Adult Education and Counseling: An Emerging Synthesis

Adult education and counseling are needed facilitative and helping functions for a nation growing older. The current challenge seems to be to make counseling and educational services more widely available to people of all ages. Fulfilling adult needs and helping them adjust to new life circumstances will stretch the counseling system far beyond its traditional settings in schools and public service agencies. Present trends highlight the need for accessible, even convenient, resources for stimulating lifelong learning, adjustment to change, and personal development. In fact, the need structure of most adults seems to be weighted far more heavily in the direction of developmental counseling and learning more effective ways to fulfill their needs. Opportunities for adult education, career planning and assessment, and counseling services head the list of needed resources.