9. COMMENTARY "The reason the wheel is so round is because we keep re-inventing it." Dr. Kenneth Earl Eye (1992). Many theoretical notions were woven through the cited presented in this paper. But I ask, were they all just reinventing the wheel? Is adult education really something unique, or just a rehash of educational dogma that resulted in the creation of volumes of new information regarding one of the oldest pursuits of humankind? I believe not. Toffler's concept of the Third Wave is not fiction, but a paradigm representing a new social reality. Since its publication in 1980, the information explosion increased exponentially. In The Third Wave, Toffler mentioned that he wrote the last part of the text using a word processor, and predicted ironically, this new machine writing would probably impact the future in many ways. That comment was pure understatement. Since 1980, computers not only facilitated new ways of communication, but impacted every facet of civilization. The world is now linked by the "magic box" through optic fiber phone lines, satellite dishes, modems and FAX machines. In many ways, the microprocessor is the harbinger of the Third Wave. And those that are computer literate, or worse yet, who avoid learning how to manipulate information using them, may be left in not only a communication but a social time warp. In many respects, they are the very ones who are attempting to maintain the Second Wave order by keeping information management in a pyramidal framework. Computer use is slowly weaving its way into the educational environment. At the elementary and high school level, computers are intermittently used to enhance learning. But computer science is still not a primary subject taught in most curricula. Teaching the three R's is still done using methods developed by the cognitivist educational theorists. Lecture and objective testing remain the predominant methodology in education. In most universities and in some Communication Departments (Clarion University of PA where I completed my master's degree), instructors encourage the master's candidates to use andragogical processes for students in planning T&D modules, but lecture continues to dominant the methods used to "teach" them (the candidates) how to train others. Knowles and others would discount this as a meaningful learning experience, because the instructors are not role modeling the facilitation process in effective adult education. Only in the adult education theories and practices presented earlier in this paper is there any real hope for a significant change in the current methodology for educating not only adults but youths and adolescents in preparation for meeting the information age with enthusiasm and joy and not fear and anxiety. Knowles, Tough, Kidd, Houle, Lindeman, Hesburgh, Naisbitt and Aburdene, and the other authors believed there is a need for lifelong learning to prepare all individuals to face the information explosion. Each maintained that the old systems of education were sorely antiquated and only by applying modern principles of andragogy could we hope to overcome the impending obsolescence of mankind. What makes adult education or andragogy, different is its focus on the individual and not a mass of students. As the world becomes more interconnected with mass means of communication via the computer, the individual learner will find it easier to access information from myriad sources using national databases like Compuserve, Genie, Prodigy, America Online, and the myriad BBS's which did not even exist 13 years ago when Toffler wrote The Third Wave. But is andragogy the answer? It is part of the answer, but I believe not just andragogy alone. There is a need for education to evolve into a unified system where pedagogy and andragogy merge together to create a true LLL environment. Even though America is "graying" at a rapid pace, and by 2030 A.D. a projected 65% of Americans will be past middle age, focusing only on adult learning is too limiting. Lifelong Learning (LLL) would emphasize a "cradle to grave" approach for individual human development. The best principles of pedagogy and andragogy would be incorporated into systematic lifelong learning curricula and emphasize thinking, synthesizing, and creating. Computer Science, Information Management, Problem Solving, Data Base Searching, Applied Mathematics, Democratic Living, and Community Service are just a few potential subject areas the lifelong learner might pursue. Knowles' (1978) proposal for LLL to parallel human developmental stages would certainly assist the information age facilitator (not teacher) in assisting individuals in creating programs to meet his/her specific needs. Rather than having learning systems founded on subject areas, the information age learning environment will be based upon individual stages of human development. Knowles' different roles and competencies would be the focus for LLL. Supporting this notion, Tough (1979) wrote that 73% of adults undertake individual learning projects during any given year and only 5% pursue some organized learning process. Now reversing this reality by "whacking oneself on the side of the head", imagine a LLL environment in which the majority of individuals in the United States and the world are pursuing individual learning projects based on roles and competencies rather than subject areas. During the "Learning" role or phase in life, the individual would pursue competence in reading, writing, computing, perceiving, conceptualizing, evaluating, imagining, and inquiring. Once these competencies are completed, the individual would begin working on "being a self" and work on competencies like self-analyzing, sensing, goal-building, objectivising, value-clarifying, and expressing oneself effectively. He will