Lifelong Learning and equal gender opportunities:a social justice approach.

Camila Valenzuela Persico. Education Phd Candidate. Researcher on Lifelonglearning, education and social justce. Universidad Autónoma de Madrid.

Abstract

This article aims to review the evolution of lifelong learning concept and its

relationship to the social justice concept from a gender equal opportunities

perspective. Because of this, firstly there is a synthesis of the development of

lifelong learning concept. Secondly, there is an overview to the social justice

concept and its strong link to education. Throughout these theoretical blocs, its

importance as an essential role at the moment of promoting gender equal

opportunities is remarked upon.

Key words: lifelong learning, gender, professional development, work based

learning, recognition of prior learning, social justice.

Resumen

El siguiente artículo tiene por objetivo revisar la evolución del aprendizaje

permanente y su vinculación al concepto de justicia social desde la perspectiva

de la igualdad de oportunidades de género. Por lo cual, primeramente se hace

una síntesis del desarrollo del concepto de aprendizaje permanente.

Posteriormente, se da una mirada a los conceptos de justicia social y su

vinculación a la educación. A lo largo de estos dos bloques teóricos, se resalta

el papel fundamental que tienen a la hora de promover la igualdad de

oportunidades de género.

Palabras clave: aprendizaje permanente, género, desarrollo profesional,

aprendizaje en el puesto de trabajo, reconocimiento de aprendizajes previos,

justicia social.

Introduction

The knowledge society that is characteristic of the post-

industrial era has installed lifelong learning paradigm,

emphasizing the inherent treat that learning is for the

human being and the need to promote it through life.

Nevertheless, there are overlapping opportunities regarding

access, to learning and training actions which are truly

evident at a gender level. We find both, highly trained

people belonging to elite of the society and people that

struggle access basic education and develop their

competence.

This has generated the need to trigger specific policies

and programs to increase the presence of those women and

men with little access to training actions, promoting

lifelong learning as a mechanism of equal gender

opportunities. However, women’s inclusion in the job market

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has a tendency to place them in low salary job positions

and low and basic skills performance, which make it

necessary to review policies and assess another strategies

polled from main actors and learners of lifelong learning

programs.

These programs promoted by governments based on

recommendations made by international organizations (such

as some programme areas of UNESCO Institute for Lifelong

learning: literacy basic skills, adult learning and

education) are mainly oriented towards the second

opportunity, and does not take into account essential

gender topics, which are core features to pursue more equal

societies.

It proves the contingency to develop training plans from a

gender perspective –feminities and masculinities- that

promote lifelong learning as a real and effective dimension

of social justice, which advocates regulating social and

economic inequality through a wide variety of concepts and

theories (merit, entitlement, equality of outcome, equality

of opportunity, need and many more). In this sense, it is

important to remark the dimension of social justice for

educational purpose as a human right, making the best of

all learning capacities to empower a social and personal

dimension of learning besides the productive one.

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This article aims to have an overview of the lifelong

learning concept and its impact on equal gender

opportunities through a social justice approach. To pursue

this aim, the article is divided into two sections; the

first one developing the history of lifelong learning

concept and the second one regarding social justice and

equal gender opportunities. The main conclusion that can be

drawn from this analysis is that promoting lifelong

learning opportunities with a gender perspective are

crucial to achieve more equal and cohesive societies.

1. Lifelong learning

1.1. Conceptual evolution

Learning is an inherent process to human activity through

experience and existence. Lifelong learning concept (LLL)

has been developed throughout history of education reaching

its highest diffusion from the hand of international

organism since 70 decade.

In 1969, the Head of International Institute for

Educational Planning of UNESCO, Philip H. Coombs, published

“The World Educational Crisis”, where he proposes education as a

continuous process through life, opening a widespread

debate and acceptance on the topic and generating a great

quantity of reports and publications within the

organization (with a wide and humanistic perspective) and

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other organizations, with its consequent implications in

educational policy at an international, national and

regional level, turning into supranational policy (Jacobi,

2009).

The Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development

(OECD) defined recurrent education as the distribution of

education throughout an individual’s life in a recurrent

way (OECD, 1973: Jarvis, 2010), claiming that all people

should have right to education further the compulsory

education.

