Tag Archives: lifelong learning

Learning through movement: Physical education and lifelong learning in European learning cities

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Made Júnior Miranda, Professor of Physical Education at the State University of Goiás (UEG), Brazil, reflects on his experience as a visiting researcher at the UNESCO Institute for Lifelong Learning (UIL) in January 2026. Drawing on his work with UIL’s UNESCO Global Network of Learning Cities (GNLC) team, he explains how physical education, sport and urban spaces can support lifelong learning across the lifespan.

© Made Júnior Miranda

I have dedicated my research to understanding human development through cultural-historical activity theory (CHAT), inspired by researchers such as Lev S. Vygotsky, Aleksei N. Leontiev and Vasil V. Davydov. This theoretical framework understands human development not as a linear accumulation of knowledge, but as a social, historical and cultural process that unfolds through human interaction across the lifespan. This understanding aligns closely with the principles that guide the work of UIL and its concept of learning cities, which mobilize resources across sectors to promote inclusive and continuous learning opportunities for all.

My training in physical education, together with my experience as a teacher and researcher, has allowed me to observe how embodied practices, sport and physical activity can become meaningful learning experiences when deliberately organized. During my stay in Hamburg, Germany, a member of the UNESCO GNLC, this insight deepened. There, lifelong learning is not merely a guiding concept but a principle reflected in public policy, the use of urban spaces and everyday cultural practices.

This lifelong learning approach recognizes that people develop knowledge and competences in multiple contexts: at school, at work, in the community, in cultural spaces and through physical and sporting practices. This broader perspective expands the notion of education beyond formal settings and emphasizes experiences that foster personal, social and cultural development throughout life. During my time at UIL, this perspective was further enriched by my work with the GNLC team and by learning about several promising practices in selected European learning cities.

For example, in the municipality of Fundão, Portugal, the Memo Move project illustrates how lifelong learning can integrate movement, cognition and social participation, especially among older adults. The initiative is grounded in the understanding that human development neither ends in youth nor is confined to formal education. By promoting physical activities linked to cognitive stimulation and community engagement, the project creates non-formal learning opportunities that support autonomy, social inclusion and well-being, while using urban spaces as educational environments.

In Reșița, Romania, the strategy of becoming a learning city is closely linked to the transformation of urban space. The integration of sports infrastructure, green spaces and leisure facilities turns the territory into a mediator of social practices. Walking, running and cycling become part of everyday life as culturally valued activities associated with health, social involvement and continuous learning. In this context, urban space ceases to be a mere backdrop and becomes an active element in processes of human development.

In Valmiera, Latvia, sport plays a central role in community life. The city hosts a wide network of sports organizations, schools and clubs, offering more than 30 sports disciplines and regularly hosting events such as marathons and local competitions. In this setting, sport is not seen only as performance or competition but as a cultural practice that fosters learning, socialization, identity formation and intergenerational participation. This experience shows how non-formal practices can complement and enhance formal education goals, promoting health, social interaction and community cohesion.

These examples point to a significant convergence between cultural-historical activity theory and the holistic vision of lifelong learning advocated by UIL. In all cases, lifelong learning is understood as a social, situated and continuous process involving body, cognition, culture and participation. Learning cities demonstrate that urban policies can create the conditions for learning to become part of daily life, contributing to more inclusive, resilient and sustainable cities.

For countries such as Brazil, my home country, these experiences raise fundamental questions. One central challenge is how to shape urban environments as effective spaces for lifelong learning that also provide diverse opportunities for physical education and sport – not only for the privileged, but for all citizens. Addressing this challenge requires connecting resources and institutions, from schools, cultural centres and libraries to public spaces, leisure areas and sports facilities, so that they function as active components of an inclusive and continuous educational ecosystem. In such a system, learning is not reduced to physical fitness or competition, but instead supports broader lifelong learning outcomes, such as social interaction and inclusion, personal development and better mental well-being.

