Lifelong Qualifications: Developing Qualifications to Support Lifelong Learners

Lifelong Qualifications argues that, if we are to deliver on a genuine framework for lifelong learning in the twenty-first century, we must develop a qualifications system to support this framework. Peter Wilson suggests that the National Qualifications Framework currently being established by QCA and its partner regulatory bodies may not be fit for the purposes of supporting lifelong learning. There is an opportunity in the near future to develop within this emerging framework the kind of flexible, responsive and individualised qualifications that learners will need to support their roles as both citizens and employees in a modern democratic society, but it is an opportunity that may be missed. In particular, the author suggests that qualifications for lifelong learning need to draw upon leading-edge industrial and commercial models if they are to become 'future proof' against the scale and pace of change in the learning environment of the next century. This publication is not simply a critique of existing qualifications. In the final sections the author suggests a model for the development of credit-based qualifications that draws together this modernising agenda with a clear commitment to widening participation and inclusiveness that, he argues, should be an integral part of a future framework of ' Lifelong Qualifications'.

Table of Contents:
Acknowledgements Chapter 1. The emerging concept of lifelong learning Chapter 2. Modernisation and social inclusion Chapter 3. The context for qualifications reform Chapter 4. Criticism... Chapter 5. ...And critique Chapter 6. Why are qualifications so important? Chapter 7. Qualifications and achievement Chapter 8. Economic liberalisation and qualifications reform Chapter 9. The mass production of difference Chapter 10. Lifelong learning in the new millennium Chapter 11. The problem of national standards Chapter 12. Mass production and design standards Chapter 13. Standards, protocols and system architecture Chapter 14. Out of control systems Chapter 15. The qualifications jungle Chapter 16. Bits are bits Chapter 17. Rationalisation, modernisation and social inclusion Chapter 18. Three phases of lifelong learning Chapter 19. Standardisation and customisation Chapter 20. Standardisation and standards Chapter 21. An alternative view Chapter 22. Customisation, complexity and standards Chapter 23. Customisation, product development and national standards Chapter 24. Standardisation, customisation and the phases of lifelong learning Chapter 25. The characteristics of a complex system of qualifications Chapter 26. Complex systems and credit Chapter 27. A protocol stack for lifelong qualifications Chapter 28. The Unit Protocol Chapter 29. The Network Protocol Chapter 30. The Credit Protocol Chapter 31. The Qualification Protocol Chapter 32. An integrated set of National Standards Chapter 33. Conclusion References