Scientific literacy corresponds to a process of knowledge construction that may help the individual to read the world where they live, so that they decide and participate actively and responsibly in the problems of their surroundings with the awareness of having the ability to transform society. This process is essential for the formation of citizens, especially when it comes to cases in which the public is from Youth and Adults Education (EJA). Among the current relevant topics to the scientific literacy of these individuals, there are those related to genetics. Thus, an investigation was carried out on how the EJA has contributed to the scientific literacy of youngsters and adults, concerning to genetics in a school of Aracaju, SE. Aiming to achieve this goal, a research of qualitative and quantitative nature was accomplished in the form of field study in a school in Aracaju. The following was used as data collection instruments: a questionnaire administered to students in the form of pre and post-test, the simple observations of Genetics lessons and a semi-structured interview with the Biology teacher. Data were analyzed in the light of the three dimensions of scientific literacy proposed by Miller (1983). The results point the classes have positive contributions, mainly towards to the understanding of key concepts of genetics, the concept of a scientist and the empowerment of students. In contrast, the compression of the content and the absence of inclusion of a broader and more problematic perspective of Genetics may not have contributed to the students understanding of other important concepts for scientific literacy. Moreover, they were gave no opportunity to better understand the impacts of Genetics in society. / A alfabetização científica corresponde a um processo de construção de conhecimentos que facilitaria ao indivíduo fazer uma leitura do mundo onde vive, decidindo e participando de forma ativa e responsável na solução dos problemas do seu cotidiano com a consciência da importância da sua atuação na transformação da sociedade. Esse processo é de fundamental importância para a formação do cidadão, sendo ainda mais imprescindível no caso do público da Educação de Jovens e Adultos. Entre as temáticas atuais relevantes para a alfabetização científica desses indivíduos, estão aquelas ligadas à Genética. A partir disso, buscou-se investigar como a EJA tem contribuído para a alfabetização científica dos jovens e adultos em relação à Genética em uma escola de Aracaju, SE. Visando atingir esse objetivo, fez-se uma pesquisa de natureza quali-quantitativa, na forma de estudo de campo, em uma escola de Aracaju, utilizando-se como instrumentos de coleta: um questionário aplicado aos alunos na forma de pré e pós-teste, observações simples das aulas de Genética e uma entrevista semi-estruturada com a professora de Biologia da turma. Os dados foram analisados a partir das três dimensões da alfabetização científica proposta por Miller (1983). Os resultados mostraram que as aulas apresentam contribuições positivas em relação, principalmente, à compreensão de conceitos-chave de Genética, à concepção de cientista e ao empoderamento dos alunos. Em contrapartida, a compactação dos conteúdos e a falta de inserção de uma problematização sobre as implicações dos avanços do conhecimento científico nessa área da Ciência, podem não ter contribuído para a compreensão dos alunos de outros conceitos importantes para a alfabetização científica, bem como, não deram oportunidade de que estes entendessem melhor os impactos da Genética na sociedade.

This research project offers an analysis of the Adult Basic Education and Training Directorate in the Eastern Cape Province. The Bush Models are described and critiqued and then used as a tool for analysis. Other organisational models are described and used to add depth to the analysis. The choice of analysing the Adult Basic Education and Training Directorate comes both from a professional desire to know and understand this organisation more fully, as well as the importance of stressing that the definition of education organisations does not stop at school, colleges and universities, but includes the government bodies which are a key part of the sector. This assignment therefore explores both the features of a government department as well as the appropriateness of using Bush’s models in this context and draws on other organisational theory--Introduction.