The challenge is not that sport is reserved for the wealthy, but that access to many opportunities remains unequal. Low-income families often face financial constraints, long working hours and limited leisure time, while many sporting opportunities are offered through private gyms, clubs and coaching services that cost money. Although public policies continue to play an essential role, they often lack the capacity to ensure equitable access. Inequalities are further reinforced by the uneven distribution of facilities, transportation costs, equipment expenses and regional disparities.

Schools remain one of the most important spaces for ensuring access, particularly for children. However, in many contexts, reduced curriculum time for physical education and cuts to school sports programmes risk weakening one of the few universal opportunities for young people to develop active lifestyles. Promoting lifelong learning through physical education therefore requires not only strong schools, but also communities and public policies that make participation accessible throughout life.

I hope these reflections will enrich the debate and foster new connections between research, practice and public policy in the field of physical education, helping Brazilian and other cities to develop into dynamic learning environments for all.

Learning cities as civic ecosystems: Culture, creativity and the conditions for lifelong learning

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Professor Rhiannon Jones, Chair of the UK Learning Cities Network and Head of Civic and Communities at the University of Derby, outlines how learning cities should be understood as civic ecosystems where learning happens everywhere – in culture, communities and everyday civic life – enabling more inclusive and meaningful lifelong learning beyond formal education.

© Designing Dialogue CIC, 2019

Across the UK and internationally, interest in learning cities continues to grow. Yet discussions about lifelong learning often remain tethered to formal education systems, institutions, qualifications, pathways and participation rates. While these matter, they only tell part of the story. Insights from a recent UK Learning Cities Network webinar on Civic, Culture and Lifelong Learning point to a broader understanding: learning cities as civic ecosystems, where learning is embedded in culture, community life and democratic participation rather than confined to classrooms.

For many people, learning does not begin or end in school. It unfolds through everyday participation in neighbourhoods, cultural spaces, community organizations and civic processes. These forms of learning build confidence, capability, voice and belonging, often creating the conditions for people to reconnect with learning on their own terms.

When learning cities are viewed as ecosystems, learning is recognized as something that can happen everywhere. It occurs in libraries, theatres, museums and cultural venues; through volunteering, mutual aid and grassroots organizing; and within civic practices such as citizens’ assemblies, festivals, participatory budgeting and public consultation. These forms of learning are often overlooked because they rarely lead to formal qualifications. Yet they are essential in helping people develop skills, relationships and civic agency grounded in lived experience.

Culture and civic practice are not add-ons to lifelong learning; they are foundational. This perspective is especially important for adults and communities least well served by traditional education systems. Cultural activity provides accessible, participatory routes into learning, while civic engagement offers real-world contexts where learning is applied and owned. In Belfast, a UNESCO Learning City, initiatives such as the Bank of Ideas illustrate this approach. By inviting residents to contribute ideas for the city’s future, the process becomes a learning experience, developing skills in dialogue, collaboration, imagination and democratic participation.

Similarly, Derby’s UNESCO Learning City agenda includes the Derby Promise and Dream Fest, demonstrating how cultural activity can be embedded in civic learning infrastructures. These initiatives bring creative opportunities to children and young people, including performances and exposure to careers in the arts. Learning emerges through experience, storytelling and participation rather than instruction alone.

Across these examples, creativity plays a distinctive role, not simply as an outcome of learning, but as a method. When embedded intentionally, creativity enables experimentation, supports collaboration across sectors and builds shared ownership among civic, cultural and educational partners. Designing Dialogue CIC, through the Social Higher Education Depot (S.H.E.D.), co-designs place-based projects using arts-based methods to connect communities and civic partners, fostering agency and creativity. Likewise, the University of Derby’s CivicLAB and the Civic Hub create environments for collaborative thinking about place and change, shaping strategy and public engagement through active learning approaches.

The Centre for Cultural Ecologies in Art, Design and Architecture (CEADA) at the University of Huddersfield further exemplifies this ecosystem approach. Focusing on Kirklees, a UNESCO Learning City in West Yorkshire, CEADA explores how cultural ecologies shape place through community engagement, public pedagogy and creative methods. Its work emphasizes that culture and lifelong learning function as infrastructure rather than optional extras: they shape how people live, connect and learn.

