* Glasgow Caledonian and Stirling universities this week launched Scotland's first research centre into lifelong learning, backed by more than Pounds 400,000 from the Scottish Higher Education Funding Council.
Mike Osborne of Stirling University, co-director with Jim Gallacher of GCU, said the first centre is going to cover the whole of Scotland, look at the range of initiatives that have been put in place and establish the degree to which these are making a difference to people.
The SHEFC funding will support the centre for three years, after which it aims to be self-financing.