Educational self-development

The lifelong concept covers all aspects of education, embracing everything in it, with the whole being more than the sum of its parts. Lifelong education is not an education system but the principle on which the over-all organization of a system is founded, and which should accordingly underlie the development of each of its component parts. In the light of such a principle, education is continued at all ages of man, according to each individual's needs and convenience. He therefore has to be oriented from the outset and from phase to phase, keeping the real purpose of education in mind: personal learning, self-teaching, and self-training.

Society is currently characterized by constant feats of creativity, invention, discovery and an increase in the importance of leisure, scholastic, para-scholastic and post-scholastic structures. These structures tend to enable a doubly privileged group (of those having received higher education and being the children of educated parents) to attain cultural self-fulfilment. This therefore constitutes a system of continuing education, the spontaneous existence of which draws attention to the inadequacy of school by itself and necessitates the radical overhaul of the school system in order that future secondary school pupils should have the greatest possibility of developing their individual cultural potential throughout life.

There are three requirements in training pupils for self-development: a common curriculum dictated by the requirements of society; optional subjects, which cater for individual differences; and free activities, selected by the individuals and groups themselves. The job of the educator is to direct pupils who want information to the various appropriate sources in the community.