Learning cities can challenge hierarchical ideas of expertise by valuing lived experience, emotion and imagination alongside formal knowledge. Learning flourishes where civic and cultural infrastructures are recognized as essential assets, where partnerships span sectors, and where creativity sits at the heart of inclusive systems.

These insights align with UNESCO’s learning cities framework. Rather than prescribing models, UK Learning Cities offer transferable lessons. Cities globally are encouraged to broaden their understanding of where learning happens, to value civic and cultural practice as vital infrastructures, and to support lifelong learning as something people live, not simply access.

The opportunity now is to reimagine learning as a shared civic practice, one that recognizes, resources and champions the spaces where people learn every day.

Reading beyond numbers: Literacy education and assessment in the Republic of Korea

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UIL Visiting Researcher Soyoun Park, Professor in the College of Liberal Arts at Anyang University, Republic of Korea, shares insights from her experience developing, implementing and evaluating the Korean Adult Literacy Survey (KALS) as part of a small research team since 2013.

© National Institute for Lifelong Education (NILE)

The Republic of Korea is frequently introduced as a high-literacy country, supported by strong international assessment results, near-universal school enrolment and rapid digital adoption. These indicators are important, yet they tell only part of the story. Literacy is not experienced equally across the population, nor is it shaped by schooling alone.

The real story of literacy lies beyond the numbers. It is shaped by history, inequality, ageing and the evolving meaning of what it means to be literate in everyday life. In an ageing society marked by historical disruption and socioeconomic inequality, literacy reflects lived experience, social participation and access to learning opportunities across the life course. Understanding literacy in the Republic of Korea therefore requires moving beyond performance rankings. It requires attention to who benefits from educational success, who remains excluded and how literacy functions in everyday civic, social and digital life.

The Republic of Korea’s literacy landscape is deeply rooted in its modern history. Many older adults lived through Japanese colonial rule, the Korean War and rapid industrialization, often with limited or interrupted access to formal education. These experiences continue to shape literacy levels among today’s older population.

At the same time, the Republic of Korea has entered a super-aged society, with more than 20 per cent of its population aged 65 or older. This demographic shift intersects with urban concentration, digital transformation and expanding cultural content. As a result, literacy policy must simultaneously address historical educational deprivation and new demands for digital and social participation.

In response to these challenges, the Republic of Korea has developed an integrated adult literacy system that links education, assessment and governance. Since 2006, national programmes have supported adults with low educational attainment through tailored curricula in basic literacy and, more recently, digital literacy. By 2023, approximately 720,000 adults had participated in these programmes, reflecting sustained public investment in literacy as a social responsibility and recognizing it as a human right.

Assessment plays a particularly distinctive role. Adult learners can obtain formal academic recognition equivalent to primary or lower secondary education through portfolio-based evaluation. This approach values learning accumulated through formal, non-formal and informal contexts and reinforces the idea that literacy development continues throughout life rather than ending with schooling. A portfolio-based approach also acknowledges that some adults may prefer not to sit an exam, as it may remind them of past negative experiences.

The Republic of Korea’s commitment to evidence-based policy is reflected in its national adult literacy surveys. The Korean Adult Literacy Survey (KALS), conducted every three years since 2014, relies on direct performance-based assessment rather than self-reported skills. This approach allows for a more precise understanding of literacy levels and how they change over time.

Survey results show gradual improvement in overall literacy levels between 2014 and 2023, alongside a declining proportion of adults at the lowest levels. However, persistent disparities remain. Older adults – particularly those over 70 with low household income – continue to face the greatest risk of low literacy.

Despite their age, they need literacy skills, for example to navigate an increasingly digital society. Beyond demographic factors, social participation, life satisfaction and political interest are strongly associated with literacy outcomes, highlighting literacy’s role in social inclusion and civic engagement.

Looking ahead, the Republic of Korea’s literacy agenda requires a shift in perspective. Rather than focusing solely on headline indicators, there is a need to interpret literacy data more deeply, compare findings across national and international frameworks such as the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) Survey of Adult Skills (PIAAC), and broaden the concept of literacy itself. This means asking how literacy relates to lived experience, how different assessment systems illuminate different dimensions of competence, and how emerging forms of digital and social participation reshape what it means to be literate.