This study sought to examine the relationships that young set with thematic education and work, from the experience of participating in the Urban ProJovem in the city of Aracaju, seeking to capture the social representations for them as built as, highlighting the open possibilities for the expansion of rights and citizenship program participants. Seeking endorse our analyzes weave a dialogue with the theoretical categories: Education, Labor, Qualification, Gender, and Youth. In the case of a public policy of social inclusion based on drug education training and civic education, we are interested in knowing if there is a respect for diversity of your target audience and the recognition that youths experience inequalities members and as such, public policy developed should help to deal with this unequal context. With this intent we favor the development of a quantitative and qualitative study as a methodological option, aiming to capture a volume of information face to face with the public participating in the program, we conducted semistructured interviews with alumni educators the coordinator of the school and the program at the time of its completion. The data analysis allowed us to conclude that despite the innovative proposal in this program, the social representations by young show that basic training and qualifications offered have contradictions that impact on the re/ construction of professional trajectories of so young equitable. / Este estudo pretendeu analisar as relações que os/as jovens estabelecem com as temáticas educação e trabalho, a partir da experiência de participação no ProJovem Urbano realizado na cidade de Aracaju, buscando captar as representações sociais por eles/as construídos/as, com destaque as possibilidades abertas para a ampliação dos direitos e da cidadania dos participantes do programa. Buscando referendar as nossas análises tecemos um diálogo com as categorias teóricas: Educação, Trabalho, Qualificação, Gênero, e Juventudes. Em se tratando de uma política pública de inclusão social baseada na tríade educação/qualificação e formação cidadã, nos interessamos por saber se há um respeito às diversidades do seu público alvo e o reconhecimento de que as juventudes integrantes vivenciam desigualdades e como tal, a política pública desenvolvida deve contribuir para o enfrentamento desse contexto desigual. Com esse intento privilegiamos o desenvolvimento de um estudo quanti-qualitativo como opção metodológica, visando captar um volume de informações face a face com o público participante do programa, realizamos entrevistas semiestruturadas com alunos/as, educadores/as, coordenador da escola e do programa na época de sua realização. A análise dos dados nos permitiu concluir que apesar da proposta inovadora presente no programa, as representações sociais construídas pelos/as jovens revelam que a formação básica e a qualificação ofertada apresentam contradições que impactam na re/construção das trajetórias profissionais dos/as jovens de maneira equânime.

Esta tese tem como objetivo investigar o alcance e a influência da política de leitura destinada às pessoas jovens e adultas a partir do acervo do Programa Nacional Biblioteca da Escola (PNBE), a fim de compreender como se dá a experiência de ler, a formação de novos leitores e do gosto pela leitura. Se estrutura a partir de três eixos temáticos de reflexão: a experiência de ler, o ciclo de política (Apêndice 2) educativa de leitura literária e a biblioteca da escola, em um momento histórico em que a Educação de Jovens e Adultos (EJA) passou a ser uma das modalidade de ensino da Educação Básica. Os dados empíricos foram construídos por intermédio de pesquisa-ação, desenvolvida com a participação livre de alunos de turmas da EJA de uma escola de Ensino Fundamental, localizada em Caxias do Sul, cidade de porte médio do interior do Rio Grande do Sul. A escolha da metodologia pesquisa-ação tem o propósito de dar ao pesquisador e ao grupo de participantes os meios para enfrentar o problema de pesquisa na relação com o quadro de referência teórica e de análise das situações dos participantes. Os acervos literários do PBNE enviados a todas as escolas públicas do País, que respondem anualmente o Senso Escolar, são tomados como ponto de partida para a análise do ciclo de política educativa de leitura. Apresenta sustentação teórica de que o leitor é quem comanda a leitura e não o livro, a necessidade da mediação para a formação do leitor e a leitura no ambiente escolar, comandada pelo currículo, exige da biblioteca escolar atividades voltadas aos conteúdos, situação que interfere diretamente na leitura de fruição e na formação do leitor de literatura. Os achados de campo, construídos pela pesquisa-ação, são analisados e interpretados, de forma interdisciplinar, pela contribuição teórica de Ball (2011, 2013), Manguel (1997, 2006), Thiollent (2011), Chartier (1996, 2001), Ramos (2013), Darnton (1986, 2010). A presente investigação decorre da convicção de que as Ciências Humanas e da Educação estão por inerência num eixo de tensão entre as teorias e as práticas e umas mobilizam e desencadeiam as outras, fazendo avançar o conhecimento. Por isso é apresentada uma proposta - uma contribuição à história de leitura e à política pública de leitura - que articula conhecimentos teóricos e práticos, para responder ao desafio atual do incentivo à cultura letrada no País. Os resultados mostram que a história de leitura é a história de cada um de seus leitores. A prática de envio de livros literários às escolas é antiga, e desvinculada de projetos de mediação, produz baixo impacto na experiência de leitura. As funções da biblioteca escolar ainda se associam às demandas do currículo, as quais se mantêm distantes da leitura de fruição. No entanto, a experiência de ler, pode mudar o percurso da autoformação da pessoa. / This doctoral dissertation aims at investigating what is the extent and influence of the reading policy destined to young people and adults from the Collections of the National Program Libraries in School (Acervos do Programa Nacional Biblioteca da Escola – PNBE), in order to understand how the reading experience takes place, how new readers are formed and how taste for reading takes place. The study is structured on three thematic lines of thought: the reading experience, the cycle of the educational policy for literary reading, and the school library in a historical moment in which Education for Young Adults and Adults (Educação de Jovens e Adultos – EJA) became a teaching modality in Basic Education. Empiric data were built by means of an action research, developed with free participation of students from EJA groups at an Elementary school, located in Caxias do Sul, an average-sized city in the hinterland of Rio Grande do Sul. Choosing action research as the methodology has the purpose of giving the researcher and the group of participants the means to face the research problem in the relationship with the theoretical references and the analysis of the participants’ situations. Literary collections of the PBNE sent to public schools in the country who answer the Senso Escolar (School Survey) annually are taken as the start point for the analysis of the cycle of reading educational policy. It is theoretically supported with the reader being the one who commands the reading and not the book, the need for mediation to form the reader, and reading in the school environment commanded by the syllabus, which requires school library to have activities aimed at the syllabus, a situation that interferes directly on reading for pleasure and forming a reader for literature. The evidence found – and built by action-research, is analyzed and interpreted interdisciplinarily, from theoretical contributions by Ball (2011, 2013), Manguel (1997, 2006), Thiollent (2011), Chartier (1996, 2001), Ramos (2013), and Darnton (1986, 2010). This investigation has its origin in the conviction that Human Sciences and Education are by virtue on a stress axis between theories and practices and one mobilizes and unleashes the other, causing knowledge to advance. That is why a proposal is presented – a contribution to reading history and public policies on reading – which articulates theoretical and practical knowledge, as a reply to current challenges towards incentive of literate culture in the country. The results show that reading history is the history of each reader. Practice of sending literary books to school is an old one and, not connected with mediation projects, it is potential reading, which produces low impact on the experience of reading. School library functions are still associated with demands of the syllabus, which are far away from reading for pleasure. However, the experience of reading changes the person’s self-development path.

