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Introduction
In 2021, Scott began work on a five-year project of research funded by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council: "A Century of Shaping Gender and Class: University Extension in Canada, 1874 - 1974." Through this research, Scott compares discourses and practices of extension work at universities from all ten Canadian provinces, and analyzes connections between such extension work and the evolving ways through which hegemonic forms of gender and social class shaped people's lives.
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Publications (64)
This article narrates the engagement of the University of Manitoba in two waves of the extension movement that shaped adult education work at universities across North America: one rooted in the delivery of public lectures and another rooted in the “Wisconsin idea” of serving citizens and the state. In contrast to developments at provincial univers...
One of the most significant community development initiatives in Canadian history was sponsored by Memorial University of Newfoundland (MUN) from 1960 to 1982. Fieldworkers employed by MUN Extension worked across the province of Newfoundland and Labrador, engaging in strategies of community change that included social action, citizen participation,...
Introduction: representation and community development
The field of community development is a fascinating domain for the analysis of representation. Community development is a field of socioeconomic and politico-cultural intervention in which particular actors (notably those working for governments, non-governmental organizations, and intergovernm...
In the first half of the twentieth century, the University of Toronto was a preeminent cultural institution in Canada. Based on a critical interpretation of archival documents, this article narrates the history of four non-formal educational programs through which the University of Toronto created opportunities for Canadians to develop privileged f...
For over forty years, presidents of the Summer School Association of Queen’s University wrote annually to teachers across Canada, encouraging them to attend summer courses for credit toward a bachelor of arts. In the 1920s, presidents’ messages associated attendance with societal progress and the professionalization of teaching. In the 1930s, such...
I narrate a historical sociology of extension work undertaken at Queen's University, McMaster University, and the University of Toronto from the late 1800s through the early 1960s. University administrators positioned extension work as dedicated to the democratization of higher education. However, a critical analysis of archival data reveals that t...
Canadian universities today assert their social relevance through highlighting processes such as community engagement, knowledge mobilization, and the promotion of equity, diversity, and inclusion. Much can be learned about such processes through examining an era in which Canadian universities asserted their social relevance through another vocabul...
Working as the director of University Extension and Publicity for the University of Toronto from 1920 to 1951, William Dunlop built a large and diverse set of adult education programs, developed an influential discourse of extension, and sustained support for the adult education movement from three university presidents. This article explains the r...
This article narrates the rise and fall of a notable adult education programme at Laval University in Quebec City, Canada. The Centre for Adult Education and Community Development was established in 1951, replacing the External Service for Social Education. In the 1950s, the Centre gained an international reputation for excellence in adult educatio...
In recent decades, precariousness has become an increasingly prominent feature of life in many countries. At the same time as precarious forms of social relations have proliferated, self-help books have become tremendously popular. This article examines five best-selling self-help books in Mexico - two promoting mental wellness, one providing finan...
Lifelong education is comprised of four broad categories of activity: early childhood education, primary and secondary schooling, tertiary studies, and adult education. Patterns of people’s engagement with each category of lifelong education differ substantially between countries and are influenced by widely varying public policies and institutiona...
Between 1915 and 1920, members of the Royal Northwest Mounted Police (RNWMP) wrote four major narratives of making contact with Inuit living in territory now known as the Kitikmeot region of Nunavut. The authors were the first representatives of the Canadian state to enter the region, and their narratives positioned Inuit as “better off without civ...
This article refutes official and scholarly accounts of the history of relationships between Inuit and the Canadian state that suggest that the state neglected its Arctic citizens in the period prior to 1950. Instead, the article argues that the early decades of contact between state representatives and the Inuit witnessed the construction and depl...
Despite the fact that millions of men engage in self-help reading, there has been little scholarly research about the reception of self-help texts by male readers. We explore how men read self-help books through presenting the results of forty-five qualitative interviews with readers of books in the domains of career and financial success, health a...
In this article, we explore the relationship between adult education and socioeconomic precariousness, through extending existing scholarship regarding the concept of the hidden curriculum. We analyze transcripts of 134 qualitative interviews undertaken to explore the learning experiences associated with reading self-help books in the domains of ca...
The concept of identity has become prominent in the study of Canadian education. We further the understanding of identity by examining the ways through which adults present themselves as subjects in learning processes. We recruited 134 adults who had recently read self-help books pertaining to health, careers, or relationships, and conducted qualit...
This article narrates the history of state-organized adult education in the Central Arctic (Kitikmeot region) from the 1950s through the early 1990s. Prior to 1960, little formal adult education was delivered in the region, as relationships between Inuit and Euro-Canadians centred on the exchange of fox furs for external products. In the 1960s and...
Adult education was an integral component of the colonisation of the Canadian Arctic. Between the 1960s and the 1990s, educational programmes were explicitly developed in order to shape Inuit adults in particular ways: from teaching them how to live in permanent houses, to teaching them how to work as administrators and tradespeople. Inuit did not...