The Republic of Korea’s experience demonstrates that numbers are essential starting points, but not endpoints. Literacy gains meaning only when quantitative evidence is read alongside historical context, social inequality and life-course perspectives. Reading beyond the numbers allows literacy to be understood not merely as a measurable outcome, but as a foundation for dignity, participation and lifelong learning.

Upholding the right to education in a transforming world: Reflections from the outgoing Chair of UIL’s Governing Board

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As his term as Chair of the UIL Governing Board comes to a close, Daniel Baril reflects on the strategic priorities, achievements and enduring challenges that have shaped his tenure.

© UNESCO Institute for Lifelong Learning

Last 1 January marked the end of my term as Chair of the Governing Board of the UNESCO Institute for Lifelong Learning (UIL). It was an honour to chair an institute that holds a unique place within the UNESCO system.

Since its founding in 1952, UIL has provided recognized intellectual leadership to UNESCO Member States and to the international adult education community. It helps shape both reflection and action on lifelong learning, while carrying a vital responsibility: defending and advancing the right to adult education. Serving as Chair of its Governing Board, therefore, comes with both an opportunity – and a duty – to keep this mandate alive in today’s context.

My term, which began in January 2020, unfolded amid a period of rapid transformation in the education landscape. Throughout it, I sought – within my means – to promote two perspectives that I considered strategic.

The first concerns the profound evolution of lifelong learning realities. Ways of learning are diversifying under the combined influence of digital technologies and artificial intelligence. At the same time, learning design now offers a broad spectrum of modalities – face-to-face, online, hybrid and blended – and an expanding range of formats, from microlearning to full-length programmes. Practices are also evolving: self-directed learning, peer learning, learning communities, recognition of prior learning, and more. In this context, I considered it essential that UIL embrace these developments as broadly as possible to remain closely aligned with lived realities and with the futures of adult learning.

The second perspective lies at the heart of UIL’s historic mission: the defence of the right to education. A striking paradox defines our era. On the one hand, we now have an unprecedented array of educational resources, pedagogical approaches and technological capacities that could, in principle, meet everyone’s learning needs. On the other hand, dramatic inequalities persist – whether in access, quality, continuity of learning pathways or recognition of learning. I therefore made it a point, whenever the opportunity arose, to reaffirm a simple requirement: educational resources should serve to strengthen the effective conditions for exercising the right to education – not the other way around.

Certain milestones stood out as defining moments of this term. The Seventh International Conference on Adult Education (CONFINTEA VII), held in 2022, was one of them. Through my participation in the conference’s organizing committee and my role as Chair of the drafting committee for its final declaration, I was able to support a broad vision of adult learning and education – one that expands the educational capacity that people can mobilize to make the right to adult education real. In this same spirit, the emphasis placed on financing in the Marrakech Framework for Action, as well as the open approach to expanding the domains of learning, clearly reflect these concerns.

At the end of these years, I take one thing above all: serving as Chair and spokesperson for UIL’s leadership in promoting an ambitious understanding of lifelong learning – rooted in the implementation of the right to education – was an honour.

But chairing UIL also means grasping how fragile the resources are that sustain such an essential mission. A competent and committed team cannot support Member States in implementing lifelong learning policies without adequate financial means. I leave this term with a clear sense of a persistent tension: that of a fundamental mission, carried forward with conviction, confronted with limited resources that too often impose difficult trade-offs.

The evolving right to education in the age of generative AI

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In his October 2025 address at the Shanghai Open University 2025 International Conference on Digital Lifelong Learning, Daniel Baril, Chair of the UNESCO Institute for Lifelong Learning Governing Board, explored how generative artificial intelligence (AI) and digital technology are fundamentally transforming education – and why this necessitates an updated framework for the right to education. This blog summarizes his remarks.

© Shutterstock_SvetaZI

What has changed

Generative AI has moved rapidly from the periphery to the centre of educational practice in just two years. While public education systems continue to pilot these technologies cautiously, well-funded private edtech companies and AI vendors are advancing quickly, creating pressures around speed, personalization and scale that challenge public institutions.

