Community Education and the Western World

Angelika Kruger, Cyril Poster

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2002
• ISBN:
  9781134946433
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Education
• Subtopic: Education General

Community education is now a worldwide phenomenon. It may have as its operational focus a school or community centre; or it may have no specific location but be an activity of a village or neighbourhood. It may be primarily concerned with learning, or with community development or with community action. Inevitably and properly, its form derives from the social and historical context of each country and from the needs of its people. The editors of this volume have a wide experience of international community education, both through their work for the International Community Education Association and their personal links with many of the countries represented here.

Part I: Defining community education

1: Why community education?

John Rennie

In the Community Education Development Centre in Coventry hangs a somewhat battered reminder of one of the antecedents of the community education movement It is a billboard—a once-white poster glued to a piece of wood—which proudly announces the ‘Re-opening of the Evening Continuation Schools’. The date printed in the bottom left-hand corner is July 1910. Those North Americans who visit the Centre, certain that community schools began in Flint, Michigan, just before the Second World War, are taken aback. Danish visitors, with their history of Folk High Schools going back over two hundred years, barely give it a second glance. It is somehow symbolic of the multifarious routes of a movement which is still sometimes described as eclectic by its adherents and as unfocused by its enemies.

The expression ‘an idea whose time has come’ is all too often persuasively used by people with an axe to grind or a bandwagon to keep rolling. It has been used by proselytisers of every political hue and is usually, at best, a dubious claim. It is almost as spurious as the battle-cry of the righteous warrior: ‘God is on our side!’ Community education, in fact, has been a very long time in coming and only in demographic terms is it possible to say that its time ‘has come’. Philosophically and otherwise it is still an emerging concept, despite its long history. Its definition is still, increasingly tediously, the subject of long debate during the conference seasons.

In the UK, community education shares a common heritage with adult education: the Mechanics Institutes, the Night Schools and the less formal classes in village halls and community centres, all providing the only kind of adult education open to the great majority of people in our communities. In later years—and Henry Morris’s first Village College opened in Cambridgeshire more than fifty years ago—community education began to unite the twin processes of community school education and community development. This has included the kind of innovative outreach work into a variety of informal community settings which the best adult educators had themselves advocated.

In seeking to answer the question ‘Why community education?’ I have followed a fairly traditional line in dividing the argument into four categories: political, educational, social and demographic. In a sense, these divisions are totally false. First, however empirical, they are inevitably an a posteriori rationalisation, given the disparate nature of so many of the movement’s antecedents and the fact that they were never laid down by any of the great founders of community education. Second, for the purposes of the argument, it is necessary to place certain experiences into one category or another when in fact they belong in more than one or even in all. For example, I discuss unemployment in the social category when it might just as well have been in the political section. Also, some ideas clearly cross categories. For example, when we talk about an ageing society—a more inexorable movement than any philosophical idea—there are clear implications for all of these categories.

In the end, the answer to the question has as much to do with faith as anything else— an a priori requirement. The faith is based on a belief in mutuality and the strength and virtue of collective endeavour. These are elements which are sadly no longer found in the pragmatic manifestos of political parties, a redundant area for today’s ideologues.

If it is a matter of faith, then, what are the articles of faith? The first might be that the seeds of the solutions to a community’s problems are contained within that community. To give a non-controversial example: it is highly desirable to have a comprehensive and efficient health service but the best way to health remains through sensible eating, exercise, nonstressful ways of working, good relationships and so on—all of which require no medicine but considerable education. To have said that the same applies, to a great extent, in the fields of employment and housing would have been, at one time, politically partisan. More recently, it has been more readily accepted by people of all political persuasions. In community education the tenet is particularly true. Where once we believed that education was the process through which the informed passed information to the ignorant, we now know that the more relevant and effective process is one where the skilled facilitator draws from people their shared experience, knowledge and values which provide collective solutions to a community’s problems.

The second might be that education is a lifelong activity. It is not an activity confined to childhood. Indeed, it could be argued that, though learning is most effective at an early age, education per se is more effective in later years. Clearly, too, like all other social activities, it is best done in the ‘natural’ context of an all-age environment.

The third might be the recognition that a full and appropriate use of all resources— finite, as all resources ultimately are—is a matter of common sense. Only in the western world would we even need to accord such a principle serious thought. People in the Third World would take such an obvious idea for granted.

The fourth might be more concerned with human resources. It operates on the basis that, though everybody in the community has needs, and some have special needs, nevertheless all will have a contribution to make. It would be the role of the community educator to enable individuals and groups to discover for themselves what their particular contribution might be and to find within themselves the strength, the inventiveness, the sense of purpose to make that contribution.

Finally, the rather old-fashioned notion of citizenship, described at a recent conference by Sir Richard O’Brien as a ‘noble concept’, remains a basic tenet. Citizenship is not to do with an arid knowledge of the structures of local government or parliamentary procedures (as in the former ‘Civics’ courses) nor with the ambitious seeking after public office or leadership of clubs and societies that is so common among the pillars of our communities; it is, simply, to do with participation. The Greek word for someone who did not participate in the community was, after all, idiot. That may have a harsh ring today, but it is surely uncontentious to claim that communities need all their people to participate.