At the beginning, the approach of the concept was the

restructuring of the educational system emphasizing adult

education and non formal learning. However, during the last

years has been an emphasis in the reform of formal

educational systems, through the impact of international

assessment performed by OECD such as PISA. This evolution

and complementation of LLL concept –from adult education to

international assessment- is due to the step toward

knowledge society, where it is necessary to strengthen

competencies from the foundation.

This is how the LLL concept was taking shape through the

60’s until today deriving into what is known as Learning

society, based on LLL paradigm, where educational reforms

should focus in create this learning society (Ven Der Zee,

2006).

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On the other hand, the concept forecast is work for social

agents, such as regional organisms with geographical

limits, its main representation in this area is the

European Union (EU) as a supranational organism, whose

activities in educational topics in the beginning were not

that explicit, although in the last decade it has generated

a wide quantity of documents and policies to understand the

meanings of the concept. In coordination with International

and Supranational Organisms, the invaluable activity

developed by nongovernmental organisms and scientific

communities, whose research has contributed greatly to

development actions of LLL. Apparently, more coordination

will be required by all these agents to create more

armorial and coherent dynamics, although they all support

each other, in their own construction of the concept

(Jacobi, 2009).

The European Union characterizes the XXI century for its

development defining LLL as a guiding principle of its

transversal educational policies to achieve becoming into

the most competitive knowledge based economy. In this

sense, the EU has developed the definition of LLL as all

learning activity that takes place throughout life, with

the aim of improving knowledge, skills and competencies

from a civic, social, professional and personal perspective

(European Comission, 2001).

This definition has encompassed a range of activities

undertaken by the European Union on committees of[Type text] Page 6

education, work and research. Thus generating a

comprehensive global strategy to achieve besides

competitiveness and social cohesion.

Therefore, these principles that support LLL and guide its

effective implementation emphasize the central role of the

learner, the relevance of equal opportunities and quality

and the importance of learning opportunities (European

Commission, 2001). These guiding principles of development

strategy have been adopted by educational policies in other

countries, such is the case of Chile, country that belong

to OECD and takes part and promotes international networks

of knowledge y scientific development that allow sharing

experiences related to the achievement of highlighted

principles by European Commission.

Another LLL definition comes from the academic sector. For

Jarvis (2010), it is the combination of processes

throughout the life of the whole person - body (genetic,

physical and biological) and mind (knowledge, skills,

attitudes, values, emotions, beliefs and senses) - that

experience in a social situation, the perceived content is

then transformed cognitively, emotionally or practically

(or through any combination) and integrated into the

individual's personal biography resulting in a continually

changing person.

For Garrido y Ejido (2006), LLL sees education as an

ongoing process throughout life, offering articulated

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learning experiences that are non-formal and informal. This

process looks at the acquisition of a set of competencies

that include both knowledge and practical skills, oriented

to the personal, social and work development, so that

facilitate active and participative knowledge society.

Both conceptual definitions are valid, one is more process

focused and the other one more global, giving a

comprehensive vision of the concept that ultimately has a

primary objective, which is improve people’s life quality

through the attainment of equal access of learning

opportunities.

1.2 Types of learning situation and classification of

educational structure

According to Jarvis (2010) and Colley, Hodkinson and

Malcolm (2002), based on Coombs and Ahmed purpose in 1974,

there are different learning types depending on the

learning situation (formal, non formal or informal). In

this sense, formal learning is the typically provided by a

recognized training institution, structured (in terms of

learning aims, timing and learning support) and which

entails a certification.

Non formal learning is typically provided by an educational

organization which does not entails certification, although

it is structured and it is intentional. Jarvis (2010)

distinguishes a main structure that derives from non formal

learning. On one side, human resource development (HRD),

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that incorporates human capital concept, searching to

increase people’s knowledge and skills. Nowadays, it is

developed training based on competencies and vocational

qualification, which involves learning based on the job

position under mentoring systems, developing social capital

concept (Kirpatrick, Field y Falk, 2003). On the other

side, it includes liberal adult education, stereotyped as

middle class spare time, highlighting the idea of widening

knowledge, skills and hobbies.