Two critical developments merit attention. First, AI-assisted self-regulated learning is becoming widespread among adults. Recent research shows that approximately 10 per cent of adults globally use ChatGPT, with 49 per cent of interactions focused on learning activities, including tutoring, creative development, health and cooking. This represents a significant shift towards self-directed learning enabled by generative AI.

Second, a ‘replacement phenomenon’ is emerging, as general-purpose AI platforms absorb functions previously performed by specialized edtech companies. Major AI firms – Anthropic, OpenAI and Google – have launched educational services, blurring the boundaries between AI platforms and edtech. This convergence threatens to reshape market dynamics and governance structures, potentially disrupting both traditional education systems and the edtech sector itself.

The trajectory is moving from episodic, provider-led instruction to blended, conversational, multimodal learning environments accessible anytime, anywhere –offering unprecedented opportunities to realize the ideals of lifelong learning.

Emerging learning technologies

Three transformative technologies are reshaping education:

  • Intelligent virtual assistants now function as always-on tutors and coaches, providing immediate access to knowledge, scaffolded help, and adaptive support across topics and languages.
  • Modern learning management systems now incorporate AI to automate content curation, infer learners’ skills, adapt learning pathways and deliver personalized feedback at scale.
  • AI-generated immersive content enables the creation of lessons, assessments and augmented/virtual reality simulations from simple prompts – lowering production barriers and enabling safe, repeatable practice experiences.

Together, these technologies expand access, enable real-time personalization and support authentic learning at scale. However, they also shift the cognitive and social dimensions of learning, placing greater emphasis on metacognition and AI literacy, as learners increasingly ‘converse with knowledge’. In this context, educators are moving towards coaching and facilitation roles while safeguarding inclusion and educational integrity.

In this rapidly shifting landscape, generative AI has come to the forefront of learning, reshaping how adults direct their own learning and how emerging technologies redefine teaching, personalization and the broader edtech ecosystem. These transformations invite a renewed reflection on how best to effectively deliver the right to education.

A right to education for the generative AI age

UNESCO’s 2021 initiative to evolve the right to education responds to the realities of the twenty-first century. Digitalization has expanded access to learning while exposing vulnerabilities in connectivity, accessibility, data protection and linguistic diversity. The initiative aims to extend the right to education across all ages and learning settings, operationalize the traditional ‘4 As’ (availability, accessibility, acceptability, adaptability) in digital contexts, and introduce accountability as a fifth principle.

Current policy debates focus on enshrining learning continuity, recognizing and validating all forms of learning, treating connectivity and digital devices as guaranteed common goods, embedding digital safeguards, ensuring digital literacy, clarifying rights around adult reskilling, regulating digital provision and protecting vulnerable populations.

The COVID-19 pandemic accelerated digital transformation dramatically. By October 2020, 1.6 billion learners had been displaced and 90 per cent of countries had adopted some form of online instruction. This pivot revealed deep inequalities in access to devices and connectivity, particularly in sub-Saharan Africa, rural areas and among marginalized populations.

Generative AI amplifies the urgency of these challenges. As AI firms increasingly take on the role of education service providers, questions arise about privatization, standards, accountability and the public interest. Safeguarding the right to education demands policy frameworks that promote equity, quality, protection and learner autonomy.

Conclusion

Realizing the promise of AI in education requires intentional design and public governance. Without these, risks include opacity, exclusion and default privatization. To counter this, we must advocate for public AI infrastructure – public algorithms, datasets and learning platforms – to ensure inclusive, equitable and quality learning opportunities throughout life.

The goal is ‘co-intelligence’, combining the best of artificial intelligence capabilities with the best of human intelligence, guided by a rights-based public mission to achieve UNESCO’s vision of lifelong learning for all, as set out in Sustainable Development Goal 4.

Climate champions: How young people are nurturing lifelong learning for climate action

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Young people are playing a crucial role in promoting lifelong learning for climate action, writes UNESCO Institute for Lifelong Learning (UIL) greening communities consultant Katie Jones. Their importance as change agents in various initiatives should be recognized and shows how critical it is that they are fully engaged in efforts to build sustainable communities.

