Working the Planning Table

In Working the Planning Table, Ronald M. Cervero and Arthur L. Wilson offer a theory that accounts for planners’ lived experience and provides a guide for developing effective educational programs for adults.  The book presents three planning case studies that illustrate how power, interests, ethical commitment, and negotiation are central to planners’ everyday work.  These stories offer guidance on how to respond to the realities of practice and clearly point out that the technical work of planning is always political. Working the Planning Table reveals how people work to negotiate educational and political outcomes for multiple stakeholders.

Preface v Working the Planning Table: A Theory for Practice 1. Seeing What Matters: Education as a Struggle for Knowledge and Power 5 2. Practicing Educational Planning: Three Stories 27 3. Negotiating Democratically for Educational and Political Outcomes 77 Working the Planning Table: The Theory in Practice 4. Negotiating the Program’s Needs-Assessment 107 5. Negotiating the Program’s Educational, Management, and Political Objectives 137 6. Negotiating the Program’s Instructional Design and Implementation 161 7. Negotiating the Program’s Administrative Organization and Operation 187 8. Negotiating the Program’s Formal and Informal Evaluation 213 9. Working the Planning Table in the Struggle for Knowledge and Power 241 References 269 The Authors 285 Index 289