Adult education programs are often grounded in problematic assumptions about learners' inadequacies. The purpose of this article is to critique such assumptions through presenting a history of the manner in which representatives of Canadian governments conceptualized the education of Inuit adults from the 1940s through the 1980s. Using genealogical...
Numerous scholars have documented and critiqued the predominance of neoliberal policies and rationalities shaping adult and continuing education around the world. Contemporary sociologists have argued that neoliberal citizens are characterized by hyperindividuality and a strong sense of personal autonomy. Self-help reading is widely viewed as one o...
Despite considerable scholarly attention given to self-help literature, there has been a lack of research about the experience of self-help reading. In this article, we explore gender differences in self-help reading. We argue that men and women read self-help books for different reasons and with different levels of engagement, and that they experi...
In recent years, the concept of public pedagogy has increasingly influenced the study of continuing education, drawing attention to ways in which adults access resources from popular culture and learn without the involvement of educational institutions. Reading relationship self-help books has become a prominent component of popular culture. There...
Objective
To address a critical gap in health education scholarship by exploring the contexts in which self-help reading takes place, the motivations of self-help readers and the processes through which such readers engage with books on mental health.
Design
Structured, in-depth interviews conducted with participants recruited through online class...
Through presenting empirical research exploring the connections between popular culture and informal learning, we argue that, as predicted by concepts such as self-directed learning and transformational learning, the experience of transition has a meaningful impact on adult learning. Specifically, transitions encourage adults to engage in learning...
Through presenting the results of qualitative interviews with readers of self-help books relating to health, relationships, and career success, this article enriches existing knowledge about the learning experiences of adults as they engage with popular culture. Of 100 adults interviewed, 96 claimed that they learned something of importance from re...
Conventional wisdom in adult education suggests that processes of life cycle change make for differences in the learning experiences of younger and older adults. Popular demographers argue that generational differences exist between those born in distinct historical periods. Outside the realm of higher education, there are relatively few empirical...
Self-help literature has become an important domain of adult learning in North America. Self-help books offer readers advice on how to take charge of their lives and achieve goals such as prosperity, love, happiness, wellness, and self-actualization. Despite the popularity of self-help books, there has been little research about them from scholars...
This article presents a case study of how the University of Saskatchewan Extension Division developed an action plan to strengthen its research capacity. Its Action Plan outlines 20 actions, organized into five strategic categories: cultivating a productive research climate; promoting faculty development and faculty renewal; engaging in graduate-le...
In this paper, we describe the outreach and engagement movement in the United States and explore the implications of this movement for university continuing education units in Canada. Across the United States, major universities have adopted the vocabulary of “outreach and engagement” to foster a shift in the relationships of those universities wit...
This article provokes critical reflection about the role of adult educators in contemporary processes of social control. It does so through presenting an empirical case study of an important liberal adult education program (Living Room Learning) and through introducing the work of British sociologist, Nikolas Rose. Rose’s provocative ideas about th...
This article inspires critical and creative thinking about the promotion of citizenship development through programmes of study designed primarily to enhance adults' vocational skills. It does so through presenting an empirical case study of an important adult education programme delivered by the Department of University Extension at the University...
Part‐time students have accounted for a significant proportion of rising participation in higher education in many countries. The objectives of this paper are to enrich the empirical literature concerning the inclusion of part‐time adult learners in higher education, and to assess the two competing theoretical frameworks that have emerged to explai...
In 1952, the University of Montréal established an Extension Service. One of the first initiatives of this service was to create a bachelor’s degree for part-time adult students. This initiative resulted in a struggle with the Faculty of Arts and, for a few years, the university prohibited the Extension Service from offering credits for its trainin...
Leaders of university continuing education units frequently dedicate significant energy to managing relationships between their units and senior university administrators. Many CJUCE readers know of cases where a particularly sympathetic (or unsympathetic) university president or provost has substantially changed the trajectory of a continuing educ...
De 1911 à 1979, les Homemakers' Clubs de la Saskatchewan ont mobilisé et suivi une étude et une action à grande échelle dans le domaine de la santé publique. Cet article examine comment ces clubs ont poussé des femmes à lutter pour avancer et les ont encouragées à considérer de telles luttes comme étant fondamentales pour bâtir leur propre identité...
This article presents a concise, historical overview of university extension and continuing education in western Canada. It argues that, over the course of the twentieth century, the major universities in western Canada made three basic claims regarding the purposes of their extension and continuing education units. Prior to 1940, universities clai...
There are two predominant interpretations of the history of Canadian university extension. The "liberal or institutional" perspective argues that extension has been a means for universities to disseminate resources, foster progress in society, and meet the learning needs of individuals. The "critical or nostalgic" perspective claims that university...