Shutterstock_Jacob Lund.jpg

As a young woman who has been championing the role of Education for Sustainable Development (ESD) in addressing the climate crisis at both the policy and practice level, I am convinced of the transformative power of inclusive learning opportunities for promoting climate action. I am pleased to have been witness to countless initiatives that clearly demonstrate how young people, in particular, are well-placed to act as powerful agents of change, fostering climate learning in a range of spaces – from classrooms to local festivals. We are, and will continue to be, disproportionately affected by the consequences of the climate crisis, inheriting a host of sustainability challenges in our communities. From increasingly extreme weather events to health hazards associated with climate change, we will face a wide variety of difficulties for years to come – at a time when we are witnessing the largest youth generation in history, according to the UN.

Lifelong learning (LLL) is increasingly viewed as a key component of our global mission to tackle the climate crisis and build regenerative communities. This was highlighted at the United Nations (UN) Climate Change Conference (COP 29) last year through the Baku Initiative on Human Development for Climate Resilience – a global commitment aimed at advancing human development and strengthening climate resilience through education and learning. The initiative notes that ‘education is a key enabler for innovative solutions to climate change by ensuring that people are empowered with the knowledge, skills, values and attitudes needed to act as agents of change’ (p. 2). In local communities worldwide, we as young change agents are both promoting and benefiting from inclusive LLL opportunities that foster climate action.

As the UN notes, we are ‘valuable contributors to climate action’. Our creativity, drive and passion for addressing global challenges as lifelong learners are ensuring that we, the youth, are at the forefront of many efforts to fight climate change. This is reflected in our engagement in awareness-raising campaigns, local decision-making structures and non-formal learning programmes.

Across the globe, structures are in place to support us in our efforts as agents of change working towards a greener society. Examples include the UNESCO Youth Climate Action Network, the World Organization of the Scout Movement’s emphasis on protecting the environment and the Youth and United Nations Global Alliance (YUNGA).

In addition to these, inspiring initiatives have been established to equip specific sub-groups of youth to act as changemakers in their communities. For example, the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) and partners, including UIL, organized a summer camp to equip young educators to confidently teach climate change education in the context of COP 29. Meanwhile, members of the UNESCO Global Network of Learning Cities (GNLC) are advancing tailored efforts to work with us young people to promote LLL for climate action.

Ahead of the Sixth International Conference on Learning Cities (ICLC 6), hosted in Jubail, Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, in December 2024, UIL organized a youth forum. This brought together young changemakers and local government officials from across the globe to explore topics related to LLL for climate action. I was very pleased to have taken part in this event, during which a series of recommendations were made on working with youth to advance awareness-raising campaigns, address climate anxiety and develop inclusive decision-making processes. I was particularly struck by the energy, enthusiasm and commitment of the young representatives participating, as well as by the concrete actions they were already taking in cities worldwide to promote climate action among individuals of all ages. Potential ways forward shared by participants were both creative and innovative, but also rooted in local realities, while demonstrating a clear awareness of key challenges we continue to face.

Recommendations from the youth forum were reflected in the ICLC 6 outcome document, the Jubail Commitment to Climate Action in Learning Cities. This calls for young people to be given ‘spaces and funding for youth-led projects, networks and climate advocacy initiatives’ (p. 3). I firmly believe that such spaces have great scope to help in addressing issues like climate anxiety, by providing arenas for solidarity, exchanging on common concerns and co-creating constructive, action-oriented solutions. It is also worth mentioning that the Jubail Commitment recommends fostering learning opportunities that harness new technologies and align with the communication styles of younger generations – something that is key to engaging with diverse youth groups in communities worldwide.

While working with youth as change agents presents many opportunities, there are also risks. One is the risk of tokenism, whereby collaborating with younger generations is treated as a ‘tick box to be checked’ (p. 7). As a young person myself, I find tokenistic approaches not only frustrating, but also potentially demotivating, in some instances. Consistently involving us young people in decision-making processes, giving us the tools to set up our own climate learning programmes and truly recognizing our value as changemakers are key to avoiding this. We have a lot to bring to the table – including creative, innovative strategies that integrate digital technologies to pragmatic solutions to make climate action more inclusive. In this sense, establishing youth climate councils or youth forums can also be fruitful.

