2003
The first Festival of Lifelong Learning and Adult Education in Spain took place in November! The overall aims of the festival were to disseminate, to celebrate, to reward and to recognize the importance of Lifelong Learning and Adult Education for personal development, active citizenship, social integration and employability. With this approach, the festival followed the objectives marked in this area by the European Union.
The national inauguration ceremony of the festival was held on 21 November in Madrid, although a number of festivities took place during the entire month of November. Among the national events were also awards for literacy campaigns with a view to equality issues, the annual Popular University Day [el día de las Universidades Populares], and a celebration of the Congress of Literary Dialogic Debate Circles [El Congreso de Tertulias Dialógicas].
Adult learners taking part in these debate circles all over the country presented their work and experiences, and answered questions from other adult learners in the audience. People with different literacy levels join the tertulias to collectively read classical literature, and to reflect on and discuss their own interpretations. The objective of the debate circles is two-fold: to bring people closer to reading and reflection, but also to help them to acquire dialogical skills; to speak and to give space for listening to diverge opinions. These circles, which also have a linkage to the ideas of Paolo Freire, are places for learning for democracy.
Already before the launch of the first learning festival a training program - with specifically a tailored Project Manual (downloadable here) - had been set up for the coordinators of the events in different locations. The manual, as well as the entire Spanish festival, is part of the project Broadening and Strengthening the European Dimension of the Lifelong Learning Week Movement, which is a network of European Lifelong Learning Festival organisers from Slovenia, Bulgaria, Germany, Romania and Spain. The purpose of the network is to continue the implementation of the EU policy in the field of Lifelong Learning. During the Spanish festival a workshop of the network took also place.
The festival was organised by the Spanish Federation of Popular Universities (FEUP) and the Centre for Social and Educational Research (CREA), University of Barcelona.
Contact
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Manuel Pérez Castell, President
Isabel García-Longoria & Montserrat Morales, Coordinators Spanish Federation of Popular Universities (FEUP) Los Madrazo 3 8014 Madrid Spain tel +34 91 5219108 fax +34 91 5231087 feup00@terra.es http://www.feup.org (in Spanish) |
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Updated
15 December 2003