2019 Annual Conference

History and Philosophy of Adult Education

Concurrent Session (45 minutes)

Professionalizing adult education has been a concern for decades. Despite a century of studies, there has been little consensus about sociological features of the professionalization process. Adult educators stand to gain when considering our professional status. In this session, we present empirical findings about the professionalization of adult education.

This session is appropriate for practitioners, educators, and scholars who are interested in learning more about the professionalization of the field of adult education and about the importance of professionalization issues more broadly. This session will present empirical observations regarding the characteristics of a profession and how we see these applying to the field of adult education.

Learning Outcomes 100 words
Participants who attend this session will be able to:
--> Define professionalization
--> Articulate why understanding a field’s professionalization status matters
--> Be able to reflect on the ways that adult education has achieved professional status and the ongoing tensions our field must navigate

Professionalizing adult education has been a concern for decades. Professionalization occurs when an “occupation transforms itself through the development of formal qualifications based upon education, apprenticeship, and examinations, the emergence of regulatory bodies with powers to admit and discipline members, and some degree of monopoly rights” (Bullock & Trombley, 1999, p. 689). Advocates of professionalizing adult education claim it is necessary to because professionals have much to gain in both economic and social benefits. Building on his body of work, Cervero (2017) noted: “…over the past 25 years I have argued consistently that our professionalization project should be based on the vision that adult education is about the struggle for knowledge and power in society” (p. 3).

The purpose of this session is to explore how leaders in a professional association characterize a profession and how the profession of adult education measures up against these features. This presentation is part of a larger project wherein 17 leaders in a higher education professional association were interviewed regarding professionalization. Through invivo coding (Saldaña, 2016), 17 characteristics of a profession were identified. Through analysis, we consider the status of the professionalization of adult education and areas in which we should continue to strive.

This session begins with a brief overview of models of professionalization. Then we briefly discuss our methods of data collection and analysis and our findings.  Finally, we will open up for discussion so that participants can help us to consider the current professional status of adult education as a field.