Informal learning is the outcome of daily activities

related to work, family and spare time. This type of

learning situation is not structured and it does not entail

certification. In most of the cases it is not intentional.

Nevertheless, distinguishing between them is a complex task

and it is assumed that formal educative scenarios entail an

important part of informal learning. In this perspective,

Colley et al. (2002), combines three approaches

(participative perspective of learning theories, community

education and mentoring) suggesting that there are few

learning situations that do not have a combination of

formal and informal learning elements. Consequently, the

limits between formal, non formal and informal learning are

significant in relation to the context and the particular

purposes. Regarding specific situations, it is a must to

pay attention to the historical, social, political and

economical context of learning and to the theoretical

learning view that is supported by the society.[Type text] Page 9

Regarding this learning situation types, a conceptual

structure of learning has been developed within lifelong

learning evolution. In its beginning early adult education

was the champion in the initial development, diversifying

into the following notions: Adult education from a liberal

approach and Superior education centered in the

professional dimension. Lifelong learning as an idea became

popular, when it was evident that school-university formal

educational system was not enough and that provision of

education had to be considerable wider.

The resulting evolution of the structure of learning

systems according to learning situation leads to Continuum

education, which combines professional education

diversifying it in Professional training (related to the

training within industry) and Professional development

(appealing to the career development), leading to the Human

Resource Development (HRD). However, it is the opening to

new learning opportunities –and supporting technologies-

that emphasizes the fact that learning is a collaborative

activity, which requires a great amount of exchange in and

between communities, encompassing different disciplines

with a common aim or related to a specific profession or

problem. These opportunities can be found in one

organization or through many organizations. To this extent,

individual learning systems for work will need of a social

interaction in a virtual world (Carneiro, 2011). This is

the case of work based learning of school teachers or like

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many other professions; or mentoring in companies or even

with excluded young people, highlighting formal and

informal elements in these learning processes (Colley,

Hodkinson y Malcolm, 2002).

1.3 Learning theory implicit in lifelong learning concept

There are different forms of understanding the concept,

since community education reflected in Overwien (2000)

studies, who takes into regard the educational dimension of

social movements as it happens with popular economical

organization (OEP) in the 70’s in Latin America. In this

way, it gives consistency to the concept, adding non formal

and informal learning dimension, emphasizing its temporal

perspective and highlighting the importance of continuity

and permanency. It is at this point when the concept turns

towards lifelong learning.

In the last years, LLL has become non just an organizer but

dominant principle of many policies, describing all

learning activities “from the cradle to the grave”,

encompassing community education, adult education,

vocational education, work based learning, distance

learning and superior education (Francis y Leathwood,

2005). It promotes the dissipation of institutional

boundaries, reconfiguring the learning situation and its

environment.

Nowadays, there is an important debate depending where the

focus on the learning-training process is, the concept

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acquires one meaning or another. In this way, there are

critical authors about the development of the concept

regarding it as a neoliberal discourse tool (Coffield,

1999; Field, 2001; Olssen, 2006). This appropriation from

neoliberal discourse of the concept remarks the idea of

personal responsibility of educational development, where

“whereas learning refers to an autonomous person as a

consumer, education requires public policies and

deliberated actions” (Garrido y Ejido, 2006: 26); connoting

people’s choice of benefiting themselves from educational

and learning opportunities.

However, inequalities in the opportunities of access to

education are clear (Garrido, 2006) regarding to a set of

barriers such as time, cost, gender and failure, which have

great impact in the access to these opportunities (Jarvis,

2010). Although, gender category cannot be understood

without contextualizing categories of social class and

race. This is so, because within LLL construct it is

regarded the hegemony of white middle class men, being

denied access to certain opportunities to men belonging to

ethnic minorities and marginalized social class (Francis y

Leathwood, 2005).

