LEARNING CITIES AND ADULT EDUCATION AS SINE QUA-NON FOR SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT IN LAGOS STATE, NIGERIA

Abstract

This presentation examined the place of education as a necessity for man to articulate himself and achieve fullness which also translates to national development. But the formal system, which is elitist, discriminatory, and instalment cannot alone provide all education one needs for self-fulfillment and national development. Despite the rich variety of natural resources in Nigeria, the country is still very much underdeveloped. Within and outside Nigeria, analysts are of the opinion that the country is bestowed with potentials to be prosperous. One wonder has Nigeria attempts without much success to pull itself out of the quagmire of underdevelopment, why has the country remained mired in poverty? This paper attempts to critique the role of adult education in developing learning cities and communities in Lagos State, Nigeria as postulated by UNESCO Institute for Lifelong Learning. This is done by critically examining the concepts of learning city and community, adult education, the objectives of adult education as provided in the National Policy on Education and sustainable development. The clientele and providers of adult education are examined. The contributions of the department of Adult Education, University of Lagos and Railway Training School are analysed in developing learning city through lesson learnt to make recommendations for improvement of adult education programmes in Nigeria to meet best practices of UNESCO Global Network of Learning Cities (GNLC).