APE system cannot be realized without theoretical and methodological design of a new basis for APE in terms of its content and methodology. This design is a complex task, as it does not allow use of an experimental method to a full extent, and because the APE system deals with the unpredictable human factor.
The result of the design is an APE program for which all components are adapted to a given category of students and employer demands. It is developed on the basis of marketing research, qualimetric forecasts, the logistic approach, and the theory of decision making, and combines the needs of adult learners with the real opportunities available in the professional educational space of the institution where the program is to be implemented.
When developing forward-looking APE programs, we should also keep in mind that adult learners are usually objectively interested in reviews of information regarding current developments, the latest trends, and prospects in a certain scientific field. What is also important to them is analytical, critical, summary, crossdisciplinary, and integrative reviews of a general educational and professional nature. In this connection, there is an urgent task to train teachers who will work in the APE system. Each teacher should have sufficient theoretical and practical professional knowledge, be broad-minded, have oratory and acting skills, be proficient in conflict management techniques, and have the appropriate psychological and pedagogical skills enabling them to work with people of different ages and social and other groups. APE teachers must be researchers who are able to: analyze, systematize, elaborate, and sufficiently concentrate information for students; highlight the conceptual theoretical and methodological foundations of the professional activity that they teach; find and maintain an optimal balance between general and specific components of the program; and organize work with individual students and a student group, while ensuring the high quality of training.
The quality of education in an APE system cannot be improved only by improving the control and evaluation procedures and measurement and assessment activities. A change in the qualimetric toolkit for an APE system is not an end in itself, but its nature can show the direction for the development of other components of APE, such as changes in the content, application of new professional educational techniques, creation of testing systems, APE quality management, etc. Russian State University uses the following qualimetric criteria for APE performance: improvement in the satisfaction of state and socioprofessional orders for upgrading skills and retraining; improvement of retrospective indicators for the quality of variable, differentiated professional educational services available to specialists with different qualifications and specializations; contribution to the decrease in open and hidden unemployment in the region; and the consistency of programs with principles and development areas of municipal, regional, and federal systems of continuing professional education.
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Russian State University regularly monitors the performance of the APE system using certain general criteria, such as the level of demand for programs by the labor market; the level of existing professional competencies in program graduates; the level of employers’ satisfaction with the quality of additional professional training; dynamics of career growth among graduates; and the level of satisfaction with the quality of additional training among graduates.
References
1. Жукова Г.С., Комарова Е.В., Никитина Н.И., Галкина Т.Э. Теория и практика реализации в системе непрерывного профобразования квалиметрического подхода (на примере подготовки специалистов социальной сферы). - М.: Изд-во РГСУ, 2013.
2. Федякина Л.В., Жукова Г.С. Анализ международного и отечественного опыта персонификации дополнительного профессионального образования специалистов социальной сферы // Ученые записки РГСУ, 2013. - Т. 1 - № 5 (119).
3. Федякина Л.В. Мониторинг качества непрерывной профессионально-правовой подготовки специалистов социальной сферы в университетском комплексе // Вестн. Московского университета МВД России. - 2009. - № 1.
Translated from Russian by Znanije Central Translations Bureau
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