Discourses on quality in Swedish adult education

Per Andersson; Karolina Muhrman

doi:10.3384/rela.2000-7426.5072

Authors

Per Andersson Linköping University https://orcid.org/0000-0003-1194-9708
Karolina Muhrman Linköping University https://orcid.org/0000-0001-7990-8684

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.3384/rela.2000-7426.5072

Keywords:

municipal adult education, policy enactment, quality, Sweden

Abstract

Swedish municipal adult education has many providers. The overall responsibility for this service still lies with the municipalities, entailing the enactment of national policy with respect to providers. This study puts focus on the discursive enactment of policy concerning quality in adult education. Five discourses on quality are identified through interviews with school leaders, teachers, and students, namely that quality is about formal demands and processes, that it is a matter of student focus, that it is about teachers’ competence and working conditions, that it is about teaching, and that quality depends on the student group. School leaders focus on formal and organisational aspects of quality, while teachers and students focus on actual processes in the classroom, connecting to their own work and lives. Compared to national policy, the local discourses are limited mainly to studying, teaching, organisation, and short-term outcomes, while long-term aims in national policy are less prominent.

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Author Biographies

Per Andersson, Linköping University

Per Andersson is a professor of education at the Department of Behavioural Sciences and Learning at Linköping University, Sweden. His research interests focus on recognition of prior learning, professional development among teachers in vocational and adult education, and marketisation of adult education.

Karolina Muhrman, Linköping University

Karolina Muhrman is an associate professor of education at the Department of Behavioural Sciences and Learning at Linköping University, Sweden. Her research interests focus on the teaching of mathematics in vocational education, and marketisation of adult education.

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