Implications of Educational Policy-Making Which Encourages Schools to Collaborate with the Community, External Agencies, Private Companies, Employers and Voluntary Organisations

Despite the move to state education, policy-makers since the early 1900s have encouraged the community, external agencies, private companies, employers and voluntary organisations to become involved in schools. The rationales for these collaborations are to address issues (e.g., delinquency, neglect, underachievement and low family support), which will be tackled through activities (e.g., extra-curricular clubs and one-to-one support) and to focus on the social aspects of schooling of wider audiences (e.g., adults). These activities are deemed as beneficial through implementation which is perceived to be issue free. Research is lacking with regard to how these policy responses are played out in practice and the perceptions of those involved. This paper reveals the individuals involved in four case study schools using an audit pro-forma, documentary analysis and interviews with school staff and external agencies. The findings highlight that several individuals were expected to deliver former statutory provision for free, but quality was a concern. Individuals may perceive that their activities contribute to the national curriculum, but staff had different perceptions. This paper reveals how policies are directing the individuals involved and their activities. There are questions over whose interests are intended to be served and the implications for pupils, parents, schools, communities and politician

The evidence base for careers websites. What works?

There is some evidence which suggests that using career websites as part of broader careers education provision can impact positively on young people’s career readiness and the quality and diversity of their social networks for careers purposes. The evidence points to a number of findings which can be turned into lessons for practice. - Information-based career websites need to exist in the context of a wider offline careers support program. They are not a replacement for professional career guidance. - Career websites that provide automated interactions need to be embedded within a wider range of careers support services. Only by doing so can they increase users’ awareness of career support or give users new ideas about careers by exposing them to multimedia resources. - Where career websites are used to facilitate communication (e.g. through online guidance and counselling or through delivery based inside virtual worlds), this can lead to positive outcomes such as gains in career decidedness and self-knowledge, gains in satisfaction with future career prospects, and in career exploration behaviours (such as more frequent career searches). - Career websites need to be integrated into careers education provision and into wider forms of career support (e.g. tutorial support and personal guidance).Careers and Enterprise Compan

External agents in schools: roles and responsibilities for children and young people’s learning and wellbeing

This thesis examines the other individuals involved in schools and classrooms who are not teachers or teaching assistants. Many terms exist for these individuals including external agents, providers and specialists. This is set within a policy background of government reports, Acts and initiatives from the early 1900s. Those invited in to be involved in schools. includes statutory agencies, military-style organisations, the voluntary sector, community members and employers. The literature which examines the involvement of these external agents in schools does so from a narrow perspective, such as a specific agent type or policy initiative. In contrast, the aim is to identify the full range of agents involved across four case study schools through a broad approach in that it does not focus on a type of agent (e.g. employers); a specific initiative (e.g. extended schools) or period (e.g. 1960 to 2000). There is a lack of discussion within the literature from the agent perspective. To counteract this gap, the perceptions of agents are compared against those of school staff, in terms of the rationales for their involvement in schools. The aim is to determine if the involvement of agents is in relation to government invitations or if other rationales exist. The contribution to knowledge is in terms of this broad approach to the identification of agents, against the approach taken in previously studies. It also adds knowledge in that it compares the perceptions of both external agents and school staff about the rationales for involvement. The research involves completion of a pro-forma by a staff member at each school to identify the agents. It also includes semi-structured interviews with school staff and external agents plus documentary analysis. It draws on a collective case study approach to describe the situation in terms of external agent involvement and used an ideology critique to examine the different interests and the legitimacy of the situation. This research draws on Bronfenbrenner’s Ecological Model of Human Development (1979) to explore the different system levels of rationale. It also utilises the different form of capital which include social capital (Putnam, 2000), cultural capital and economic capital (Bourdieu, 1997), human capital (Becker, 1964), intellectual capital and organisational capital (Hargreaves, 2001; 2003; Craig et al. 2004). These are presented as a typology. The different forms of capital are used to explore if the involvement is in relation to one form of capital over another. Through this process of reflection the aim is to share an insight in terms of the reality of external agent involvement in schools and to make recommendations through this research to improve the involvement of external agent involvement in schools through shared knowledge. The findings indicate a high involvement of external agents in the schools with trends of agent type being linked to government policies. However, the ‘messiness’ in the identification of agents resulted in just a ‘snapshot’ of the agent involvement. This is a consequence of insufficient staff knowledge related to their role, time in service or value they place on the capitals of the agents. There is a disconnection between some agent perceptions of their relationship to the school and the inclusion in the data. The findings also suggest there is a complexity in terms of the rationales which operate at multi-system levels. These rationales include financial, educational, informational and wellbeing. Where agents are involved through school requests there is clearly an agent benefit but also a link to macro rationales. Where agents are involved for rationales that emanate beyond the schools, access difficulties are reported and the desire to ‘fit in’ to negotiate access. Agents use the different capitals such as social capital and economic capital to attempt to gain access to schools. Although agents have their own primary rationale for being involved in schools, many are asked by schools to deliver specialist or targeted provision at no cost. There are tensions between some agents and schools in terms of the expectations placed upon them by schools. However, even where agents offere physical cash to schools, it does not result in open access to pupils. This highlights a complexity in the rationales for involvement of external agents in schools

Progression for success: Evaluating North Yorkshire’s innovative careers guidance project

This report sets out the findings from an evaluation of North Yorkshires innovative careers guidance project.North Yorkshire County Counci

Using Stimulus Material to Explore How Supervisors and Candidates Clarify Expectations During the Research Supervision Process in England

