Adult learning and education represents an important part of lifelong learning which is nowadays widely recognised as having a key role in addressing the challenges which individuals and societies are facing globally. As the Belém Framework for Action, which was approved at the 6th UNESCO International Conference on Adult Education (CONFINTEA VI) in December 2009, states, “adult learning and education equip people with the necessary knowledge, capabilities, skills, competences and values to exercise and advance their rights and take control of their destinies. Adult learning and education are also an imperative for the achievement of equity and inclusion, for alleviating poverty and for building equitable, tolerant, sustainable and knowledge-based societies” (UNESCO 2009).

However, if adult learning is to reach its full potential, it needs to be supported by people who have appropriate professional competencies. While teachers of young children in school have usually undertaken some programme of professional education, often at university level before starting to teach, this is often not the case with persons who teach adults. The professionalisation of adult education is therefore perceived as a key challenge around the world, both at the individual country level and in the international context. The Belém Framework for Action identifi es the professionalisation of adult education as one of the key challenges for the fi eld and notes: “The lack of professionalisation and training opportunities for educators has had a detrimental impact on the quality of adult learning and education provision (…)”

(UNESCO 2009). Around one third of the 150 country reports on adult education submitted for the conference cited inadequate qualifi cation of personnel as one of the biggest areas in which action needs to be taken (UIL 2009).

In reaction to this situation, among other things, the UNESCO member states at the CONFINTEA conference committed themselves to “training, capacity-building, employment conditions and the professionalisation of adult educators, e.g. through the establishment of partnerships with higher education institutions, teacher associations and civil society organisations” (ibid.).

UNESCO is not the only player to stress the importance of adult education teachers’ professional development. At the European Union level, the topic of the professionalisation of adult education has also experienced increasing policy attention for a number of years now since it was prominently highlighted in the fi rst communication of the European Commission on adult learning (European Commission 2006), in the action plan on adult learning, which followed one
year later (European Commission 2007 and in the 2011 Council resolution on a renewed European agenda for adult learning (Council 2011). Numerous projects, both national and cross-border cooperation projects, have been initiated since then to identify competence requirements, defi ne standards and develop training provision for adult education and VET teachers and trainers (see for example CEDEFOP 2013).

These developments form the general background for the initiative taken jointly by the German Institute for Adult Education – Leibniz Centre for lifelong learning (DIE) and the Institute for the International Cooperation of the Association of German Adult Education Centres (DVV International) to develop, test and disseminate a core curriculum for training adult educators outside of the university sector which, being in line with the basic principles of adult education, satisfi es
international scientifi c standards and is suitable for use on a transnational scale. Curriculum globALE is the result of this initiative. The overarching aim to which Curriculum globALE is supposed to contribute is threefold:

• to enhance professionalisation of adult educators by providing a common reference framework
• to support adult education providers in the design and implementation of Train-the-Trainer programmes, and
• to foster knowledge exchange and mutual understanding between adult educators worldwide.