Lifelong learning and the Coombs definitions

At about the same time as planners were seeking to re-define fundamental educational concepts in terms of new economic and social
development priorities, UNESCO had published (1972) its forward looking `Faure Report on the future of education. The Report was
a classic re-statement of the humanistic and scientific bases of educational thought; but it was also written in a way which placed
education within a framework of other kinds of economic and social development. At its core was the concept of the learning society.
Drawing on the best of past practice and embracing the possibilities of new discoveries and technologies, education was seen as
covering all age groups and all sections of society. We propose lifelong learning as the master concept which should in future
determine the shape of educational systems (UNESCO 1972:182). If this is accepted, out-of-school education becomes as important as
the formal system, and it was, at that moment, timely to move away both from the idea that education and schooling were one, and
also that learning was or could be confined to particular places, times or age groups. Planners had succeeded in putting a tripartite
analysis of learning systems onto the educators own agendas.
Figure 1: The Coombs typology of educational programmes
Definition (1) Informal Education: the truly lifelong process whereby every individual acquires attitudes, values, skills and
knowledge from daily experience and the educative influences and resources in his or her environment-from family and neighbours,
from work and play, from the marketplace, the library and the mass media
Definition (2) Formal Education: the hierarchically structured, chronologically graded educational system, running from primary
school through the university and including, in addition to general academic studies, a variety of specialized programmes and
institutions for full-time technical and professional training.
Definition (3) Non-Formal Education: any organized educational activity outside the established formal system-whether operating
separately or as an important feature of some broader activity-that is intended to serve identifiable learning clientle and learning
objectives. (Coombs et al 1973)
These definitions do not imply hard and fast categories. In particular, there may well be some overlap (and confusion) between the
informal and the non-formal; this is considered below in the section on Top Down and Bottom Up. Non-formal was the new term
in the early 1970s; but although it was intended to make people look at education in a different way, the practice of non-formal
education is as old as society itself, and would include religious initiation ceremonies (and the instruction which goes with them) and
various kinds of apprenticeship training. NFE in the modern world embraces a vast range of educative services, such as health
education, family planning, agricultural extension, functional literacy or the educational programmes of womens groups.
The key elements are a clear definition of purposes and clienteles and an organized educational programme.
Used flexibly the definitions are a useful way of looking at and analysing some kinds of community education. What has to be
avoided is unproductive argument about marginal cases and their allocation to categories.
Formal education, non-formal education and development
Until the late 1960s, formal education was seen as the necessary investment good in human capital which would produce `growth and
therefore improved standards of life for all. The expansion of formal schooling, especially secondary and tertiary education,was
emphasised, usually in conjunction with a manpower plan, in order to reduce the gap between per capita incomes in rich and poor
countries and, by analogy, the gap between rich and poor in all, including industrialized countries; this was the urban, western,
economists view and dominated contemporary international thinking. What actually happened was not expected. The poor became
poorer, rural areas stagnated, unemployment became greater (and because it was urban, more visible), popular participation was
nowhere in sight. But these ills were increasingly recognized and the sea change which occurred was caused first by re-definitions of
`development and, later, by attempts to re-plan education to fit the new ideas.
We must conceive of underdevelopment as a constellation of circumstances, physical, social and political, which contribute to the
deprivation of the mind as well as of the body. It involves the poverty that debilitates health, the ignorance and superstition which
depress the human spirit, the conservatism that resists change, the social privileges which inhibit the fruition and proper use of talent
and skill. Hence we have to conceive of development as a situation wherein man himself becomes both the object and the subject of
his own improvement. (Castle 1972: 8)
This new view of development now commonly accepted by international aid agencies was also given prominence as the essential
underpinning of the new education policies of the World Bank.
questions of employment, environment, social equality, and, above all, participation in development by the less privileged now
share with simple growth in the definition of objectives (and hence the model) of development toward which the effort of all parties
is to be directed. (World Bank 1974: 10)

This was the context in which the non-formal idea took off. Remember that the key concerns were:

to improve the quality of life for the less privileged;

to encourage a cost effective contribution to economic and social development by conceiving of `education in new ways; and

to do so by reducing inequalities and unemployment and by increasing `popular participation in planning as well as in
curriculum design and the process of learning.

