LLinE Lifelong Learning in Europe

Editorial by Kristiina Kumpulainen: Walk the LLinE. Reflections on the past and the future

The first ten years of LLinE

In the first issue of LLinE published in the year 1996, the editor-in-chief Dr. Kauko Hämäläinen describes the rationale for the birth of the journal. In recognizing the value of the existing work conducted in the field of adult education and lifelong learning, Dr. Hämäläinen argues for the need to create more dynamic dissemination forums where research meets practice and, conversely, practice meets research. These focuses still strongly ground the mission of LLinE.

During the first ten years of LLinE, the journal has established itself as a trans-European platform, disseminating and advancing adult education, lifelong learning, intercultural collaboration and best practice research in and across Europe. The journal has provided a forum for showcasing leading discoveries in the areas of adult learning, active citizenship, societal demands for adult educators, workplace development and learning organizations.

The next ten years of LLinE

Today, we live in a global world that poses new challenges and affordances for adult education and lifelong learning. The socio-economic challenges that confront the field are far too complex to be solved by individuals or small groups that work independently. We must pool our resources, our insights and our findings. The role of LLinE as a forum for sharing seminal ideas, insights and innovations and for promoting dialogue and collaboration in Europe and globally is more vital than ever.

LLinE will also help to define and project the field’s identity and to promote the dissemination of knowledge and information to various sectors promoting evidence-based practice and policy in adult education and learning across Europe.

As a heritage of its interdisciplinary origins, the fields of adult education and lifelong learning include a mixture of theories and methodologies. Most of these have been developed in diverse settings, and are often guided by different theoretical strands and logics of inquiry. Whereas in the past, it may have been adequate to approach issues surrounding adult education and life long learning from one perspective, it is less likely now due to the complex and intertwined nature of the field. The guiding theories, methodologies, technologies, curricula and educational practices must co-evolve in orchestrated efforts.
This not only means that research and practice in lifelong learning must be conducted by collaborative, interdisciplinary teams, but also that we need to develop theory, technology, research methodology and educational practices for adult learning that serve the present field and its contexts the best. We need to re-examine and also create new theories of adult learning that are not only based on individual learning modes. We need technologies that support lifelong learning across and within different age groups, professional fields and cultural spaces. We need methodologies that capture both micro-level interactions and community-level interactions, and even regional level developments as mediated by social practices and infrastructures. The articles in this issue guide us to such directions.

LLinE – a journal of and for the community

The launch of LLinE was a propitious step forward for the community of practitioners, researchers and policy makers within the field of adult education and learning. The emergence of the journal heralded a broader transition of the field to a new level of interaction, sharing and joint knowledge creation. This is a field where research, practice and policy on life long learning intersects, informing, guiding and enriching one another.

LLinE journal is committed to serving as an important communication vehicle of the growing community interested in the multi-dimensional aspects of lifelong learning and cognate fields. The journal deals with cutting-edge topics that are discussed in high quality papers authored by leading professionals in the field.

At the beginning of this year, I stepped in to the editorial community of LLinE as the editor-in-chief. It is now my turn together with the editorial community to further this exciting and important work, the main mission being the creation of a stimulating communication medium and a knowledge archive for an increasingly global, interdisciplinary community of life long learning.

Professor Kristiina Kumpulainen, editor-in-chief of LLinE
Director of CICERO Learning
University of Helsinki