Cork Learning City: Toward a Community Wide Learning Environment

Abstract

Cork has had a wide learning agenda for several decades. As early as 1911 the university wasalready offering extra mural education. A few years later it was engaging with trade unionsoffering courses for working men, through the support of the City Corporation (CityCouncil). That tradition took off in earnest in 1947. In Cork throughout the 20th century therewere experiments around broadening education and the development of new educationalmodels. From this base the city, through the Cork City Development Board, engaged in a twoyear consultation ahead of launching a vision for the city over a ten year horizon called Cork2002-2012: Imagine our Future. Imagine our Future included a theme on Cork as a LearningCity, with an orientation towards an all encompassing flexible learning model: “We seelearning as a life-long activity for all our citizens and not as something to be pursued only byyoung people”