The characteristics of non-formal education

relevance to the needs of disadvantaged groups;

concern with specific categories of person;

concern with clearly defined purposes and

flexibility in organization and methods.

Perhaps the last of these has caused the most confusion because methods by themselves do not distinguish the formal from the nonformal. It is possible to have teaching in a formal secondary school which is highly informal (e.g. a discussion group), while a nonformal class for unemployed workers might be highly formal in teaching methods and directed towards acquisition of a specific skill.
It is the flexibility derived from the absence of externally derived curricula which is the distinguishing characteristic, and this may or
may not include taking advantage of the opportunity to use more flexible or informal methods.
The disadvantaged
By disavantaged I mean here all those social groups who are either under-represented in formal education or who are considered
failures within it. Such educational disadvantage also correlates closely with other kinds of social deprivation, including poverty,
unemployment and low social status.
If we begin from the lifelong learning principle and accept that this should apply to all an idea most recently expressed
internationally at the World Conference on Education For All (1990) then it follows that NFE should concentrate on those who have
been left out or who have dropped out of school and those who have been considered failures at school. And remember that `failure
may often be defined simply as failure to secure employment at the end of a school or college course. Thus in countries where there
was an explosive expansion of formal schools the concentration was often on unemployed school leavers, and in industrialized
countries work related job training. These are still some of the crucial tasks of NFE into the 1990s.
An early example of post-primary skill training for the unemployed was the Village Polytechnic movement in Kenya. Many leavers
from rural primary schools have been educated to accept that urban wage or salary employment is the norm to which they should
aspire and it is often difficult for them to conceive of alternatives. The VP programme was started in the late 1960s to provide multipurpose low cost training centres designed not merely to give useful skills to school leavers, but also to motivate them to create
employment opportunities for themselves by providing goods and services required in their immediate neighbourhoods. By 1990 there
were some 575 Polytechnics in existence with over 31,000 students attending artisan courses (UNESCO 1990a: 42: Fordham (ed.)
1980: 47). In the U.K. a parallel activity in the 1970s was the job-related training of the Manpower Services Commission, then the
biggest provider of NFE in Britain.
However, not all NFE for the disadvantaged is designed to serve vocational needs. Another tradition is directed primarily at the
participation of marginal groups themselves. In Latin America this might be called `popular education (Archer and Costello 1990),
while in the west we would probably be talking about community projects or community development. One such project which
specifically identified itself as NFE was the University of Southamptons New Communities Project, 1973-76 (Fordham, Poulton and
Randle 1979: 207-221). This was an attempt to shift existing adult education provision towards the enrolment of more working class
students. The main finding of the action research involved was that existing provision was inappropriate and that a community
development type of approach to organization led to a quite different type of work the non-formal idea in practice. Learning came
about not from formal classes, but from a community newspaper (editing, production, distribution), adult literacy, pressure for nursery
education and the establishment of a physical base for community activities. Many learners came to the Projects activities without
having clear educational goals of their own; these were provided by the professional tutors and organizers. The professional attempt to
carry forward an educational programme in all cases was what distinguished the project from more general community work or from
informal (i.e. incidental) learning. This is the chief distinction between non-formal and informal as defined in this piece.
Purposes
Non-formal education shares with adult education more generally the need for prior definition of purposes. A formal school system
usually has its purposes defined for it, either by Government or a religious sponsor or an external examinations system. But an adult
education programme, especially one that is not working towards an external examination, must usually define its purposes. Indeed,
all programmes allied to social movements of one kind or another are defined in terms of purposes. R H Tawney undertaki

