Forum an Excellent Example of a New Trend in Adult Education

In this era of rapid change in how services are marketed, there’s an interesting convergence of adult education, entertainment and capitalism. Illustrative of this phenomenon is the Forum for Excellence recently held at a resort hotel in Phoenix.

The concept was created by New York Giants running back Herschel Walker and two former football players at Texas A&M;, Todd Christopher and Dan Peoples, now executives at a medical supply company in Jacksonville, Fla. The three friends, convinced that they could make money on the need for continuing management education, formed what’s known as a limited liability company, with the aim of creating an environment in which professionals could update their knowledge while having fun. The LLC, a relatively new kind of partnership, provides personal protection for the investors much like that afforded in a corporation, as well as some tax benefits.

The forums bring together speakers who share new ideas and knowledge based on their experience or academic expertise. What makes these efforts different from conventional conferences sponsored by trade associations, colleges and universities is that they package education in an entertaining way at the same time that they promise profits and tax advantages.

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True, many conferences are held in big cities where recreational and culinary attractions are used to attract conventioneers, and they may generate a profit. However, they are usually designed and run by organizations whose primary responsibility is to provide educational offerings that meet requirements for licensing or increased professional competence. Entertainment and profit making take a back seat to pedagogical format and content.

The list of participants in the Phoenix Forum for Excellence was impressive. The speakers at the 2 1/2-day conference included Alan Dershowitz, Norman Schwarzkopf, Jack Kemp, Dick Cheney, John Naisbitt, John Sculley and Terry Bradshaw, along with management gurus James Belasco, Ken Blanchard, Jack Llewellyn and Fred Wiersma. It was expected that they would link their expertise and experience to management and leadership issues in an entertaining way, which they did.

Bradshaw, the former Pittsburgh Steeler quarterback, used the stage as a football field to reenact and explain a situation in which he ignored his coaches’ advice on a crucial touchdown play. The lesson he taught (as his comments and actions generated gales of laughter) was that sometimes it’s more important to listen to your gut than to the instructions of your boss. His message rang a bell that might not have been heard had those in the audience been reading about the delegation and challenge of authority in a college textbook.

To be sure, the Forum for Excellence model is probably not what Federal Reserve Board Chairman Alan Greenspan or Labor Secretary Robert Reich have in mind when they speak of the need to train, retrain and educate for a fast-changing work environment. They no doubt are thinking about increased vocational education, on-site, in-house educational programs and improved public schools.

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However, as the need for new learning increases due to technological and economic change, so will opportunities to make money providing lifelong learning. No longer will colleges, universities and consulting firms have a lock on providing management and other forms of education to individuals and organizations.

In his book “Amusing Ourselves to Death,” Neil Postman identified a technological advance that explains the emergence of these kinds of ventures. He predicted that the persuasiveness of TV would forever change the nature of public discourse, which he said has become “an artifice of its display.”

This is not to say that the entertainment aspect of the Forum for Excellence was a ruse to confuse education with entertainment. Rather, entertainment in the form of celebrity and motivational speakers was used as a strategy to sell a product: lifelong learning. Because of increased competition for this product, Postman would no doubt advise designers of educational programs to pay as much attention to its packaging as they do to its content.

Some may question the convergence of education, entertainment and moneymaking. Perhaps the question should be, does it pass the rigor test? It may be too early to form an answer, but it’s not too early to warn colleges, universities and trade associations that one of their products--lifelong learning--has a new look.

It’s called celebrity-based education!