University of the third age teachers in the years 1973–2011

The text is an attempt to present the peculiar group of teachers which compri­ses both of academic professionals , and community workers working for ple­asure, often with out formal technical or pedagogic classifications. Their com­mon aim is to involve in prolonging the educational process of the last phase of a man’s development – post-productive and post-professional stage of life. The author made an attempt to systematize the determinants outlining the transformations of the given group of teachers in the perspective of forty years. This is, however, a prospect of the entire closed history of Universities of the Third Age (U3A). In the face of developmental prospects of U3A in Poland it is essential to consider the future recruitment of academic teachers. One of important elements, and at the same time restrictions, there will probably be an idea of a system solution in Polish U3A. This will probably be a compilation of the French and British U3A models; therefore this text also includes an out line of both of these strategies relating to the prospect of demographic, trans­formations parallel to the increase in educational aspirations of senior citizens.