ng the early classes of the Workers Educational Association saw himself as helping in the emancipation of the working class (Tawney
1964), literacy has frequently been promoted to help people read the Bible or the Koran (UNESCO 1990b). Julius Nyerere put it as
well as any when he asserted that:
A man learns because he wants to do something. And once he has started along this road of developing his capacity he also learns
because he wants to be; to be a more conscious and understanding person. the first function of adult education is to inspire both a
desire for change and an understanding that change is possible. (Nyerere 1978: 28-29)
NFE for the disadvantaged is about reducing poverty, increasing equity and about greater equality in the distribution of power and
resources. This implies a closeness to politics which makes some professionals uncomfortable. At the Commonwealth conference on
NFE in 1979, Malcolm Adiseshiah noted:
education is not politically neutral. It is an active supporter and faithful reflector of the status quo in society. If the status quo is
predominantly unequal and unjust, and it is increasingly so, education will be increasingly unequal and unjust and there will be no
place for non-formal education to improve the conditions of the poor. If, however, society is moving in an equalitarian direction, then
non-formal education can and will flourish. (in Fordham (ed.) 1980: 21)
If we try to correlate the flourishing of NFE and political change then the 1970s can certainly be described as the decade of NFE
(Rubenson 1982). Similarly the 1980s saw the neglect of NFE and many would assert that this was in tune with the politics of the
decade, accompanied by greater inequalities both within and between countries.
Flexibility and work with specific groups
Many would argue that the most important characteristic of NFE is flexibility and it was noted above that this is not to be confused
with informal methods of teaching. When the REPLAN programme was launched by the Department of Education and Science in
1984 to provide educational opportunities for unemployed adults in England and Wales, there was some confusion about what could
be done. Many saw the provision of special vocational training as the answer but, drawing on the tradition of non-formal education for
adults already established, what actually happened was that the REPLAN organization acted as a catalyst for change through the work
of other providers ( Stoney et al 1990). Part of this effort was to ensure a flexible format for provision in terms of starting dates, timing
and location when previously colleges and others had thought only in terms of their own established systems.
Mokades et al (1987) record case studies of two contrasting outer London local education authorities, where flexibility of approach
was the essential element in a successful outcome (i.e. increasing both access and educational provision for the unemployed). In one
case there was strong political commitment and plenty of well intended provision; but there was little recognizable order and
continuing barriers to access. Here the task of REPLAN was to create `an orderly, comprehensible offer to replace the exis
ting administrative chaos. In the other case, unemployment was not seen as an issue, there was little provision and the unemployed
were invisible. Here the task was to get the show on the road. The common element in each approach was to be flexible both in
terms of organization and in the way `education was conceived.
Simkins (1976) analysed NFE in terms of purposes, timing, content delivery systems and control, and this is still the most useful
analytical tool available. His ideal type models of formal and non-formal education can be used to apply to any programmes with
which you may be familiar.
Figure 2: Ideal-Type Models of Formal and Non-Formal Education
Formal
Purposes:
Long-term & general
Credential based
Timing
Long cycle/preparatory/
full-time
Content
Standardised/input centred
Academic
Entry requirements determine
Delivery system
Institution based, isolated from environment, rigidly
structured, teacher centred & resource intensive
Control
External/hierarchical

Non-formal
Short-term & specific
Non-credential-based
Short-cycle/recurrent/
part-time
Individualised/output centred
Practical
Clientele determine entry clientele requirements
Environment based
Community related
Flexible, learner centred & resource saving
Self-governing/democratic

informal non-formal and formal education - a brief overview of some different approachesLooking to institutions: informal,
non-formal and formal education

