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Indicator V-6
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Adult Continuing Education
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NOTE TO READERS: Please include the following reference when citing data from this page:
"American Academy of Arts and Sciences, Humanities Indicators, http://HumanitiesIndicators.org".
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Since 1999, the NCES has collected information on levels of participation in adult education as part of its
National Household Education Survey Program. Beginning in 2001, these data included the subject matter of courses in which students enrolled. Such courses were not taken as part of a degree or certificate program, though college credit may have been earned.
Survey findings indicate that between 2001 and 2005 a small but growing percentage of adults pursued continuing education in the humanities. In 2001, 1% of the American population over the age of 16, approximately 2 million people, had taken at least one humanities course for personal interest or development in the previous 12 months. By 2005, the proportion had risen to 1.5%, or approximately 3.3 million people (Figure V-6a).
In both 2001 and 2005, adult education students in the humanities tended to be young (Figure V-6b), with approximately 50% of all such students having been between the ages of 16 and 34. However, the character of the age distribution changed considerably over the four-year period. Whereas in 2001 those in the youngest age category (16–24) were by far the most numerous, in 2005 humanities course takers were spread somewhat more evenly across the age categories. Another striking difference between the two time points is the significantly higher proportion of course takers in 2005 who were between 55 and 64, their proportion having increased from 5% to 14.5% of all adult education students in the humanities.
Adult education students were somewhat more likely to be women than men (Figure V-5c). In 2001, 56% of those taking such classes were female, though by 2005 the gender gap was less pronounced, with women constituting 52.8% of course takers.
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