A Learners Forum is a meeting of adult learners who are currently involved in education. They meet together to identify issues and concerns about their education which they want to discuss. The purpose of the forum is to talk over their experiences, give each other mutual support and to identify causes for celebration or concern that will benefit from some collective attention. Working together it is more possible to support and celebrate good developments but also to work on strategies for bringing about changes where these are necessary. Getting together helps to generate a collective and authentic voice on behalf of adult learners.
Local forums can bring together learners from a range of institutions in a local or regional area.
Their involvement in local Lifelong Learning Partnerships will become increasingly important, especially when the new local Learning and Skills Councils come into effect in 2001. With a bit of vision, it is possible to imagine a national network of learners forums, co-ordinated by a national group on a rotating basis, which arranges periodic conferences and gatherings to bring local and regional groups together to discuss and seek to influence national educational policies. Top Learning and Social Change Encouraging adult learners to become vociferously and actively involved in identifying the issues which concern them, and shaping the decisions which affect them, has a long history in adult education. It is a tradition that is associated with the kind of learning that changes people's lives. It involves education that is not only about personal development and change but also about working with others to 'make a difference' in the wider community and in political and civil society.