The debate regarding the meaning of the concept leads to

conceal two dimensions of LLL: on the one hand, the

instrumental, addressing professional life and

competitiveness; and in the other hand, the humanistic and

civic dimension, addressing society enrichment and[Type text] Page 12

individual self-realization (Garrido y Ejido, 2006). For

UNESCO, LLL is the essential organizer principle to achieve

a global knowledge-based society and promotes formal, non

formal and informal learning, complemented with the four

pillars of learning proposed by the International

Commission on Education for the XXI century: learning to

be, learning to know, learning to do and learning to live

together (Carneiro, 2011).

The difference between education and learning has led the

study to focus on learning, which implies an active person

in the path of acquiring aptitudes, skills and competencies

as an inherent process; and education are the policies

disposed as interdependent processes which feed each other

(Garrido y Ejido, 2006).

Regarding the neoliberal discourse contented in the

development of LLL paradigm, Olsen’s (2006) point of view

applies the Foucault’s concept of governmentality to the

interdependence between learning and education, invoking to

a change towards a democratic and social justice discourse,

even in economical conditioning of educational practice.

Both, education and learning spring from a built in vision

of a three nested system: the learning classroom, embracing

students and teachers; learning school, joining inspectors,

directors, managers, families; and the learning community,

extending the learning experience toward the community as

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permanent learners, including mass media and social and

cultural institutions (Carneiro, 2011).

Accordingly to this system, Carneiro (2011: 4) refers to

the double role of education, connecting the old to the new

“this penetrating duality of education is compounded by a

rapidly changing society… as if the old order of thinking

would be changed by new paradigms of understanding the

reality… the increase in the speed of change prevents us

stop and reflecting”. In such manner, knowledge and

learning are like two sides of the same coin. The real

challenge is to understand a united world, where

connectivity needs to be understood as proximity:

understanding to be in a world where minorities are

committed to their citizenship in deprived zones.

Consequently, learning occurs in diverse and non

academicals scenarios, it is less teacher instructor

centered and more learners centered, demanding self

regulatory skills, resuming the training concept (bildung),

implying an active, experiential and practical pedagogy.

Hence, the role of the teacher needs to be reformulated,

switching from learning the dominant knowledge (curriculum)

towards skills development. Biesta (2006) locates the focus

in learning more than in teaching which presupposes that

learners know what they want and that formal education is a

part of the learning offer, taking diverse kind of shapes

(distance learning, non formal learning and so on).

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In this sense, the need to be constantly updated due to

rapid change implies an interconnected society – not just

in working terms but in the social and personal dimension-,

demanding a new vision of the learner that develops a

learning trajectory in new settings (Barnett, 2006). So,

learner rebuilds the identity permanently according to the

meaning that the context bestows to the learner.

It implies the development of new curricular styles

involving the changing potential of educational policies

for the new learner’s profiles and their trajectory, which

includes overcoming the overlapping discourse in the

founding of the policies regarding the deficit,

disadvantage and diversity discourse (Blundell, 2005;

Rogers, 2005).

Another dimension to take into account is the assessment,

in the case that men and women differ in their learning

styles and in access to opportunities, calling for new

models and review them according to the gender continuum,

changing hegemonic andocentric patterns established,

fostering new forms of assessment that connect the learner

to the teacher, especially in adults (Stalker, 2005). These

aspects are key factors of quality in terms of relevance

and impact of adult education (UNESCO, 1997, 2009).

According to Carneiro (2011), a completely comprehensive

model, regards three temporary variables (past, present and

future); paradigm shifts (from industrialization to

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globalization towards a new period of renascence); the

delivery modes (from uniformity to segmented distribution,

towards customization); and driving forces (market

bureaucracy should revert on empowered communities).

Moreover, the understanding of teaching-learning process

goes through all the learning theories: behaviorism,

cognitivism, constructivism, conectivism and generativism.

This last approach proceeds from two philosophical

tendencies dealing with scientific knowledge establishing a

marked distinction between received vision, which is a

passive recollection of existing knowledge; and the

semantic vision that involves a full-fledged reconstruction

of received knowledge and presupposes a constant quest for

added-value meaning. It involves a chain that goes from

data to information (meta data), from information to

knowledge (meta information), from knowledge to learning

(meta knowledge), from learning to meaning-making (meta

learning). Then, generativism is in between innovative

learning and learning to innovate and address the

foundations of a creative society, where the challenge is

to create new knowledge from previously codified knowledge

(Carneiro, 2011).

