In 2021, the section Publications on the SIAE education activity website became richer by as many as three professional publications, all in Slovenian. We have published a professional monograph Let’s Tell Each Other Stories – Experiences of Adult Educators During the Pandemic and a research study Distance Adult Education and Guidance During the Pandemic – Reflections and Guidelines for the Future (both available in print). The third is the evaluation report on the adult education training programmes for professionals implemented at the SIAE in 2020, which we briefly present below.
Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, we were forced to reorganise our work, study, leisure time; we had to adapt to a new way of life. We more or less all experienced firsthand that the transition to such a form of work and education is not entirely straightforward. We were forced to work remotely, and the entire educational process moved to the virtual world. If the individual’s decision to join or not join e-learning was taken into account before the pandemic, all of a sudden, this option was gone. Namely, e-learning began to be used daily as a primary form.
Thus, in 2020, we focused more on the systematic training of employees and providers to use various online and videoconferencing tools for more efficient implementation of distance adult education. In addition, we organised internal training to learn about online tools such as MS Teams, Zoom and Moodle so we could offer technical support to providers. Plenty of professional and contextual work has been done in the field of e-learning. Among that, we also include the evaluation report or analysis of the implementation and monitoring of adult education training programmes and the participant’s satisfaction with the training carried out in 2020 at SIAE.
The evaluation report was divided into five chapters.
- First, we present the methodology of collecting data about participants and their satisfaction with the implemented programmes. We have developed a method for monitoring opinions and evaluating implemented training programmes for many years, and we obtain data based on various questionnaires using the online tool 1KA and questionnaires within the KATIS system. Within the module Statistics, which is part of the internal web application supporting SIAE education activities, we can process the data on involved and qualified participants and data on implemented programmes according to various criteria in anonymised form.
- In the second chapter, we analyse the data on the participants and the implemented adult education training programmes.
Compared to 2019, despite the pandemic, slightly more (0.3%) participants were involved in the training programmes, primarily women, with a degree in social sciences, pedagogical and andragogical education and professional exam in the field of education. The share of those included in the training programmes changed by age. Compared to 2019, when the percentage of people aged 41 to 50 was 38%, and those aged 31 to 40 was 30%, the shares of people aged 31 to 40 and 41 to 50 were almost equal (around 37%). Nearly all (95%) had the status of an employed person, half of all participants were employed at adult education centres, and just under a third, representing the majority share, were employed in the Osrednjeslovenska region.
We carried out 56 implementations of 36 different programmes; some were carried out several times. Compared to 2019, we managed to implement 2% more training programmes and 3% more of them with different content despite the difficulties.
- In the third, central chapter, we present the implemented training programmes in more detail according to the sources of financing (public and commercial sources, ESF projects). In addition to the four planned programmes, we carried out seven additional implementations, which we organised for employees, and in some programmes, we were joined by external collaborators and lecturers. Most of them were training programmes for professionals to work in online classrooms and use various online tools to carry out distance learning. All of scheduled Friday’s meetings were carried out in person at SIAE.
Also in 2020, we responded to the needs of companies and organisations and carried out almost 30% more implementations than planned within the commercial activity. We have entered into cooperation with some new clients.
As part of two projects, we also carried out numerous other training programmes for professionals, namely a total of 20 implementations, which are presented in more detail in Chapter 8, entitled Analysis of programmes financed from ESF projects.
- In the chapter Professional and ICT support to SIAE educational activities, we write about procedures implemented for the recognition of prior knowledge and the development of a new ICT module to support distance recognition procedures.
- In the concluding chapter, we highlight the report’s basic findings and pay attention to proposals for further development of individual tasks that we perform as part of our regular work.
The evaluation report (in Slovenian) is published in the section Publications.
Neda Đorđević (neda.dordevic@acs.si), SIAE
