Public deliberation as a teaching andragogy: Implications for adult student learning from a doctoral higher education policy course

Abstract

Public deliberation provides an inclusive and robust mechanism for making shared decisions in community and political settings; however, its application to teaching and learning remains underutilized (McMillan & Harriger, 2007). This manuscript reports on a case study of the use of public deliberation as a teaching andragogy in a graduate level course in higher education policy, which showed that public deliberation creates greater ownership of the course, fosters critical thinking and student agency, and implicates taking action.

Keywords

• Public deliberation
• adult learners
• andragogy
• graduate students