then begin working on being a "friend." Now this role can and will run simultaneously with the others, but it is a separate and important role to be mastered. Competencies in this role are loving, empathizing, listening, collaborating, sharing, helping, giving feedback, and supporting. These are certainly important interpersonal skills to possess, and which are not presently being taught on any formal level in our schools today. In fact, they are not being taught at all. An individual can learn these by participating in individual learning projects. He could also learn them if he chooses to enter therapy and through extensive work incorporate them into his personality. How much better it would be if the entire fabric of community emphasized these competencies. Next, the individual will work on the role of "family member" and develop the competency of maintaining health, planning, man aging, helping, sharing, buying, saving, loving, and taking responsibility for one's own behaviors, attitudes, and beliefs. The role of worker requires the individual to be competent in career planning, technical skills, using supervision, giving supervision, getting along with people, cooperating, planning, delegating, managing one's own resources. The final role in Knowles' (1978) LLL system is leisure-time. Now the individual will become competent in knowing resources, appreciating the arts and humanities, performing, playing, relaxing, reflecting, planning, risking and preparing for the future, one which we already realize is quickly making the Second Wave Civilization obsolete itself. Learning will become fun, people will become self-actualized, and life will reach new plateaus of spontaneity and joy. Somewhere a traditionalist writhes in agony as these notions are proposed and asks: How does one measure learning which is individually based, focused on roles and competencies, and not oriented to subject matter? How does one decide when to begin a project? How does one keep track of the individual as s/he pursues a LLL program which is not the same for everybody? Who controls the movement from one role to the next? How is this type of program paid for? What about teachers, and schools, and education budgets, and all the other bureaucratic red tape? These questions are certainly the foundation for future research by those practicing pedagogy and andragogy and who believe the present system is obsolete, and especially by the learner, who knows it is. They will need to ask questions, like Lindeman proposed (see pages 86-87). Again, the traditionalist asks, is it truly obsolete and is LLL the only approach which will arrest educational systems from self-destruction? Given the arguments of the writers already cited, there is enough evidence to suggest that as the information age overwhelms the last vestiges of the Second Wave civilization and its mass production educational systems, LLL will emerge as the educational system not only of choice but necessity. Some basic education will need to take place. This will occur in the "learning" role. But imagine the three year old who, instead of watching "Sesame Street" once a day at 4 pm on PBS broadcasting systems, turns on the family PC and accesses not only this program, but a multitude of programs and uses them to learn to read, write, type, think, analyze, draw, create, and masters these skills all by the age of six. Computer Assisted Instruction (CAI) media formats will replace simple computer games as the preferred mode of entertainment. A movement toward this type of message began with the development of Apple Computers 15 years ago. The possibilities now are limitless. Exciting graphics and multi-media computer applications will eliminate boredom in learning projects. Multi-tasking capabilities under OS/2 and Windows NT (New Technology) will permit the LLLearner to work on many projects at one time. Tired of doing advanced calculus via CAI, the LLLearner switches tasks and writes a letter to a friend and then sends it via fax/modem. S/he then returns to an applied CAI and reviews the concepts of democracy and what it means to be an enlightened citizen. If old enough, he may tune in to the Senate or Congress in session and monitor the voting. He may, if Ross Perot's suggestion is finally made a reality, participate in voting via the "electronic town meeting." Before the individual goes to dinner, the computer will prompt him to update the "task calendar" on screen. Popping down a window, the learner types in the accomplishments for the day and projects for the next day what new and interesting learning activities he hopes to complete. Toffler (1980) described a renewal of "cottage industries" as individuals in the 21st century remain home and still contribute in many ways to the growth and development of their separate companies. Imagine "cottage schools" connected again via fiber optics, integrated using all the best practices of pedagogy and andragogy, and which permit the individual to tap into the learning centers of the world without having to travel to them. Using the current national databases like Compuserve (or Eduserve), the LLLearner can search ERIC, other databases, communicate via a host of Forums on specific subjects, check the weather, read the AP wire news and never leave his own home. Truancy would disappear. Boredom would be replaced with excitement. Anxiety would be eliminated, because the learner would progress at his own pace. In all these activities, curiosity, thinking, synthesizing, and creating would be enhanced. Every author described some facet of this type of learning environment as being the most effective for enhancing individual development and essential for preventing obsolescence in the Information Age. However, it would be naive to believe that such an