CHAPTER ONE

INTRODUCTION
Background to the study
Education is a lifelong process. It connotes the dynamic investment aimed
for both the future and the present. It leads to the achievement of richness and
completeness within the lives of individuals. It is a major instrument that leads to
the socio-economic growth of the country. It is a powerful tool for social change. It
is a vehicle for acquiring knowledge and skills. It has the capacity to conscience
and empowers the individuals (Dr. Radhika, 2019). Individuals possess the right to
acquire education and learn throughout their lives.

Adult education is a core component of lifelong learning. It comprises all

forms of education and learning that aim to ensure that all adults participate in their
societies and the world of work. It denotes the entire body of learning processes:
formal, non-formal, and informal, whereby those regarded as adults by the society
in which they live, develop and enrich their capabilities for living and working,
both in their interests and those of their communities, organizations, and societies
(UNESCO and UIL, 2016).

Adult education also includes education and learning opportunities for active
citizenship, variously known as community, popular or liberal education. It
empowers people to actively engage with social issues such as poverty, gender,
intergenerational solidarity, social mobility, justice, equity, exclusion, violence,
unemployment, environmental protection, and climate change. It also helps people
to lead a decent life, in terms of health and well-being, culture, spirituality, and in
all other ways that contribute to personal development and dignity (2015 UNESCO
Declaration).
 The individuals are regarded as adults when they reach 18 years of age.
They develop capabilities and enrich their knowledge, improve technical and
professional qualifications or turn themselves in a new direction and bring about
changes in their attitudes and behaviors in the personal development and
participation in balanced and independent social, economic, and cultural
development. Adult education includes all the activities that are put into operation
to meet educational goals and objectives. Through adult education, the learners can
augment their experiences and develop skills and abilities. Apart from the
development of knowledge and skills, individuals can generate awareness in terms
of their rights and duties, which are required to turn into effectual citizens of the
country (Radhika, 2019).

Adult education over the years as early as when all forms of informal and
non-learning have exited has been in practice as a dominant way of transferring
knowledge skills and abilities, particularly in vocational skill acquisition as well as
other necessary abilities, need to be a functional member of the society. In the late
1920s, adult education began to emerge as a field of study and not just as a
practice, (Rubenson, 2010). In this development as a discipline or field of study,
adult education has been able over the years, to establish more firmly and articulate
more distinctively, the various fundamental principles, characteristics, forms, and
objectives that have established it better as a field of study and have brought about
professionalism to its field of practice.

Community Adult education Programme or non-formal education as a

discipline has been characterized as one of the three forms of education, namely
formal, informal and non-formal education. And as such there are certain
characteristics or features that distinguish adult education from other forms of
education and these as identified by Lavate, (2014) are that “most Adult Education
is voluntary. Therefore, the participants are generally self-motivated; the practice
of adult education is referred to as andragogy.” Further expounded upon by
Aderinoye and Ojokheta (2017), further characteristics are stated below;

 For any programme or activity to be called adult education, it must be

educational in nature. A Programme or activity is said to be educational if it
leads to an increase in knowledge, brings about a positive attitudinal
formation, and is capable of ensuring a change in behavior of people.
Therefore, any programme of adult education must be able to achieve any of
these three purposes or all of them.
 For any programme or activity to be called adult education, it must be
relatively planned and organised. Any programme or activity that is casually
and haphazardly planned and not systematically organised cannot be
classified as adult education. Adult education programmes must be
consciously planned and systematically organised putting into practice all
the known principles of programme planning and organisation.
 For any programme or activity to be called adult education, it must aim at
achieving A Goal or an Objective and must be purposefully directed. Adult
education programmes are usually organised for accomplishing a well-
articulated purpose or for achieving a goal or an objective. The goal(s) or the
objective(s) must be clearly stated at the commencement of the programme.
If there is no goal or objective to be achieved, therefore, such programme is
not adult education. Hence, adult education is purposefully driven.
 For any programme or activity to be called adult education, it must be
directed at those considered as ADULTS in their society. The definition of
an adult here differs from society to society.
  For any programme or activity to be called adult education, it must be
problem-solving in nature. Adult education is usually referred to as problem-
solving discipline. This is because every adult education programme is
usually organised to solve one problem or the other confronting people in
society. The problems could come in many dimensions. It could be the
problem of knowledge gap, or negative attitudinal formation, or poor
behavioural reaction from people over a phenomenon. In essence, if there is
no problem to be solved, there will be no need for adult education.
 For any programme or activity to be called adult education, it must aim at
promoting social change.
A common definition of community emerged as a group of people with
diverse characteristics who are linked by social ties, share common perspectives,
and engage in joint action in geographical locations or settings (Kathleen, 2015).
According to Driu 2014, the geographical community can be a town, a suburb, or
even a small section of a suburb. There might be a few communities in the same
town. There are other times when a town might be only part of a community, such
as when the community includes the rural areas outside town, or two towns are
closely linked. All communities are dynamic in nature. They act, interact, evolve,
and change as a result of larger political and economic forces as well as internal
and external forces.

A community and its meaning might vary with each member's unique
understanding. There can be many kinds of the community adult education
programme such as Local community programme, Ethnic community
programme , Community of scholars, intellectuals, Community of values,
Professional community programme like Legal community; medical community,
International community, Religious community,
Polynesian/Melanesian/Micronesian community and Political community (Driu,
2014).

The United Nations (2015) also defines community development as "a

process where community members come together to take collective action and
generate solutions to common problems." Community adult education
development has a structured intervention that gives communities greater control
over the conditions that affect their lives. This does not solve all the problems
faced by a local community, but it does build up the confidence to tackle such
problems as effectively as any local action can. Community development works at
the level of local groups and organizations rather than with individuals or families.
The range of local groups and organizations representing communities at local
level constitutes the community sector (Driu, 2014).