Therefore, learning concept relates to constructivist

paradigm and active participation of the learner is

essential core within the paradigm, fostering creative

skills, critical and analytical thinking and problem

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solving strategies. This approach recalls authors such as

Dewey and Rogers to address certain shortages in the

current education systems and promote a knowledge-based

society. Learning is given in a wide variety of contexts

and shows different kinds of needs that formal system not

always covers or recognize.

From this perspective, Jackson (2011) proves that migrant

women learning actions in social spaces, provides them not

just of skills – such as literacy and language- but of

relational capital that shows the capacity of these

instances to develop not just the economical aspect but the

social and the personal as well, fundamental for human

development. It is so that the belonging sense can be

developed. Devos (2011) reflects about gender incoherencies

in the transnational knowledge society through a study in

which a set of women with higher studies that for diverse

reasons had to displace, could not achieve and develop

certain aspects of their identity, because it is related to

the territory.

At this point, LLL concept has a set of implications at a

gender level, (Francis y Leathwood, 2005; Rogers, 2006)

creating pressure through different theoretical critics

(such as feminism, Marxism and so on) to embody diversity

not just in gender but promote LLL for everybody, not

through a unified discourse ruled by a neoliberal hegemonic

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discourse but under local and individual specific needs and

to connect the disconnected.

The philosophy of this LLL approach addresses certain forms

of social inequities to create a just society that

interacts in an interpersonal base, so locality produces

its own ethos. It will be a social policy task and the

educational commitment to address educational resources to

the non-privileged (Jarvis, 2010). Therefore, it is

necessary to reflect about social justice paradigms and its

impact within the educative process.

2. Social justice

Educational research with gender perspective in education

is not new as it is a widely implemented trend in last

decades around the world, promoted by international

organisms, mainly by UNESCO, that has developed a specific

entity to promote gender equality and women empowerment.

Subsequently, social justice in education is a powerful

tendency of research in English speaking countries with

high relevance and scientific production within educational

research.

Within the present analysis, social justice is bounded to

lifelong learning with a gender approach, so the concept

will be developed from the equal opportunities perspective

resuming its theoretical development and emphasizing the

capabilities approach proposed by Marta Nussbaum (2010,

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2012) and the participation model proposed by Iris Marion

Young (2006). This is due to the origin of the concept

regarding the distribution of material benefits and during

the years it has adopted these other views which complement

the model recognizing the diversity of capabilities to

develop as well as the procedures and freedoms available to

achieve them and the possibility to be part of the society

regarding the wide variety of identities to represent and

participate in society.

Nevertheless, the concept social justice has a wide and

historical development that has thrived in the niche of a

number of disciplines such as Philosophy, Politics,

Sociology and Economics; each approach regards education as

an essential are of social justice development.

There are a varied ways of focus the term in the historical

evolution. According to Murillo y Hernández-Castilla

(2011), current approximations evolve from the paradigms of

distribution, recognition and to those of participation.

Social justice as distribution is the way in which primary

goods are distributed in society, evoking Rawl’s theory

from the 70’s, based on aristotelic philosophy. The

capabilities approach is interesting as a subsequent

approach, created by the economist Amartya Sen and pursued

by Marta Nussbaum, proposing that the idea of justice

brings in real freedoms that each human being enjoys. The

importance of this approach is that it requires examining

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the procedures value and the capabilities instead attending

just to the needed goods for such freedoms.

Therefore, education is a central element of the

capabilities approach, as international organism

development programs managed to shape skills and changing

inner capabilities, becoming in a source of satisfaction.

“People that have received an education, enjoy more and

better employment options, political participation and

productive interaction with other persons of the society,

both to a local and national level, even, global”

(Nussbaum, 2012: 181).

The same author highlights that women who knows how to read

and write have more communicational possibilities and can

share with similar people, which promotes other benefits in

the sphere of participation of women in society, at home

and in their leisure time, encouraging gender equal

opportunities (Nussbaum, 2010, 2012).