educational system is "just around the corner." Toffler's "ad-hocracy" is not a household word yet. Bureaucracies still control the major funding sources for education and the major systems and corporations of the world. The National Education Association (NEA) is still one of the most powerful lobbies in Washington. Parents who use school for child care and don't really care whether or not their children really learn anything would balk at having their children home for all, or at least part of the day, making it difficult for one or both parents to go off to work and leave "Johnnie and Susie" home with the "Windows" open. Corporations still want employees to sign time sheets and "be present and accounted for" so that they can justify paying them. Yet the facts presented thus far describe a vastly different work world in the not-to-distant future. The 21st century society will be different, unique to human existence and irreversible. Just ask even the most resistant Second Wave supporter who recently "had" to learn to use a computer to perform his/her job related responsibilities if s/he would go back to the way things were done even a year ago, and the answer would be a resounding "no". Modern communication systems free the individual from boredom, in learning, working, and in recreation. All these barriers exist, and will not disappear without some reactionary behaviors on the part of the "old guard". But the changes are inevitable. When and How are the only questions that are relevant for the proponent of LLL. In describing this type of LLL, I believe it meets all of Penland's (1977) criteria why adults undertake learning projects. The learner of the future will: 1. Set his own learning pace. 2. Use his own style of learning. 3. Keep the learning style flexible and easy to change. 4. Create his own structure to the learning project regardless of what role is being pursued. 5. Develop competency in whatever role he wants. 6. Participate in learning immediately without having to wait for a class or some other systematic learning event to take place. 7. Budget his time so that he can engage in individual or group learning as he sees necessary for his own development. 8. Avoid forever, the formal classroom with a teacher, if he so chooses. 9. Worry no more about money for a course of study. 10. Travel only as far as his communication system to access the information systems of the world. This description of a LLL system may seem to be farfetched, incomprehensible, a neat idea but not very feasible. I believe not. What makes it realistic, comprehensible and very feasible is the exponential rate of change taking place in the world as Toffler (1970, 1980) described, and how corporations are "reinventing" themselves (Naisbitt and Aburdene, 1985), and how adults are pursuing individual learning projects at an ever increasing rate (Tough, 1978), and lastly, how adults, and youths as well, more effectively learn (Knowles, 1970, 1978, 1980; Kidd, 1973; Hesburgh et al., 1973). What will it take for a LLL system to replace the current one presently in place? These are just some of the strategies I believe it will be necessary to implement to create a true LIFELONG LEARNING NETWORK: 1. Develop learning modules (especially CAI's) which emphasize individual learning projects using modern communications networks rather than existing traditional frameworks where the adult must travel to the experience rather than have the experience come to him. 2. Engage corporations in studying more effective ways to train and then support individuals in applying their new knowledge on as well as off the job. 3. Create the kind of "Electronic Town Meeting" that Ross Perot advocated in the 1992 Presidential Campaign to engage children, adolescents and adults in participatory democracy, not only to make the process of government more meaningful to them, but also to teach how it actually works and how it can be impacted by the mass electorate. 4. Raise problem solving, creative thinking, and LLL to the status of an art and science to be practiced, enjoyed, and promoted as essential to individual growth and development. 5. Undertake extensive research into the effectiveness of the "cottage school" and continue to make adjustments in the learning process as new and more efficient communication media are invented. 6. Provide tax breaks, incentives, and make funds available for all individuals so that the purchase of the necessary communication hardware and software are available to all human beings on the face of the earth. 7. Promote the concept of LLL for individuals in all families, neighborhoods, communities, counties, states, and nations. 8. Make all long-distance phone calls related to LLL 800 numbers so that communication is accessible to even the poorest individual. 9. Restructure libraries and other traditional sources of information in such a way that they become true clearinghouses of usable and available information accessible to all individuals connected to the optic fiber family of man. 10. Enjoy it. The Third Wave. The Lifelong Learning Process. The opportunity of being self-actualized from cradle to grave. In conclusion, like Knowles and the other adult educators visualized that the adult learner would be weaned away from the perception that he was engaged in schooling, this new LLL system would promote the acquisition of the skills of learning appropriate to the individual's aspirations as he works toward developing into a self-directed learner, making use of the world's learning resources centers that are available to him through communication systems on his terms as he becomes a true LLLearner. Again, there will be no such thing as adult education. Again, there will be no such thing as graduation. There will only be LifeLong Learning.