Summary in English. / When considering their dropout, many described experiences of being a misfit, or feeling uncomfortable with discourse practices in which they were expected to engage. Some had logistical difficulties in attending, such as transport or small children, but even greater than these was the fact that they had been disappointed. These learners believe the "literacy myth" that literacy, as a set of skills one can acquire, will result in significant improvements in one's life. They also equate literacy with education, and although they experience none of the benefits that are supposed to accrue to the literate, they continue to say that they believe in its power. However, in practice, attendance at adult centres is relatively poor in comparison with numbers of potential students, those termed "illiterate." It may be deduced that adult "illiterates" regard literacy as some kind of "saviour", a panacea for all ills. Even if it is not directly accessed, the fact of its existence and the notion of its power is enough to provide hope for a better future and comfort in hard times.

The study aimed at investigating the role played by ABET programmes in the development of rural black women in the Omusati Region. The study was to determine whether the ABET programmes that are provided in the area are offering relevant education that helps the women of the area in their development. The research findings indicated that the ABET programmes offered are not providing the relevant skills needed to develop the women participants. The programmes that are offered concentrate on literacy and numeracy, and it seem not to be very effective in making a difference to the women's lives. Women needs skills that can help them generate income to improve their living conditions. The study, in summary, established that the programmes offered by the ABET centres would be more effective if skills training is included to uplift and improve the lives of the participants on a social, economical as well as educational level. / Agriculture, Animal Health and Human Ecology / M. Tech. (Human Resource Development)

This study investigated the physical affective, cognitive and volitional problems of the learner in adult basic education (ABE) with reference to the learner's relationship towards the tutor, the learning content, the self, and family and friends. The research design provided for a literature study of ABE in South Africa, as well as the personhood and relationships of the ABE learner. This was done to arrive at a research hypothesis concerning the relative impact of various categories of problems on the ABE learner. The empirical summary had both quantitative and qualitative components. It was found that ABE learners are influenced by the following factors, listed in order of impact: affective problems; cognitive problems; problems related to the learning content, physical problems and problems related to family and friends. Positive fmdings were that volitional problems and problems related to tutors were relatively less significant. In its recommendations the study emphasises the crucial role of, and need for professionally trained adult basic educators who can deal effectively with the personal and contextual problems of ABE learners. Moreover, the typical perseverance of ABE learners demands the establishment of excellent and responsive infrastructure for ABE provision, inter alia in provincial education departments. / Psychology of Education / M. Ed. (Psychology of Education)