The purpose of this paper is to explore how public health professionals built capacity to carry out health promotion despite a low level of investment and competition for financial resources with acute-oriented healthcare services. Three data sources are used in this analysis: key-informant interviews with project participants, final reports from t...
From 1912 to 1975 the Department of Extension at the University of Alberta provided an impressive range of programmes and services to people across the Canadian province of Alberta. The four Directors of Extension at the University of Alberta during this period became leading figures in the history of adult education in Canada. They positioned thei...
This article explores claims made on websites of CAUCE members about the purpose of university continuing education. CAUCE members often claim a role in addressing the needs or goals of learners seeking professional development, personal enrichment, or the furthering of knowledge and skills. They claim to deliver programs and services that promote...
This article examines the Kirkpatrick evaluation framework through a case study of a national leadership development program. The authors introduce the program and the Kirkpatrick framework, and then describe the research processes and instruments through which the framework was applied to evaluate the pilot cohort of the program. The article concl...
This article introduces the work of the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), and describes its interest in the application of distance learning strategies pertinent to the challenges of food security and rural development around the world. The article briefly reviews pertinent examples of distance learning, both from the experien...
In Canada, agriculture and its related industries are undergoing rapid and significant changes. Among the many issues facing farmers and other agri-business people are the development of biotechnologies, the decline of on-farm and rural populations, the emergence of new public policies, concerns over food safety, globalisation of markets, sensitivi...
The concept of "capacity" has generated substantial interest among community development practitioners and scholars. This article describes our efforts to understand and measure health promotion capacity in Saskatchewan, and encourages readers to think about the usefulness of this concept in other community development contexts. We conceptualize ca...
The Saskatchewan Heart Health Program (SHHP) Dissemination Phase "Building Health Promotion Capacity" is a five-year program funded by Health Canada, Saskatchewan Health and the Heart and Stroke Foundation of Saskatchewan. This phase began in July 1998 and builds on two previous SHHP phases: the provincial heart health survey (Saskatchewan Health,...
The "digital divide" refers to inequitable access to information and communication technologies (ICTs) between wealthy and poor countries and between privileged and underprivileged social groups within all countries. This presentation outlines global parameters of the digital divide, discusses the use of ICTs in education in "developing countries,"...
Using the author's experience as the coordinator of the Canadian Agriculture Lifetime Leadership programme as a case study, this article provides an interpretive essay about programme planning in adult education. Two conceptual frameworks are used to structure narratives of the programme planning process. The first asserts that programme planning i...
In recent years, both practical barriers and conceptual problems have been identified concerning needs assessment work in adult and continuing education. This article provides an empirical study of needs assessment research that was conducted to support university-based continuing education programming in the field of health promotion in Saskatchew...
This article explores the relationship between learners' socio-demographic characteristics and their level of participation in computer conferencing. A quantitative study of participation among thirty learners in a non-credit, agricultural leadership development program provides the empirical data for this exploration. The relationships between lea...
p> Every approach to conducting research in continuing education involves background assumptions about the nature of what is being studied, the means through which one can acquire knowledge, and the purpose of the research process itself. Although often not explicitly declared, these assumptions have a significant bearing on the choice of research...
Each copy of any part of a JSTOR transmission must contain the same copyright notice that appears on the screen or printed page of such transmission. The JSTOR Archive is a trusted digital repository providing for long-term preservation and access to leading academic journals and scholarly literature from around the world. The Archive is supported...
Governments, universities and community-based organizations in Canada are struggling to determine the most appropriate means to build local capacity for community development. This paper reviews five recent research initiatives concerning the learning needs of community development practitioners in Canada. Lead organizations for the five needs asse...
University continuing educators have recognized that political- economic and institutional changes are making social activism more difficult to sustain. This article argues that to build more effective and vigorous forms of social activ- ism, continuing educators need to understand how systems of oppres- sion are changing. In postmodern societies,...
Abstract In the middle of this century, Canadian state representatives transformed their conceptualization of the relationship between Inuit, education, and modernity. In the 1930s, Inuit were seen as destined to remain collectively insulated from the modem world, and education was considered either insignificant or dangerous. By 1955, Inuit were s...
This article examines the Kirkpatrick evaluation framework through a case study of a national leadership development pro- gram. The authors introduce the program and the Kirkpatrick framework, and then describe the research processes and in- struments through which the framework was applied to evalu- ate the pilot cohort of the program. The article...
Introduction Reading self-help literature has become one of the most important means through which adults intentionally pursue learning. Self-help books typically offer readers advice on how to take charge of their lives, feel better about themselves, and achieve such goals as prosperity, love, happiness, wellness, and self-actualization. Often wri...
"February 1994." Thesis (Ph. D.)--Carleton University, 1994. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 361-378). Photocopy. s