Change is the only permanent thing in life and it is ubiquitous in any

society, particularly in a society with a strong desire to fulfill human needs. Social
change is a product of a true, patriotic and committed leadership. Dike (2008)
opines that Nigeria's short life has been packed with successions of social changes
which cut across the different strata of the nation. There has been the shift from
regions to states, farms to cities, agriculture to petroleum and now, political power
has shifted from the north to the south. The irony however is that these changes
have not been for the benefit of the common man. The changes recorded in the
Nigerian society since independence cut across the different sectors of the national
life such as politics, economy, education etc. The link between language and
society is very strong, to the extent that a change in one ultimately affects the
other.
 Social change is a challenge for social scientists (Huntington 2013). It is a
ubiquitous feature of social reality that widely described and explained the
evolution of human societies as well as the transformation in the basic components
of human society right from the traditional to modern-day societies (Olagbeju
2015). As a matter of fact, human societies have experienced constant alterations
in social values, norms, institutions, relationships and stratification as a result of
internal and external forces of social change. The external forces are events that
occurred on a large scale, affecting an entire nation or several nations altogether
such as climate change. While internal forces are events that occurred on a small
scale causing internal structural re-arrangements with far-reaching influences on
the social fabric of the society, i.e. demographic change. By virtue of the tenacity
of internal and external forces, social change will always attract the attention of
sociologists and social-scientific theorists, regardless of its conceptual starting
point to address it (University of California Press 2015).

This is an undeniable fact even in the current era of the hyper-differentiation

of theories- in which many theories are competing for attention and space not that
they compete for head-on- with each other as much as they coexist- but because
the intellectual arena can, at best, manage very few out of the many theoretical
approaches (Turner 2018). However, an examination of the academic literature
revealed that the theory of social change is still the weakest branch of sociological
theory (Huntington 2013). This is due to the lack of general theory as the basis for
understanding the dimensions of change across human societies (Huntington 2013;
Turner 2018).

Against this backdrop, this study discussed the dimension of the changes in
socio-cultural, political and economic conditions in Nigeria between 1960 and
2015, through a theoretical discourse. In addition, this study would assist in
improving the understanding of the dynamic nature of community adult education
as a determinant to social change, its driving forces and inevitability in the current
global integration of socio-cultural, economic and political conditions. The study
will help social scientists, academicians, politicians and professional development
planners to design better policy interventions and socio-political reforms. It would
also help the Nigerian government, at all levels, to formulate policies that would
enhance the efficacy of managing the internal and external forces of change in
order to bring about desirable socioeconomic development for the populace in the
contemporary world.

Statement of the problem

The practice of community adult education programme in Nigeria as has

been briefly discussed is not the only concern that could be raised if community
adult education should be utilised to achieve the desired social change. Rather
other challenges for adult education programme and its professionals and
practitioners must be comprehensively looked at in order to position it as a
veritable tool for the achievement of social change in Nigeria.

For instance, community adult education programme has not been given its
pride of place in terms of adequate funding, utilising only qualified personnel to
handle adult education programmes, ensuring that adult education directives, issues
and policies are handled by adult education experts and making adult education
more available and functional to all adults especially in the rural areas. Relevant
federal and state government agencies and ministries have not involved community
adult education experts in their programme planning in order to present relevant
community adult education programmes from the grassroots, state and the nation
as whole to achieved a desire social change in the society. This study tends to
examine the community adult education programmes as a determinant of social
change.

Purpose of the study

The purpose of this study is to examine the community adult education
programmes as determinant of social change in Ondo State Nigeria. The purposes
include:

1. To find out the major perspectives of community adult education programme

as determinant of social change in Ondo State Nigeria
2. to examine the impact of community adult education programme on people
for social change
3. to examine the Impediments to the Implementation of Community Adult
Education Programmes as determinant of social change
4. to investigate the challenge facing community adult education programme in
achieving social change in Ondo State Nigeria
5. to determine the types of community adult education programmes set to
achieves social change in Ondo State Nigeria.

Research questions

1. What are the major perspectives of community adult education programme

as determinant of social change?
2. What are the impacts of community adult education programme on people
for social change?
3. What are the Impediments to the implementation of community adult
education programme as determinant of social change?
4. What are the challenges facing community adult education programme in
achieving social change?
 5. What are the types of community adult education programmes set to
achieves social change?

Scope of the study

For the purpose of this research, Akungba Akoko residents and the entire Adult
Education centre should be considered. The study area covers majorly adult
residents in Akungba Akoko community.

Significance of the study

The study will be of great benefits to the Akungba Akoko community on the
impact adult education programme can help in strengthen the community and
enhance development.

Also the study will help adult to enhance using the various community adult
education programme embracing the sustainability of social change in the
community.

The study will of great benefit to government in concentrating on improving the

community using the empowerment of various community adult education
programme to achieve the relevant goals and objective and also to solve possible
challenge the community development.

Delimitation of the study

The study will be carried out among Akungba Akoko residents. The restriction is
necessary in order to carry out a valid research based on thorough study that would
produce representative and quality research feedback.
Operational Definition of Terms
Community: it a social group of any size whose members reside in a specific
locality, share government, and often have a common cultural and historical
heritage.

Adult Education: Adult education is a developmental education which embraces

all forms of educational experiences needed by men and women according to their
varying interest and needs.

Programmes: These programmes include, mass literacy programmes, functional

literacy, extramural programmes, correspondence courses, open university,
distance education, lifelong education, remedial education, women education, pre-
retirement education, internship programmes.

Social change: social change can still be defined as the alteration within the social
structure, characterized by changes in cultural symbols, rules of behaviour, social
organization or value systems