BECOMING AN ADULT EDUCATOR: BIOGRAPHICAL PATHWAYS OF SOCIAL WORKERS AT THE INTERSECTION OF SOCIAL WORK WITH GROUPS AND ADULT EDUCATION

Lamprini Pappa, Thanassis Karalis, Katerina Kedraka, Efthymios Valkanos

Abstract


This study explores the biographical pathways through which social workers whose education and professional experience include Social Work with Groups enter and develop professionally in Adult Education. It examines how prior experience of working with groups, experiential learning, training, and certification contribute to the development of adult educator competence, and how participants make sense of the relationship between the two fields within their professional identities. The study used a sequential, two-phase qualitative design. The first phase comprised two focus groups with social workers with and without certification of adult educators’ educational competence by the National Organisation for the Certification of Qualifications and Vocational Guidance (EOPPEP). The second comprised 40 biographical narrative interviews with certified social workers, divided into two groups according to their period of certification. The findings show that adult educator competence develops through non-linear biographical and professional trajectories and that certification serves different functions depending on its position within a professional biography. In some cases, it systematises and formally recognises knowledge and skills developed previously; in others, it contributes to the initial pedagogical structuring of the educator role. Experiential learning emerges as a key point of intersection between Social Work with Groups and Adult Education, while convergence between the two fields does not erase their distinct professional purposes and boundaries. Their relationship is incorporated into professional identity through synthesis, complementary expansion, or bounded convergence.

Keywords


social work with groups, adult education, experiential learning, professional identity, adult educator competence, biographical pathways

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References


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DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.46827/ejes.v13i9.7000

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