Page 198 - Homo senescens II: izbrane teme

Ana Krajnc

Rutar Ilc, Z. 2018. »V senci: mladi v stiski in osip.« Vzgoja in izobraževanje 49 (5):
3–4.

The Importance of Social Climate and Fluctuation in Older Adults’
Education
Older students are highly motivated. They also possess an outstanding need
for a primary social group and positive social climate. Study groups can and
should compensate for their social exclusion after retirement. In the education
ofolderadultstherearepracticallynodropouts.Atthebeginningofstudyyear,
students search for and find study groups appropriate for them. When that
happens, elder students may stay with the Third Age University for the next 20
or more years. There is a relatively high fluctuation of students at the begin-
ning of the study year. The self-initiative of individual students in fluctuating
from one study group to another guarantees higher efficiency and quality of
learning in the study group, and better interpersonal relations, which fulfils the
socioemotional needs of the students. The network of Third Age universities
in Slovenia carried out research in 2015 in which we empirically tested our hy-
potheses about the goals of older adult education, dropout, social climate and
fluctuation. The basic hypotheses were confirmed, which proved the validity
of our previous observations.
Keywords: third age university, social climate, social group, learning group,
dropout in education of older adults, self-initiative

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