It is also important to avoid placing the entire burden of fostering LLL for climate action on us young people, which could potentially stoke climate anxiety. Intergenerational learning opportunities that engage older learners, younger learners and everyone in between can help to distribute responsibility more fairly.

Finally, in some communities, certain sub-groups of youth may face barriers to accessing climate learning opportunities. Empowering young people from diverse backgrounds to drive LLL for climate action is not just beneficial – it is essential. By implementing targeted outreach strategies, interactive workshops and dynamic learning programmes, we can transform this vision into reality.

Partnering with us as catalysts for change can help to ensure that LLL for climate action is deeply embedded in society. There is a need to act now – the sooner we can all work together effectively through a systemic approach, the sooner our individual actions will add up to drive forward cohesive climate action. By acting swiftly, we increase our chances of saving our oceans, forests, biodiversity, and the ecosystems that depend on them. Equipping us with the knowledge and skills to lead the way will not only strengthen our competencies but also lay the foundation for more sustainable, resilient communities in which we can all work collaboratively to build a regenerative future together.

Education across borders: Seventy years of the International Review of Education

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As the UNESCO Institute for Lifelong Learning (UIL) launches an online exhibition to celebrate 70 years of continuous publication of the International Review of Education (IRE), editor Paul Stanistreet considers the significance of the anniversary and explains how UIL plans to mark it

Fifty years ago this month, in March 1955, the UNESCO Institute for Education (UIE) published the first issue of a new journal, the International Review of Education.

Founded in Hamburg in 1952, UIE, under the directorship of Walther Merck, Professor of Comparative Education at the University of Hamburg, was mandated to “establish contacts between educators in Germany and other countries … without prejudice arising from national, racial or cultural differences” and “to participate in the work of UNESCO … to maintain peace in the world and to carry out educational programmes for international understanding”.

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Third places: Where democracy and inclusion come to life

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UIL Library volunteer Josefine Sandwall reflects on the importance of ‘third places’, drawing from her personal experience as a ‘book’ in a Living Library.

© SeventyFour/Shutterstock.com

Human connection is at the heart of our lives and societies. Being part of an inclusive community – where we engage with diverse perspectives – shapes not just who we are as individuals, but also how we see the world. It influences our values, beliefs, and even political opinions. When nurtured in a democratic space, these connections help build a more inclusive world.

‘Third places’ help to facilitate this process. These spaces create opportunities for social interaction, open dialogue, and meaningful participation in democratic discussions and events. In an age of social isolation and digital polarization, they allow for face-to-face interaction, breaking down stereotypes and assumptions.

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A right to education for all: Unlocking potential behind bars

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As we mark International Day of Education, Daniel Baril looks back at the Montreal International Conference on Education in Prison, held last October, which presented an inspiring vision for the future of prison education. Drawing on his closing remarks, he emphasizes the profound ways in which prison education upholds the universal right to education, ensuring inclusivity for all.

© Thai Department of Correction

Education in prison is not merely a tool for social rehabilitation but a fundamental human right. At the Montreal International Conference on Education in Prison, this central message resonated as speakers emphasized the necessity of recognizing incarcerated people as rightful holders of this right. Access to education in the prison environment, often characterized by exclusion, must be re-examined through this human-rights lens.

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Playful learning and joint action: New methods in climate education in Hamburg

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In the second of our series of posts on lifelong learning and climate action, published to coincide with the Sixth International Conference on Learning Cities, Jürgen Forkel-Schubert explains how the learning city of Hamburg is rising to the climate-change challenge

© Markus Scholz, City of Hamburg

As a major port city in the north of Germany, Hamburg is confronted with the harsh realities of climate change. Rising sea levels and the increasing frequency of extreme weather events have prompted Hamburg to take administrative and technical measures to mitigate the effects of climate change and support greater climate adaptation.

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