POLITICAL FACTORS

I make no excuse for beginning the argument for community education with political matters. The naïve cry of sportsmen caught up in the controversy surrounding relationships with South Africa—‘Keep politics out of sport!’—has been matched, regrettably, by equally futile pleas from educators to keep politics out of education. Why such calls for ‘purity’ are so pointless is because both sport and education, the latter the more so, have always been riddled with politics. It is simply too late to keep them out.

More dangerous than mere naïvety is the deliberate manipulation and exploitation of education by politicians and their supporters—often cynically carried out in the name of fairness, or choice, or equality, or, inexcusably, of ‘democracy’ itself. In some respects education in eastern bloc countries is more honest: there is no pretence that education is anything other than one dimension of the political life of a country. In the west we have claimed, with some justification given our tradition of academic freedom, to have secured an educational system that is relatively free of political values.

This has always been a rather specious claim. It is no coincidence that selection of pupils has always been a conservative stance and that demands for neighbourhood schools have come largely from the left. Nor is it surprising that the proponents of a concentration on basic skills are mainly from the right, whilst calls for an open curriculum tend to come from the socialist camp. Nevertheless, in Europe and the USA, at least, there has been, if not consensus, then a very broad middle ground regarding the major issues. In the UK, for instance, there are now more comprehensive schools under a Conservative government than there were under a Labour administration.

The last ten years have seen a gradual dismantling of this consensus. The educational initiative, particularly in the English-speaking world but in parts of Europe also, rests with the radical right. Largely, of course, this has been because of the immensely powerful political positions of Reagan and Thatcher. Both have adopted overtly ideological policies across the board, and education has been swept along in the tidal wave of reforming legislation, certainly in the USA and the UK For once, then, education is high on the political agenda and seems set to remain there for the foreseeable future.

Sheer expense, as much as ideology, has created this situation. In most countries in the western world, education ranks alongside defence and health in terms of expenditure at national level In the UK, education accounts for no less than 70 per cent of the budget of local authorities. It is this apparently disproportionately high expenditure which has moved education into a position of high profile at local level. Incidentally, of course, it has made the service all the more vulnerable to cuts at times of economic stringency.

How are all these political factors an argument for community education? First and foremost they highlight the need for people to participate in the educational process. People will need to understand the variety of new educational programmes, not least to preserve their own interest in their children’s education. In the not so long ago days of the single-teacher school, it was easy enough for parents to understand what was going on in education; it was, after all, the same as when they themselves had been pupils. Now, with macro-level decisions making things unrecognisable, parents could so easily be excluded from the process—by bafflement as much as anything.

That such dangers are recognised by parents is best exemplified by the reaction of parents in France to proposed changes in the control of their parochial schools. One of the largest demonstrations of the post-war era was the result of what parents saw as political interference in ‘their’ schools. This perhaps might have been expected in Catholic France. Politicians in the USA and UK would do well to recognise the sheer number of such parochial schools in their own countries and the comparable strength of feeling on the part of the parents who support them.

A second argument revolves around the national and international debates concerning what is taught in our schools. Despite widespread European and even inter-continental admiration for the British system of academic autonomy of schools, a national curriculum is to be imposed by central government. A change in political control at national level might conceivably alter the nature of this imposed curriculum, but it is now clear that the principle will remain in place. Whatever the rights and wrongs of the arguments surrounding this decision, are we now to be so McLuhanite as to believe that the curricular needs of children in rural Wales are the same as those in inner areas of London? Or is this precisely the kind of issue that community educators, with their beliefs in local ownership and participation, need to address? These key politico/educational issues are an irrefutable argument for the need for the community education process.

Earlier I made reference to the commonsense use of all resources. To an extent, this is a financial argument. Not surprisingly, therefore, it has led local administrators in the UK, Australia, Canada and the USA to opt for dual use of premises. In some places this is regarded as being synonymous with community education, though it is nothing of the kind. Dual use can be adopted without any attempt to build in the participatory processes which are central to community education thinking. It is fair to say, though, that the mere fact that dual use opens up buildings to the whole community does often lead to the adoption of community education approaches. Retired people rubbing shoulders with adolescents, unemployed people competing for space with family groups, kindergartens needed to enable young mothers to take adult classes—all these need managing. That in itself calls for participation. Common sense often leads on to genuine community involvement.

But is this ‘political’? In a very real sense it most certainly is, because the management of scarce resources is surely at the heart of all political argument. Happily for community educationists, this is one argument which has been supported in many places by people from right across the political spectrum. The obvious savings on vandalism when a school is ‘open all hours’ is appealing to all parties. Ironically, in one English county a political move to reduce the use of school buildings by the community, mainly to save money on heating and light, led to the unseating of the man responsible, though he represented a constituency in which his political party was extremely strong. It seems that community schools, too, engender a sense of ownership among their users.

