ICT Learning is for Everyone: Focus on third age NGO volunteers

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ICT Learning is for Everyone Focus on third age
NGO volunteers

• June Hazzlewood
• University of Tasmania
• For NCVER Conference
• Mooloolabah July 2006

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The Greying of the NGOs

• member decline
• few takers for executive responsibility
• finances constantly in the red
• dissolution of niche associations
• lack of the obligatory quorum

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The Research Project

• how
• when
• where and
• why
• men and women in the third age of active
  retirement learn to use computers and access the
  Internet

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Training and Support Implications for
Stakeholders

• the learner
• family and friends
• the wider community
• researchers
• policy makers
• funding bodies
• training providers

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VOCED for NGO Volunteers

• Subsidised vocational training and support is
  needed for older adults who are no longer seeking
  paid employment, but who are often responsible
  for running small businesses with either large or
  shoestring grant-dependent budgets

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LMNOP

• Learning that matches the needs of older people
  helps to ensure that the experience and
  enthusiasm that third age NGO volunteers
  contribute to community social capital is not lost

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TasmanianBrain Drain Brain Gain

• Outflow - younger people depart for interstate
  and overseas destinations
• Inflow - post-World War II baby boomers and
  retirees arrive
• 10,000 more adults over 65 are added to
  Tasmanias population every five years

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The NGO Research Sample

• Men and women, aged from the early fifties to the
  late eighties, volunteer in a variety of NGOs
• They are learning alone or in groups in formal
  and informal supported ICT learning programs

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Research Methodology

• The constructivist research design employed
  incorporates naturalistic, ethnographic and
  interpretivist qualitative elements as it gathers
  data from semi-structured interviews, participant
  observation, focus groups, case studies and
  document analysis

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Theories of Ageing

• Activity theory
• Continuity theory
• Role theory
• - Stratification theory
• - Disengagement theory

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Research Question 1

• What are the issues relating to adult learning in
  the third age of active retirement in the
  technological age?
• Finding - These third age volunteers are shown to
  lead full and interesting multi-role lives that
  belie the stereotypes and myths of ageism

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Research Question 2

• How do older men and women learn to use computers
  and access the Internet?
• Early ICT adopters learned to use computers and
  the Internet in the workplace or by trial and
  error
• Later ICT adopters seek a variety of formal and
  informal training and support and self-directed
  learning options

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Research Question 3

• What are the incentives for and the barriers to,
  learning about and via new technology in later
  life?
• Incentives relate to satisfaction gained from
  community service and related social interaction
• Barriers expressed are lack of time to practice
  skills learned and the cost of upgrading
  hardware and software

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Research Question 4

• What are the ICT training and support
  implications for older adult learners, trainers,
  service providers, researchers and policy makers?
• Issues are directly connected with time and cost
  barriers.
• Lack of adequate ICT training and support is a
  deterrent to volunteer recruitment

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Research Question 5

• How do the skills, knowledge and information
  gained from accessing computer technology, add to
  community social capital?
• Social capital bonding, bridging and linking
  aspects are apparent as these NGO members bond
  within their own groups, boundary cross between
  groups and forge linkages between local, state
  and national government bodies and NGOs

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Summary

• The transfer of human capital to social capital
  deposited in the learning community bank by the
  third age cohort is significant
• NGO volunteer effort adds considerably to
  community social capital
• Volunteer contribution is not included in NGO
  financial statements or in GDP checks and
  balances

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Third Age Role Change Beneficiaries

• Rolelessness is replaced by agelessness as third
  age ICT learners quickly seek new community NGO
  service and study opportunities
• This benefits themselves, their immediate family
  and friends and, through volunteer involvement,
  strangers

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Social Inclusion not Exclusion

• A blend of actual and virtual learning is a cost
  effective way to counter post-retirement social
  isolation
• Facilitating the uptake of technology by third
  age learners enables them to contribute to
  learning communities

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The Diverse Third Age

• More diverse than any other age cohort, older
  adults have a wealth of lifetime experience by
  virtue of its members having lived long and
  varied lives
• Service providers and policy makers can harness
  this experience to help in developing and funding
  needs-based rather than one-size-fits-all courses

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Refuting Ageism Myths and Strereotypes

• Third age learners inhabit the NGO volunteer
  community
• Older adults are living longer and learning new
  tricks with new clicks
• Chronological age is not a limiting factor in ICT
  literacy acquisition

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Implications for the Second Age

• Givig lip service in glossy reports, which puts
  the onus of community learning on the presumably
  autonomous learner is short-sighted and
  counter-productive
• Lofty political rhetoric does little to help
  those who are anxious to acquire ICT literacy and
  does nothing to address the engaging of the
  disengaged, who are becoming alienated and
  marginalised

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The Sandwich Generation(Abaya 1992)

• The sandwich-generation grandparent cohort is
  showing signs of time-stretching as
  grandchildren, spouse or sibling care and
  extended or continually recycled committee
  service erode home-based health and well-being
  activities

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e for exclusion?

• Parsimony in budgeting for affordable and
  appropriate ICT training and support provision
  for older adults may produce this less desirable
  cyber word association
• Piecemeal-funding encourages an NGO mendicant
  mentality as third age ICT training and support
  is considered by second age policy makers to be a
  luxury rather than a necessity (Haddad 2000)

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LIFELearning is for Everyone

• Any pace
• Any place
• Any age
• Any stage