These apparently conflicting approaches are summarized in

the recognition approach, mainly developed by Nancy Fraser,

which is to devise a political orientation program that

integrates the best of the politics of redistribution and

the best of the politics of recognition. The recognition

model derives from Hegelian philosophy and conscience

phenomenology that indicates a reciprocal interaction

between people, where each one sees the other as an equal

and at the same time as separated. This relationship is

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composed of subjectivity: where each individual becomes a

self only insofar as it recognizes the other subject and is

recognized by him (Murillo y Hernández-Castilla, 2011).

Fraser (2006) has developed an approach where social

justice dimensions interplay between them, regarding

resource distribution, diversity recognition and linguistic

representation, generating a large contribution to the

theory of social justice. Consequently, this model proposes

a dualistic perspective holding that class policies

(distribution) and identity (recognition) are integrated

from moral philosophy, social theory and political theory.

Iris Marion Young goes further in the development making it

complex by the need to understand social justice as a

procedure or a process as far as it becomes in a tool to

pursued distributive justice and political recognition from

a participative perspective (Murillo y Hernández-Castilla,

2011).

In “Responsibility for justice” (2011), Iris Marion Young

with an extensive analysis of the concept in the light of a

series of theoretical developments, on the one hand shows

that the entry of women in the workplace contributes to

introduce more competition in the labor markets and

expectations about appropriate roles for women. Besides,

she highlights a more individualistic understanding of

social relationships that blur social responsibility.

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On the other hand, “through structural processes of market

relations, how personal life goes on, depends somehow on

how their talents, aptitudes and ambitions are adapted to

the market demands and in the other side, the global

assessment of the person. Although, the market demand of a

person skill and what it produce is a circumstance that

conditions a person’s life and it is further a person’s

control; usually, it is not a question of luck. Market

relations are compounded by cultural traditions and

changing fashions influencing preferences for

institutionalized power relations that enable some people

to have greater control over the resources that other

people, and other missions and institutional rules” (Young,

2011: 43). This situation may narrow conditions of

participation to different groups within society, specially

minorities or non dominant groups.

Young’s (2011) model expresses that today few people think

that there is social equal opportunities. There are great

differences regarding quality of education and shamefully

it depends on race and social class, greatly because it is

largely expected that each community assumes their own

educational expenses.

As well, it is admitted that the educational system is

unfair and this model introduces ideas of what is missing

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to make it fair, however, these prepositions turn to be

radical. During schooling, efforts should always be

compensated and should be acknowledged the high competency

levels achieved. Instead, failure, if it should happen

should not be punished. Whoever fails to reach their

educational aim always should have another opportunity to

try again. Moreover, failure should not discard the

opportunity of more tries. (Young, 2011).

This philosophy holds that anyone who wants to learn

something, improve their skills and be well trained to

promote a social structure should have the opportunity to

do so. The opportunity to learn something should not be

closed even in the event of a permanent failure of the

person. If we take this principle seriously, it is the task

of society collectively to provide the opportunity to

acquire a certain level of knowledge and skills, as a

possibility for life. However, school failure has a high

cost as a social stigma closing opportunities to develop

within society in different areas. Most societies offer

just one chance in a life to foster the needed skills to

develop well-being (Young, 2011).

The contributions of Social Justice, both the capabilities

approach and the recognition and participation, express the

need to have opportunities throughout life to promote the

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development of skills, allowing people to achieve their

full potential in every moment and in every field. Due to

social interplay and the speed of changes it is a must to

count with opportunities that boost the highest people’s

development, especially of those who belong to groups whose

characteristics have less space for its progress and

participation. It has a strong relevance when learned

attributes become obsolete having few opportunities to

learn new skills and update them.

Some European societies offer a recycling system for

workers, although even the best programs offer a limited

path. A fair society would not punish failure and to some

extent would offer the opportunity of learning through life

(Young, 2011).

Moreover, when promoting educational systems and learning

as a universal right, there are inequities developed by

globalization none recognized as related to gender, social

class and race; although, lifelong learning seems to be

inseparable from social justice development, practices and

policies are varied and often have segmented and even

played the imperialist order (Jackon, 2011).

