Lifelong learning has great political and social implications for formal educational institutions. Imported from Europe, lifelong education stresses education for all ages offered at the time the learner needs the competencies being taught and supplied by the society as a whole rather than just from the schools. The forces that produce the growing need for lifelong education include the rapidity of change, psychologists' discovery of the adult need for continuous learning, and a rising percentage of middle-aged or older adults in the population. Many schools faced with declining enrollment are instituting nontraditional programs to attract adults seeking learning opportunities. Yet many lack confidence in the schools' ability to fill these needs, nonschool educational programs are proliferating, and traditional schooling is receiving a lower priority in competition for the tax dollar. It is still an open question whether school leaders will cooperate to answer the demands for lifelong education or whether they will remain disorganized and unprepared in an obsolete and marginally functional institution. (Author/JM)