Diversity Issues In Adult Education

Intro

Today’s America’s ability to provide a basic education to anyone is truer than ever before. Does it mean everyone gets an equal education? The concept behind education is an individual who has been educated and knows all the answers. For some this is a person who has been through the rigors of school and graduated. Most of us want to believe it is someone who makes a living with what they have learned. Adult education is flawed and does not provide the best education for people. Education starts as a child and ends when the adult receives their degree. Pedagogy students have not reinforced their patience or experience to be educated. Therefore, education is only truly achieved when an individual goes through life and has become an adult.

The value of education is taken for granted by youth, but for adults who have managed the hardships of life based on their experiences know the true value of a good education. According the Merriam, even the hardships of life become more challenging when faced with diversity issues. Therefore I want to discuss a few of these issues, the challenges, and possible solutions starting with diversity in the classroom (Demetrion, 1999).
Given the fact that the U.S.

population is characterized by drastically increasing diversity, it is essential that schools and facilitators are culturally competent practitioners. No longer can we lack awareness that diversity issues exist within people, groups, and society in general. Lacking knowledge and understanding about what diversity issues mean to the Adult student can have possible consequences that may diminish ability to be competitive in today’s society. A lack of understanding can be based on inexperience, ignorance, and the inability to be empathetic about adult student’s culture, customs, and values. Diversity issues lower level of independence and the expectations of education. It affects attitudes towards learning, work, personalities, social skills and abilities. When we talk about diversity issues with respect to andragogy learners, I am referring to the kinds of things that influences, distort conditions, and sets of circumstances that adversely affect their ability to learn. Some facilitators refer to the extra burdens that learners carry as barriers to acquiring knowledge. Adults bring those barriers with them. The nature of these barriers and the level of impact it has on the learner has considerable influence on the ability to succeed in a class. One of the solutions an educator can employ in their classroom is to have a general understanding of the diverse cultural backgrounds of the adult students. This can be accomplished by talking about things

that exclude them, avoid making the student feel isolated and keep them participating. The point of this observation is to see what affects their ability to function in the classroom, what continually slows them down, and the level of impact it has on the learner and the considerable impact on the learning. Often the full impact and influence of a learners issue only comes to light, bit by bit, as you get to know the learner better. Address each issue as it appears. This leads me into multiculturalism.
Multicultural classrooms bring Adults with diverse backgrounds together. The environment in the school should provide everybody with an equal opportunity to maximize their learning potential. The school should offer a unique learning experience for every individual within the school’s environment. However, discrimination comes up as a major issue in a diverse cultural make-up. Discrimination adversely affects the education of diverse students in the classrooms. It is evident that biases in our education system contribute to the underperformance of students from minority groups. The students most affected by these problems are adults other than Caucasian. It can involve discrimination against students by their peers due to differences in culture, religious, and beliefs. Schools, facilitators, and government policies under represent the needs of these minority groups. One solution could be retraining seminars for facilitators on cultural beliefs and classes on tolerance for each demographic and ethnic group of adult students. Another could be all inclusive program involving adults from these underrepresented groups, policy makers observing classes, fellow students from the communities and facilitators in the school. Together a consensus of changes could be enacted. Another factor affecting adults is globalization.
Globalization eased borders between countries and nations. Local issues, concerns and practices that only affected local students, now impact immigrating adults around the world. If the world continues to be more interconnected, education will need to represent the global community. The impact affects undereducated immigrating adult, therefore education becomes a necessity and a responsibility for the United States. Globalization impacts how we live, and how we communicate with each other. If we do not have a strong education system in place for Adults, communication is impacted. Do adult learning expectations, philosophy change and evolve? Currently, these questions remain unasked. Scott focused on three areas: economic globalization – its purpose and impact, with an educational emphasis; an alternate vision for a sustainable future, and the role of adult education in the transition to a post-modern world (Scott, 2008) Beveridge’s focus was how knowledge developed under the influence of globalization. He reported the significance of knowledge development in educational institutions and argued that the very nature of universities and staff influenced the type of knowledge generated for students (Scott, 2008). What could be possible solutions for globalization in the American education system? As educators, we can ensure the curriculum meets the demands the private sector have placed on adults. Emphasize the importance of government involvement in adult’s secondary educations, in that the burden is not left solely to private. Educating the private sector to recognize and respect the traditions and the differences between new Americans, (refugee and immigrants). Prepare adults to live and participate as citizens and professionals in their new country. The role adult educators should be to make them aware that adult education requires lifelong learning which provides better employment opportunities. I would like to continue on and address gender inequality.
During my time in primary education, I was expected to know certain things as a male. Mechanics, math, automotive, but at the same time, females were required to take home economics classes where they were trained to be homemakers. As we progressed in school, the inequality continued by offering secretarial courses like typing, filing and even switchboard operating. Males were allowed to take carpentry, auto shop, and masonry to ensure we were prepared to work in blue-collar jobs in communities where factories employed adults. Male students were taught to use machinery at school, so they’d be prepared to enter the workforce upon graduation. This type of behavior continues today by discouraging math and sciences and the inability for many females adults to get occupations comparable to their male counterparts. This in turn limits the earning potential for half of the labor market. As labor force gets older, females become disparaged in several ways males seem to avoid. The glass ceiling is still in effect, limiting the rise of women in the labor market and again limiting occupation success and earning potential. While males contribute to the procreating process, it often stops there, and females stop advancing in work and education to take care of offspring. Let us not forget that gender inequality doubles if we involve female adult immigrated students. In many non-western countries, the inequality is palpable. Inequality still exists here but it is more subtle. In my experience, many immigrated females have little or no education due to the fact that male children were sent to school while the females stayed home to continue domestic responsibility. Let us not forget that, when these immigrants come to a western country, females are paralyzed when it comes to desired and necessary skills expected in the labor market. What are the solutions? If we are referring to American students, start the children off with non specific gender toys. Allow females to play with chemistry set, as well as, dolls. If we are talking about highschool girls, get them started in math and science as soon as possible but since my paper’s focus is on adult education, then prepare classes for both female and male students. Offer education that is easily assessable. Provide employers with incentives to employ females in the labor market.
During my time as a facilitator I have encountered doctors, nurses, lawyers, and teachers.

They all had commonality; they were adults coming from another country. Female or male, they were well educated and experienced, but they could not gain employment based on their training or degree from their native country and they were all immigrants. When it comes to females arriving from other less educated countries, provide them with necessary education above and beyond that of cleaning, day care and

cooking.