The most common way of contrasting informal and formal education derives from an administrative or institutional concern and
includes a middle form - non-formal education. Back in the late 1960s there was an emerging analysis of what was seen as a 'world
educational crisis' (Coombs 1968). There was concern about unsuitable curricula; a realization that educational growth and economic
growth were not necessarily in step, and that jobs did not emerge directly as a result of educational inputs. Many countries were
finding it difficult (politically or economically) to pay for the expansion of formal education.
The conclusion was that formal educational systems had adapted too slowly to the socio-economic changes around them and that they
were held back not only by their own conservatism, but also by the inertia of societies themselves... It was from this point of departure
that planners and economists in the World Bank began to make a distinction between informal, non-formal and formal education.
(Fordham 1993: 2)
At around the same time there were moves in UNESCO toward lifelong educationand notions of 'the learning society' which
culminated in Learning to Be ('The Faure Report', UNESCO 1972). Lifelong learning was to be the 'master concept' that should shape
educational systems (UNESCO 1972:182). What emerged was the influential tripartite categorization of learning systems. It's best
known statement comes from the work of Coombs with Prosser and Ahmed (1973):
Formal education: the hierarchically structured, chronologically graded 'education system', running from primary school through the
university and including, in addition to general academic studies, a variety of specialised programmes and institutions for full-time
technical and professional training.
Informal education: the truly lifelong process whereby every individual acquires attitudes, values, skills and knowledge from daily
experience and the educative influences and resources in his or her environment - from family and neighbours, from work and play,
from the market place, the library and the mass media.
Non-formal education: any organised educational activity outside the established formal system - whether operating separately or as
an important feature of some broader activity - that is intended to serve identifiable learning clienteles and learning objectives.
The distinction made is largely administrative. Formal education is linked with schools and training institutions; non-formal with
community groups and other organizations; and informal covers what is left, e.g. interactions with friends, family and work
colleagues. (See, for example, Coombs and Ahmed 1974).
These definitions do not imply hard and fast categories - as Fordham (1993) comments. When we look more closely at the division
there can be considerable overlap. For example, there can be significant problems around the categorizing the education activity linked
to involvement in groups and associations (la vie associative) sometimes it might be informal, at other times non-formal, and where
the group is part of a school - formal. We can see similar issues in some of the discussions of informal science education in the USA.
[I]nformal education consists of learning activities that are voluntary and self-directed, life-long, and motivated mainly by intrinsic
interests, curiosity, exploration, manipulation, fantasy, task completion, and social interaction. Informal learning occurs in an out-ofschool setting and can be linear or non-linear and often is self-paced and visual- or object-oriented. It provides an experiential base
and motivation for further activity and learning. The outcomes of informal learning experiences in science, mathematics, and
technology include a sense of fun and wonder in addition to a better understanding of concepts, topics, processes of thinking in
scientific and technical disciplines, and an increased knowledge about career opportunities in these fields. (National Science
Foundation 1997)
The NSF definition falls in line with what Coombs describes as informal education - but many museums and science centers also
describe their activities as informal science education (and would presumably come fall under the category of non-formal education).
Similarly, some schools running science clubs etc. describe that activity as informal science education (and may well fulfill the first
requirements of the NSF definition).
Just how helpful a focus on administrative setting or institutional sponsorship is a matter of some debate. It may have some use when
thinking about funding and management questions - but it can tell us only a limited amount about the nature of the education and

learning involved. The National Science Federation While a great deal of the educational activity of schools, for example, involve
following prescribed programmes, lead to accredited outcomes and require the presence of a designated teacher, a lot of educational
activity that goes on does not (hence Jackson's [1968] famous concern with the 'hidden curriculum'). Once we recognize that a
considerable amount of education happens beyond the school wall or outside the normal confines of lessons and sessions it may be
that a simple division between formal and informal education will suffice.
Recognizing elements of these problems, some agencies have looked for alternativedefinitions. One possibility here has been the
extent to which the outcomes of the educational activity are institutionally accredited. Such activity involved enrollment or registration
- and this can also be used as a way of defining formal education. Non-formal education is, thus, education for which none of the
learners is enrolled or registered (OECD 1977: 11, quoted by Tight 1996: 69). Using non-accreditation as a basis for defining an area
of education has a strong theoretical pedigree. Eduard Lindeman famously declared that:
...education conceived as a process coterminous with life revolves aboutnon-vocational ideals. In this wor1d of specialists every one
will of necessity learn to do his work, and if education of any variety can assist in this and in the further end of helping the worker to
see the meaning of his labor, it will be education of a high order. But adult education more accurately defined begins where vocational
education leaves off. Its purpose is to put meaning into the whole of life. (1926: 5)
Institutional accreditation became the basis for allocating funding within the English adult education sector during the 1990s - but in
an almost exact reversal of what Lindeman intended. Programmes leading to accredited qualifications were funded at a much higher
rate than those leading to none. Significantly, such a basis said little about the nature of the educational processes or the social goods
involved - with two crucial exceptions. Accredited programmes were more likely to be outcome focused (with all the implications this
has for exploration and dialogue), and more individualistic. Indeed, it can be argued that one of the things this funding regime did was
to strengthen an individual bias in education and undermine the building of social capital. Many groups and classes that had
previously looked to a mix of learning and social interaction, had to register students for exams. This then had an impact on the
orientation of teachers and students.
Turning to process: conversation and setting
Tony Jeffs and I have been critical of administrative approaches to defining informal (and formal) education. Instead we have looked
to process as a significant way into setting the boundaries of informal education. Viewed in this way, formal education can be seen as
essentially curricula-driven. In other words, it entails a plan of action and defined content. It also involves creating a particular social
and physical setting - the most familiar example being the classroom.
In contrast, informal education can be viewed as being driven by conversation and, hence, unpredictable. Informal educators do not
know where conversation might lead. They have to catch the moment, to try to say or do something to deepen people's thinking or to
put others in touch with their feelings. Such 'going with the flow' opens up all sorts of possibilities.
On one hand educators may not be prepared for what comes, on the other they can get into rewarding
areas. There is the chance, for example, to connect with the questions, issues and feelings that are
important to people, rather than what they think might be significant. This is also likely to take
educators into the world of people's feelings, experiences and relationships. While all educators should
attend to experience and encourage people to reflect, informal educators are thrown into this. (Jeffs and
Smith 1999a: 210)
For the most part, they do not have lesson plans to follow; they respond to situations, to experiences.
There is not a prescribed learning framework, nor are there organized learning events or packages.
Outcomes are not specified externally (Eraut 2000: 12) or accredited. What is more, those working in
informal education, for the most part, have far less control over the environment in which they are
operating: 'Informal educators cannot design environments, nor direct proceedings in quite the same way
as formal educators' (Jeffs and Smith 1999).
Informal education, thus:

Works through, and is driven by, conversation.

Involves exploring and enlarging experience.

Can take place in any setting.

Its purpose, at root, is no different to any other form of education. I would argue that it is concerned with
helping people to develop the understandings and disposition to live well and to flourish together. John
Dewey (1916) once described this as educating so that people may share in a common life. Informal
educators have a special contribution to make here.
First, a focus on conversation is central to building communities. The sorts of values and behaviours
needed for conversation to take place are exactly what are required if neighbourliness and democracy are
to flourish. What is more, the sorts of groups informal educators (such as youth and social action workers)
work with - voluntary, community-based, and often concerned with mutual aid - are the bedrock of
democratic societies (Jeffs and Smith 1999: 34-46).

Whether we are identified as a formal or informal educator we will use a mix of the formal and informal. What sets the two apart is the
relative emphasis placed on curricula and conversation, and the range of settings in which they may work.
A question of style: informality and formality
Within the primary education field the notion of informal education has been used to describe the more fluid, 'open' and apparently
progressive forms of schooling that developed in the 1960s (e.g. McKenzie and Kernig 1975). As Blyth (1988: 11) has commented,
informal pedagogy has 'figured spasmodically in English education from quite early in the industrial age and even before. Robert
Owen and, later, Samuel Widlerspin are examples here. However, there was a particular moment when 'informal education' came to
the fore:
Certain words have acquired a peculiar potency in primary education, and few more so than informal. Never properly defined, yet
ever suggestive of ideas and practices which were indisputably right, informal was the flagship of the semantic armada of 1960s
Primaryspeak . . . spontaneity, flexibility, naturalness, growth, needs, interests, freedom . . . selfexpression, discovery and many
more. (Alexander 1988: 148)
Many of the thinkers (e.g. Rousseau, Pestalozzi, Froebel, Dewey and Bruner) that we would see as informing the development of
informal education as a conversational form are also important influences in this movement (see Blyth 1988: 7-24). However, since
the 1960s the terms of educational debate have shifted dramatically. By the mid 1990s, the British government 'espoused the simple
nostrum that the key to enhanced standards and economic competitiveness was an unrelenting concentration on basic skills in literacy
and numeracy, to be addressed mainly through "interactive whole-class teaching"' (Alexander 2000: 2). It is now far less common to
hear informal approaches to primary education being advanced as a blanket alternative to formal ones.
When we look at usage within discussions of primary schooling, the most consistent form by the late 1980s was the noun informality,
rather than the adjective informal (see Jeffs and Smith 1990: 5-6). Thus, instead of informal education, we it was possible to examine
informality in pedagogy, in curriculum, in organization, in evaluation and in personal style (Blyth 1988). What was being examined
here was a tendency. To talk of informality in education was to indicate significant elements of flexibility and openness.