[EPALE newsletter] The Human Measure
Dear EPALE members,
Recently, I came across a social media campaign called Human-made. In its posts, various well-known people talk about the importance of things created by real people amid the synthetic noise of generative AI.
In the age of artificial intelligence, „human-made” has quickly shifted from simply meaning „not naturally occurring” to becoming a premium marker of authenticity, labour and intent. At the same time, it is already creating a market for „human-washing”: machine-generated content, tools and even deepfakes designed to appear more human than they really are.
But what exactly is the value of human-made? If large language models were trained to write books that felt distinctly creative and meaningful, would those books be any less valuable? And why are we often selective about what should and should not be replaced by machines? Manual and routine work has already been transformed by automation, yet many assume that creative or knowledge-based work necessarily deserves special protection.
(I won’t even get into the irony of craving more human-produced things while collectively training AI systems to reproduce the very patterns we recognise as uniquely ours. This contradiction may itself be one of the most recognisably human traits.)
Perhaps the more important question is this: in a world where text, images, music and even conversation can increasingly be replicated, what are the things we should really hold close?
I suspect the answer lies less in finished products than in the processes that produce meaning: shared interpretation, collective judgement, and the emotional and social structures through which we make sense of the world.
While technology may imitate expression, should it also enter the spaces where we decide together how to live? It cannot experience loneliness, nor the deep social sense of belonging. It cannot take responsibility for a community, engage in civic action, or negotiate differences in pursuit of a shared future.
The future challenge for adult learning is not simply preparing people to work alongside intelligent machines. It is ensuring that people remain capable of shaping the societies, workplaces and communities in which they are deployed.
Heini Huhtinen – EPALE Adult Learning Expert
EPALE Resource Kit – Beyond the Skills Gap
The adult skills crisis in Europe is very real, but are we asking the right questions about it? The first EPALE Resource Kit of 2026 builds on this year’s thematic focus of Skills for Quality Jobs and Lives and goes a step further. It brings together a selection of pieces published on EPALE at the start of the year to present a unified argument: the way we frame the skills gap influences – and sometimes limits – the solutions we envisage. The kit addresses the structural barriers that prevent millions of adults from learning, the impact of AI on the concept of basic skills, and the policy response now emerging across Europe. Rather than offering easy answers, it provides a sharper set of questions for practitioners, policymakers and anyone working at the intersection of adult learning and social change.
AI impacts the labour market – What does it mean for adult learning?
In a digitalising economy, who gets hired and who quietly disappears from the talent pool? Drawing on recent analysis from the OECD and Cedefop, this article demonstrates how unequal learning opportunities can accumulate over a lifetime, and how digitalisation could restrict recruitment at a time when demand for AI-related and hybrid skills is growing. This would push those who would benefit most from new opportunities further to the margins. A human-centred transition is the way forward: learning ecosystems that connect education, work and guidance, and which do not leave any group behind. This is because the future of work depends less on the technology itself than on how we respond to it.
EPALE Podcast: Rethinking Civic Education
Where does democracy actually get practised and what happens to the places where it doesn’t? At a time of growing pressure and division across Europe, we explore why civic education remains surprisingly hard to define, the challenges facing a sector squeezed by shifting funding priorities, and the rise of „civic deserts”: areas, often rural, where civil society infrastructure is sparse or absent. The conversation also takes an unexpected turn: towards the workplace. As one of the few remaining spaces where people with different backgrounds and opinions still meet regularly, the workplace may hold untapped potential for dialogue, disagreement, and democratic practice, and civic educators are starting to take notice.
The Loneliness of 10,000 Followers: On Belonging, Community, and the Difference That Matters
Ten thousand followers won’t make you feel less lonely. So what will? In this piece Saskia Eschenbacher draws on Peter Block, Robert Putnam and transformative learning theory to unpick a distinction that matters more than ever: between audience and community, consumers and citizens, visibility and belonging. Social media promises connection at scale – wide, shallow, algorithmically curated – but belonging, the article argues, doesn’t scale. It is built slowly, reciprocally, in small groups and real conversations, through questions that are uncomfortable precisely because they shift us from blame to co-authorship. For adult educators, the implication is quietly radical: the work that matters most may not be delivering content, but creating the conditions where belonging becomes possible.
