I recently attended EPALE UK’s Conference “Celebrating Adult Learning” held in Birmingham. It was an incredible programme of various activities which brought together almost one hundred delegates working in adult learning from across the UK.
The keynote address was given by Sir Alan Tuckett who gave us a thought-provoking perspective on adult community learning, its role in society, its history and the contribution it makes to policies across government departments.
I selected the ‘Cultural heritage and Projects’ and ‘Partnerships and Projects and Partnerships and Engaging Learners’ workshops. Both were very interesting workshops which highlighted best practice in Adult Learning.
My highlight of the conference was a workshop Martin Clark, Director of Grampus Heritage and Training Limited, in which he discussed their ‘Green Village’ project. This project aimed to empower rural communities economically, socially, culturally and environmentally in order to fight rural decline and decay. Their innovative project ‘Your Granny Can Fly’ was of particular interest to me as it lead to discussions on intergenerational learning using cultural assets.
The conference also provided a great networking opportunity, I met many individuals from various organisations around Europe who shared similar aims and objectives as The Ubele Initiative. I hope that the connections made will develop into partnerships in the future.
Many thanks to the EPALE UK team for arranging it all.
Aisha Khan
