The present study is exploratory field research and aims to find the basic aspects of the problem of adult motivation for training and more specifically for returning to the formal education system. The research focus is evening schools and the research discourse concerns the role of these schools, their place in the system of school education, the transformations they have been undergoing during the last 10 years and the challenges their existence faces in the context of the emergence of new, alternative forms of training for adults, including validation of competences.

The study has the following research objectives:
1) to research evening schools existing in Bulgaria
2) to research the leading factors for adult learners (personally significant and such stemming from the outside, social and economic environment) and motives influencing their decision to go back to school, study and complete their secondary education, as well as to continue in the higher education system;
3) to justify and give arguments for the significance and mission of evening schools as part of the education and training of adults;
4) to outline and present competence development courses in lower and upper-secondary high school for persons over 16 years of age as one of the alternatives for training adult learners in the context of contemporary tendencies for short-term variable life-long learning forms – advantages and disadvantages.

The methodology is based on the understanding that 1) the research is being realized in a specific historical context of a decrease in the number of evening schools at a national level due to changes in the legal framework of adult education; 2) the research of attitudes and motives can be limited or influenced by some negative connotations related to the development of evening schools in the country as schools for people who have not completed their education “on time”; 3) the reasons and factors for adults returning to school have complex nature and are determined by a multitude of factors, whose research presupposes qualitative approach and multi-faceted analysis.

Taking these matters into consideration, the research is of the primary research type and is characterized by a flexible design. The research methods are qualitative and descriptive and include:
1) observation of the situation that evening schools exist in reality – conditions and challenges;
2) interview with evening school principals, in order to outline their specificities and determine their role in the system of adult education and training, to define specific problems and ways for their solution;
3) teacher and adult learner focus groups to research factors influencing the choice to return to school and the motives for it are discussed via both viewpoints – of teachers and students. The study takes into account all advantages and shortcomings of the chosen methodology.

The main findings and discussion are about the reasons and motives that adult learners have in order to return to evening school, part of the formal education system aimed at adults in the conditions of the emergence of new alternatives, short-term forms of training and validation of competences.

Keywords: Adult training, evening schools, motivation to learn.