The Botswana National Literacy Programme (BNLP) was officially launched in 1981 as a major adult literacy initiative. Literacy was in this case defined as reading, writing and calculating. However, experience over the years of implementation showed that provision of the 3Rs is not enough but literacy needs to be made functional in order to be useful to the learners in their daily lives. Income generating projects were therefore introduced to the National literacy programme as a way of making literacy functional. It has been realized however that the BNLP supported income generating projects are failing or not doing well. The aim of this study was therefore to investigate the performance of income generating projects supported by BNLP in relation to projects meeting member' objectives, group dynamics, economic growth, members' health status, commitment to the projects, use of literacy skills in running the projects, conducting feasibility studies before embarking on income-generating projects, business management, availability of start up finance and follow up. Hypotheses of this study stated that the BNLP-supported income generating projects are failing because of projects not satisfying members' needs, group disputes among group members, lack of growth, ill health lack of members' commitment to the projects, inappropriate literacy curriculum, inadequate feasibility studies before starting the projects, business management, lack of finance and lack of follow up after training. The methodologies used for this study were participatory and survey research. Qualitative strategies were employed using focus group discussions, force field analysis, observations and questionnaires. Stratified random sampling, was employed to select the sampled population often operating and ten non-operating income-generating projects in the South East, Southern and Northern regions of Botswana. Purposive sampling was employed to select all twelve trainers of the income generating projects within the same regions. The results of this study were analysed using SPSS 11.5, and manual inspection. The results of this study supported this hypothesis to a great extent in that causes of failure of the projects were because the personal objectives of project members were not met, there was a problem of group disputes among members, ill health of some members was affecting their production, literacy skills learnt in literacy and income generating skills provided by BNLP were not adequate to be used in the running of the project and business skills are taught separately from the basic literacy skills of reading and writing and numeracy. Feasibility studies were not conducted before embarking on income generating projects and there was mismanagement of the projects. Inadequate follow up was also seen to be one of the contributory factors to the failure of projects. Hypothesis of this study was also partially rejected in a sense that, the results showed that almost all the projects received some grants to start their projects and therefore start up finances were not a problem but rather a problem of shortage of funds for expansion, Lack of ensuring sustainability of projects was due to mismanagement of the funds by the office bearers and mostly LGLs. Recommendations of this study directed to income generating-project members included settling group disputes, conducting feasibility studies, embarking on relevant projects individually or as groups. Policy recommendations included support of individual and group projects, running a pilot project where appropriate literacy needs of the piloted projects will be provided, involvement of the participants in decision-making concerning their projects and curriculum. The policy recommendation included ensuring that funds are only given to viable projects and literacy curriculum is relevant to the running of income generating projects to ensure sustainability. Recommendations for further studies included BNLP conducting an in-depth study to establish the prospects and problems of group approach in income generating activities, investigate the level of skills that the BNLP supported income-generating projects and their trainers possess and their specific needs for skills development and lastly evaluate the training materials used in both literacy classes and income-generation training to get more insight on what is lacking, and how this could be improved. / Thesis (M.Sc.)-University of KwaZulu-Natal, Pietermaritzburg, 2006.

This study discusses the provision of vocational skills in Adult Basic Education and Training (ABET) centres in the North West Province (NWP) of South Africa. Currently, South Africa is engulfed with challenges of high unemployment rate, skills shortages and poverty amongst the adult population. The standardisation of the ABET system and the colonialism ideologies ·can be blamed for the current poor state of ABET centres. A qualitative research method was used. The qualitative research design was the best choice because it was concerned with how the research respondents create meaning based on their understanding and experiences about the provision of skills in the ABET centres. Two case studies were used as the methodology to carry the research. Triangulation was used to collect data. Structured interviews, focus group interviews, observations and visuals were utilized to collect detailed data about vocational skills in the ABET centres in the NWP. lnterpretivism research paradigm was used as an epistemological position, to position me in the study. Critical theory was used to frame the study. The use of critical theory enabled me to investigate the different types of skills that were offered in the two ABET centres and the impact they have in the socio economic development of the ABET learners. The use of critical theory in this study enabled me to come up with alternatives of improving the current programmes that are being offered in the ABET centres faced by ABET learners need collective efforts from all the stake holders that are involved in the designing of the ABET curriculum and learning programmes. ABET is dysfunctional and it needs to be urgently overhauled. ABET learners depend on the grants offered by the government. Facilitators are under prepared and unprepared to teach the school subjects that they were currently responsible to teach. ABET centres do not have physical building structures that belong to them, this causes or poses a serious challenge in teaching and learning. / Educational Studies / D. Ed. (Comparative Education)

The study aimed at investigating the role played by ABET programmes in the development of rural black women in the Omusati Region. The study was to determine whether the ABET programmes that are provided in the area are offering relevant education that helps the women of the area in their development. The research findings indicated that the ABET programmes offered are not providing the relevant skills needed to develop the women participants. The programmes that are offered concentrate on literacy and numeracy, and it seem not to be very effective in making a difference to the women's lives. Women needs skills that can help them generate income to improve their living conditions. The study, in summary, established that the programmes offered by the ABET centres would be more effective if skills training is included to uplift and improve the lives of the participants on a social, economical as well as educational level. / Agriculture, Animal Health and Human Ecology / M. Tech. (Human Resource Development)