Therefore, a current problem in the capabilities approach

of great importance is gender, as the inequality of women,

slows the development of nations and shows that certain

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approaches are inadequate for development of gender within

society. One of the main developers of gender equality are

access to education, “which besides of teaching a wide

variety of skills, eases the opening of traditional gender

roles (Nussbaum, 2012: 176).

In this sense, UNESCO and other international organizations

have encouraged an increase of women’s participation in

education and developing learning path which will allow her

to live in better societies. This is a product of the

agreements achieved from World Educational Conferences

(such as Jomtien 1990 and Dakar 2000) and Millennium

Declaration which has defined the Millennium Development

Goals (MDG) that should be achieved by 2015. One of the

programmes adding efforts to pursue the MDG is the

Education for all (EFA), where aim number 5 refers to

eliminate gender disparities in primary and secondary

education by 2005. MDG proposes in goal 4 to promote gender

equality and women empowerment. According to these aims,

this organization has published the “World Atlas of Gender

equality in Education” (2012), highlighting that girls,

even in most of regions and countries still disadvantaged,

tend to increase their retention rates and to obtain better

outcome than men once within the educational system.

However, there is a horizontal and vertical segregation (as

women perform in low salary positions and they are not

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present in high responsibility positions) in terms of

gender stereotypes as the economical development is valued

focused on the production of goods and services and

ignoring the reproductive caring work without compensation.

Breeding and caring works are not completely valued and

considered in its all gender continuum at the moment of

assume and develop policies to attain a more just and

gender equal society, despite the fact that these

activities contribute to the training and development of

human resources and the knowledge society (Ribas, 2005).

3. Conclusion

The evolution of lifelong learning has had a relevant

impact within supranational and international policies,

with contrasting ideological dimension in its approach.

However, it is the synergy with the Social justice

discourse that denounces lacking aspects within programmes

remarking the importance to offer educational opportunities

though all levels to foster the inherent learning process

and develop human skills and competencies to its highest

capacity independent of socioeconomic background, ethnicity

and gender.

In this manner, the initiatives to recognize prior acquired

skills through non formal and informal learning activities

at the work place or diverse community practice are

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extremely important to validate participation and to

acknowledge people from various sectors of society that

until now have not been represented in Lifelong Learning

programmes.

Lifelong learning discourse must make an effort to value

new learning styles and promote educational instances that

harness skills potential to achieve cohesive, productive

and developed societies, not just to an economical extent

but including personal and social development. To this

extent policy makers should consider within their activity

that society is fragmented and learning occurs at all

levels and policies should be directed to work with the

recognition of prior learning and not waste talent to

develop innovation, consequently, policies have to be

flexible and be based on customized programmes for each

community and be harnessed on generativism pedagogies.

The development of policies should always regard within

their philosophy the gender equal opportunities, fighting

against traditional gender stereotypes to increase women

presence within positions of responsibility and balance it

with breeding and caring activities, which are essential

for the sustainable development of a growing and cohesive

society.

[Type text] Page 27

At a learner level, there is a great amount of work to do

sharing experiences and knowledge to be aware of what it

means to be a lifelong learner, all the instances in which

people interact and the differences in opportunities of

gender, social class and gender level must be addressed

through a great conscience of the main role lifelong

learner has in their life. This is especially relevant when

the role of men and women within society is discussed

related to their potential and skills to take part of the

development of an equal, just and sustainable life.

Through this research the challenge seems to be complex as

it regards various areas that interplay and highlights the

need to develop transversal policies. One of the main tools

to improve gender equal opportunities is through promoting

Lifelong learning activities with a social justice approach

which enables the opportunity to recognize the capability

of every human been and improves development by including

women in responsibility positions and sharing with men

their historical breeding and caring activity.

In general terms gender equal opportunities should be

encouraged with a transversal approach encompassing all

learning activities that enable men and women to develop

their capabilities as well that allows them to be fully

represented in society. As learning occurs in everyday life

and situation a wide Lifelong learning programme with a

[Type text] Page 28

social justice grasp will allow to promote gender equal

opportunities regarding a participative methodology.

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