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Age and ageing in higher education: exploring the benefits and costs of higher education distribution over the lifecourse

'At the times of economic uncertainty, public concerns and youth unemployment, a strong case should be made for a lifecourse perspective with its focus on both individual and societal wellbeing'.

On 5 December (Day One of the two day 2012 Budget announcement) the opening remark of Professor Tom Schuller- keynote speaker at a seminar attended by researchers, policy makers and higher education leaders- drew on his extensive international experience at OECD to stress the importance in times of not losing sight of longer term policy issues.

In his Welcome Address, Professor Brian MacCraith, President of DCU, set the scene by highlighting the dramatic demographic changes taking place in Europe and globally. Tom Schuller approached his overall theme from two angles: firstly, the ageing of population, and its overall impact on higher education; and, secondly, sociological implications of ageing on universities as expressed in changing patterns of gender enrolment trends, access policies and curriculum provision. Reflecting on the expansion of higher education, Professor Schuller remarked that, while an investment in education is considered to be a good thing on the individual level, there are at least three important questions that arise. These include the 'lag' question (change in relative advantage) the distribution question (of benefits and costs of higher education) and the generation question (issues of equality, efficiency and tension)'.

Professor Tom Schuller is Director of Longview, a UK 'think-tank' promoting the value of longitudinal and lifecourse research, and was previously Director of the Centre for Educational Research and Innovation (CERI) at OECD, Professor of Lifelong Learning at Birkbeck College and at Edinburgh University. He was speaking at the seventh in a lecture and debate series Higher Education in challenging times: questioning the unquestioned hosted by the Higher Education Research Centre (HERC) DCU, with support from the Higher Education Authority (HEA) and the Dublin Region Higher Education Alliance (DRHEA).

The event was chaired by Professor Maria Slowey (DCU) Director of Higher Education Research and Development, with expert panellists from two of Ireland's largest longitudinal studies: Professor Brendan Whelan (TCD) Research Advisor, the Longitudinal Study on Ageing (TILDA) and Professor Mark Morgan, Cregan Professor of Education and Psychology, St Patrick's College and Acting Director (TCD) Growing up in Ireland. Trudy Corrigan, Lecturer in the School of Educational Studies and Coordinator of DCU's pioneering Intergenerational Learning Programme illustrated in practice the potential benefits of younger and older learners working together.

Speaking of ageing and higher education, Tom Schuller made the case that the focus should not be on older adults in isolation, but should address changes over the lifecourse as a whole. Therefore, it would be worthwhile to explore issues around paid/unpaid work across the lifecourse, family systems and the extent of their provision of financial and caring supports to both older and younger relatives, along with new understandings of pathways from one life stage to another. Supporting his last point he proposed an alternative mapping of the key lifecourse transition stages based on the extensive research conducted by Tom Schuller and others for the recent UK National Inquiry on Learning Through Life.

The theme of gender and higher education was the second identified in the talk. The speaker argued that one of the broad social trends relates to differential performance between male and female students- at all levels and across almost all OECD countries (with the exception of Germany and Switzerland). On the other hand, however, this educational advantage is not translated into occupational equality, in terms of monetary 'reward' or levels of seniority for women. Seeking explanatory factors for the persistence of these trends raises issues of discrimination, personal choice, the structure of the workplace and the ways in which promoted positions might be redefined to attract more women to apply.

Speaking of the general challenges and issues facing higher education nationally and abroad in the times of demographic changes, Professor Tom Schuller spoke of 'rebalancing' of resources over the lifecourse and possible changes in curriculum content and provision to match demographics. He concluded the event by stating thatresearch on 'transitions and trajectories of people over their lifecourse' in order to understand patterns and variation is now high on the agenda, in addition to a need of a greater experimentation in the use of the human capital in the workplace.