The recognition of this fact by politicians, taken in conjunction with a long-felt need to demand proof of ‘value for money’, has led the UK towards Local Financial Management (LFM) and Local Management of Schools (LMS). In part this has been due to influences from the USA and some Australian states, where politicians have been raising similar issues. Local management of schools is a radical step of a political nature based more on financial considerations than on any other.

The implications for community educators are enormous. Will the new governing bodies—in the UK they include community representatives, teachers, businessmen, and a strong representation of parents—opt to save money on community activity in order to spend it on ‘basics’? Or will they charge heavily for community use to help to fund more traditional programmes? Will their inexperience lead them to take the safe options and fail to see the need for or the relevance of work with the community?

In a situation fraught with uncertainty, the greatest paradox for community educators lies in the choice that governing bodies now have to ‘opt out’ of local government administration and receive monies direct from central government. There are those in the community education field who see this possibility as a beacon of hope: a long-awaited independence enabling truly democratic, local participation in the running of the school. This is not without foundation; but it would be dangerously naïve to assume that funding from central government will not carry with it an imperative to adhere to governmental directives. ‘He who pays the piper calls the tune.’ What price local democracy in these circumstances?

Ironically, the notion of community control of schools gained some currency in the USA in the 1960s and the early 1970s. It lost its popularity because of the political manipulation which it encouraged. Now we in the UK are at risk of repeating the error. There may, however, be lessons to be learned from the USA of a much more positive nature. Each of their community schools has a community council. These are not dissimilar in style and function from the community subcommittees of the governing bodies of some UK community schools. They are more effective, however. They are not subservient to an over-arching governing body and they have direct access to the school principal, who usually sits as an ex-officio member of the council. Their membership is less restricted than ours and they will address and take action on issues which our subcommittees would pass up to the main governing body or even pass across to external agencies. It may be possible for community educators to ensure that we have the best of all worlds: genuine participation; fair representation; real power over financial decisions with the responsibility to implement those decisions.

All these political issues are increasingly making an impact on our schools. It would be dangerously foolish to assume that their implications are merely managerial or even financial. What is happening in the western world is nothing less than a root and branch restructuring of the governance of our schools, of what they will teach and of how they will be financed. The community is being given a greater opportunity, as of right, to affect this process. Community educators have the tools to assist the community to become involved. That provides the greatest thrust to their own argument for inclusion.

EDUCATIONAL FACTORS

On being shown round a thriving community school catering every week for some 7,000 people of all ages, a previous Secretary of State for Education in the UK declared that he was ‘appalled’. This was, to say the least, an unexpected response. On being asked the reason, he replied, ‘Here we are, trying to educate our children in schools—and failing— and here are you trying to do that and educate the whole community at the same time.’ He had, of course, missed the point.

That particular school had a swimming pool that was used by all age groups during the day and evening; a gym used for ‘baby-bounce’ fun in the afternoons as well as for adolescents; woodwork and metalwork shops timetabled for use by the unemployed and the retired on certain afternoons; a crèche; parental involvement in classes; and a sixth form of 180 of whom 120 were adults on a ‘return to learn’ scheme. Moreover, like so many schools it had a good academic track record in external examinations. After all, with so many adults about the place, there was an adult atmosphere—very conducive to good academic habits. As Hugh Cunningham said when he was principal of such a school, Madeley Court in Shropshire: ‘How can we expect youngsters to respect our schools when we know their parents would not be seen dead in them?’ Community schools do not have that handicap. They are not ‘children’s ghettoes’; they are like the rest of society, a mix of all ages. The structured research to examine pupil achievement in such schools is waiting to be done, but the subjective opinions of education officers and headteachers leave little doubt of their success.

Research on parental involvement, on the other hand, has been undertaken. Indeed, a major study conducted by the National Foundation for Educational Research is currently under way in the UK. In the USA it was necessary to produce a weighty bibliography, The Evidence Continues to Grow (Henderson 1987), of the many studies that proved the effectiveness of parental involvement programmes. In Coventry, England, one major study looked at the effects of parental involvement on 1,000 disadvantaged children who were compared with a similar number of middle-class children who had had no such programmes. On language and reading, these 8-year-olds were at least the equal of their middleclass peers. The evidence was so surprising that the groups were retested the following year and, if anything, the data had hardened.

Clearly, encouraging as such results are, they cannot be attributed solely to community education. It is possible to implement parental involvement programmes in fairly traditional schools. However it is plainly so much easier in community schools, and it was community educators who recognised the value of such work, who pioneered the innovatory programmes which demonstrated that value and who developed the methodology to underpin the work. Foremost among these was Eric Midwinter, not only a seminal thinker in this field but also a creative activist and a prolific and vivid author. His writings have giv...

Table of contents

• Cover Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Foreword
• The contributors
• Part I: Defining community education
• Part II: Learning in the community
• Part III: Business enterprise and the community
• Part IV: New challenges, new structures
• Part V: Relearning
• References