The new desire for education: young people are discovering further education as an active form of leisure activity

Increasing leisure time is changing the values of Germans. According to a study by the BAT Leisure Research Institute, more and more people want to give new meaning to their lives outside of work and career through educational activities. In the personal value hierarchy of German citizens, education ranks fourth after leisure time, family and friends. The younger generation rate the importance of education for their own lives particularly highly. They not only want to enjoy their work, but also want to fill their extra free time with meaning in life.

The 20 to 29-year-olds in particular, who have largely completed their school and vocational education and are at the start of their professional careers, use personal further education as an active form of leisure activity. They use their free time for voluntary learning without stress. One fifth of all young people aged between 20 and 24 regularly devote part of their evenings and weekends to personal further education. In 1986, the proportion of those actively engaged in education was only 14 per cent.

The proportion of 25 to 29-year-olds who are active in education has also increased (from 9 to 12 per cent). This is the result of a representative survey conducted by the B-A-T Institute, in which 2,000 German citizens aged 14 and over were asked about their leisure habits.

A comparison of the last four years shows that the younger generation is increasingly enjoying learning in their free time, while the willingness of the middle and older generations to learn is stagnating or declining. The proportion of 35- to 39-year-olds who voluntarily continue their education after work has even fallen by half (from 10 to 5 per cent).

Obviously, the urge for further education among the under-30s corresponds to a new attitude to life in their free time: "Free time is also education time. Many young people are swapping their desk at the office for a PC at home," says Prof Dr Horst W. Opaschowski, Director of the BAT Institute.

The new desire for education ranges from foreign language courses and computer courses at adult education centres to study trips and artistic creation in weekend seminars and holiday academies. This is also and especially a question of school education. The proportion of respondents with a school-leaving certificate who enjoy learning after work is six times higher (24 %) than that of secondary school leavers (4 %). The new enjoyment of learning in leisure time probably presupposes an earlier sense of achievement in learning at school. The society of the future will also be an educational society. And those who use their leisure time as an educational opportunity are investing in their own future.