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In this chapter, we explore what Kasworm et.al (2000) term as 'the changing landscape of higher education' and address the influence of this changing landscape of education on adult learners' needs of the 21st century. Our discussion is pitched against the background of technologies, globalization, fluctuating world economy and educational transformation. Our understanding of 'needs' recognizes the fact that we have to transcend educational preferences of adult learners in terms of objectives, expectations and orientation to learning even though these are important subsets of needs that have predominated much discussion on adult learning, and which have been translated into the principles of andragogy (Knowles, 1990, Rogers 2002). In our discussion, we take a wider perspective by focusing primarily on the knowledge and skills needed by adult learners to thrive in the 21st century. We are interested to understand how those factors affect their needs, and how they could be met in order to fulfill the imperatives of a learning society. Specifically, we focus on issues and challenges for adult higher education in Malaysia as the development of quality human capital becomes the focal point of a nation bent on achieving a fully developed status by 2020. We examine their initiatives in widening access to adult learners and what adjustments that need to be made in order to cater to the diverse needs of their adult learners.

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