Lifelong Learning, Systematic Skepticism and Decent Democracy.

Overview & Synopsis

This keynote address discusses the implications of the university continuing education community. The paper asserts that while the boundaries of higher education have blurred in terms of physical buildings; the characteristics of students interested in higher education; the curricular offerings of high schools, community colleges, and universities; and the purposes of higher education institutions; a core purpose that involves enabling society to develop and maintain an understanding of itself and the world remains. Three areas of change for continuing education are suggested: examining and following the customer (student) care models effectively used by for-profit and corporate universities; more deeply examining the nature of knowledge; and making more explicit to students the academic mode of thinking are recounted. The four-pronged model of distance learning used by the Open University in order to illustrate the implications of incorporating change on individual students, the community and society is cited. It is concluded that by providing flexible, quality and low-cost education, mega-universities (that follow the distance learning model) are the institutions that will lead the future of university education. (SKF)