Research On "Adultification" Of American Higher Education

The ratio of the non-traditional school-aged students is getting larger and larger than the traditional ones'in colleges and universities in recent years----many adults who are older than 30 years study in higher schools now. Professor Pagenon named the phenomenon Adultification in 1993. There are no monographs or essays discussing this theme in China. But some scholars have noticed such a tendency which is similar to that in the USA. It certainly will make some differences in many aspects, such as the ways of school entrance, the methods of study, the arrangements of the curriculum, the choices of teaching material and the authentication of the degree and so on.There are five parts in the essay: The history of American Higher Education Adultification is analyzed in Partâ… . Some related American laws, bills, plans and so on are expounded and discussed in the order of time to display the promotion of the Adultification. The correlative data proved that the rate of the increase of the non-traditional students and part-time ones in the history of American higher education. And the general introduction of the phenomenon in USA is also made in this part.The contributing factors of the American higher education adultification are analyzed in Partâ…¡. The social background of the revolutions, such as politics, economy, science and technology and population and so on, are the external elements while the internal ones are the foundation of the new types of the higher-educational organizations, the setup of the practical subjects of the American Higher Education Adultification.The characteristics are dissected in Partâ…¢. Adultification is not only concerned in community colleges, but also in others types of schools. For example, the research schools and the comprehensive universities. The characteristics including the large-scaled age-groups and distributions mainly in the engineering courses and the coexisting of both formal schooling and informal schools and others, play an important role in American higher education.The affections of the Higher Education Adultification are analyzed in Partâ…£. How to solve different kinds of contradictions in Adultification is mainly talked about in this part, too.Partâ…¤is the enlightenment. China tries to learn from American higher education adultification. For example, to quicken China's lifelong learning system and the establishment of related laws; to admit the identity of the credits and diplomas between adults colleges and ordinary colleges gradually, to change the unconcerned attitude towards continuing education, to encourage non-traditional (adult) students to further their study in universities and to pay more attention on the diversity of China's higher education to intensity social service etc.