Aim/Purpose This study examined the perceptions of doctoral supervisors and candidates around how expectations for doctoral supervision are clarified, and the strategies used. Background Clarifying expectations is recommended in supervisor and candidate handbooks, supervisor training and recognition programme. Formal strategies have been adopted as a blanket approach by some departments, faculties, or universities but little research explores supervisor and candidate perceptions of this practice or available strategies. Methodology Semi-structured interviews using stimulus material were held with nine supervisors and nine doctoral candidates from a university in England which adopts a team supervision model. Supervisor and candidate dyads were not used. Contribution This study can be used to consider the process of clarifying expectations. A smorgasbord or selection of strategies is presented, for practice. Findings Six supervisors were clarifying expectations at the beginning using an informal discussion, although some supervisors used multiple strategies. Candidates did not recall their expectations being clarified. Some supervisors and candidates believed that expectations did not need to be clarified and there were concerns about formal strategies. Team supervision had a positive and negative influence. Four candidates wanted expectations clarifying but the different starting points and power issues suggested that supervisors need to create the space for regular discussions as part of a working alliance. Recommendations for Practitioners The stimulus material or smorgasbord of strategies can encourage dialogue between supervisors and candidates to enable them to discuss and select appropriate strategies, from the full range available. Recommendation for Researchers Researchers might want to undertake their own studies using stimulus material. The smorgasbord could be used in practice and research undertaken to see how it could be further developed. Impact on Society Supervisors and candidates using the smorgasbord and the idea of the working alliance can assist to have ongoing conversations about expectations. Future Research Researchers could conduct studies in other universities to see if similar findings are discovered. Future research could be undertaken where institutions have adopted a formal approach

Gatsby careers benchmark north east implementation pilot: interim evaluation (2015-2017)

This report presents interim evaluation findings on the implementation of the Gatsby Benchmarks (herewith referred to as the Benchmarks) for good career guidance with a sample of 16 pilot schools and colleges (herewith referred to as education providers) in the North East of England. These interim findings report progress made against the Benchmarks during the course of the pilot (autumn 2015 to autumn 2017), the enablers and barriers faced, and the impact of the Benchmarks on learners’ career readiness and attainment. The interim findings suggest the following: Timescale - Schools and colleges involved were able to make significant strides towards fully meeting most, if not all, Benchmarks within two years. To date Benchmark 2 (Learning from career and labour market information) and Benchmark 7 (Encounters with FE and HE) have seen the largest increase in the number of pilot education providers fully achieving them. Benchmark 3 (Addressing the needs of every pupil) and Benchmark 4 (Linking curriculum to careers) have the least number of pilot education providers fully achieving them. Positive impact on learners. Learners show an increase in some aspects of career readiness and tentative increases in some aspects of GCSE attainment. Effective implementation of the Benchmarks. This was enabled by the existence of a regional facilitator to support pilot education providers and strong provider leadership and robust organisational infrastructures. Key barriers were a lack of time and space (in the curriculum), a lack of funding and a lack of commitment at senior leadership level, which impacted on achieving a cultural shift in some education providers. Regional impact. The implementation of the Benchmarks is impacting more widely in the region with non-pilot education providers forming links with pilot providers to seek support on developing good career guidance in their settings. Furthermore, wider stakeholders such as local employers and providers of careers education were also using the Benchmarks to review and develop their services to schools/colleges. Emerging challenges: A noticeable challenge was how the term ‘meaningful’, in relation to encounters with employers and employees, was interpreted and how education providers monitor provision of such encounters.Gatsby Charitable Foundatio

Personal guidance: What works?

The Careers & Enterprise Compan

Graduate gap years: Narratives of postponement in graduate employment transitions in England.

For UK higher education students, the ‘gap year’ or ‘year out’ is historically conceptualised as an amassing of wider life experience, often overseas, during a twelve-month period between the completion of A-level studies and the first year of a university degree. However, in a recent comparative study, which saw interviews conducted in both 2014 and 2015 with final year undergraduate students (n74) from different social backgrounds, across two English universities (one Russell Group university and one Post-1992 university), the term ‘gap year’ was being re-appropriated to capture something different. The term was being used to describe a period following graduation in which graduands planned to take low-paid work or ‘ordinary’ jobs, take stock of their financial situation, and attempt to save money and/or repay urgent debt. A high proportion of students in the 2015 stage of the study (16/37) spoke of taking a graduate gap year, compared with 9/37 in 2014. It may be that the increasing costs of debt-based forms of higher education payment coinciding with growing precarious employment has contributed to this situation. By borrowing the term gap year to describe a new and different phenomenon, some of the student interviewees may be legitimising the predicament in which they find themselves. This chapter explores the experiences of students who spoke of taking a graduate gap year. It examines the different roles of a graduate gap year and discusses wider implications for unequal graduate outcomes.Society for Research into Higher Education funded the original research

The relationship between leadership, teamworking, structure, burnout and attitude to patients on acute psychiatric wards

Contains fulltext : 99818.pdf (publisher's version ) (Open Access)Background: Conflict (aggression, substance use, absconding, etc.) and containment (coerced medication, manual restraint, etc.) threaten the safety of patients and staff on psychiatric wards. Previous work has suggested that staff variables may be significant in explaining differences between wards in their rates of these behaviours, and that structure (ward organisation, rules and daily routines) might be the most critical of these. This paper describes the exploration of a large dataset to assess the relationship between structure and other staff variables. Methods: A multivariate cross-sectional design was utilised. Data were collected from staff on 136 acute psychiatric wards in 26 NHS Trusts in England, measuring leadership, teamwork, structure, burnout and attitudes towards difficult patients. Relationships between these variables were explored through principal components analysis (PCA), structural equation modelling and cluster analysis. Results: Principal components analysis resulted in the identification of each questionnaire as a separate factor, indicating that the selected instruments assessed a number of non-overlapping items relevant for ward functioning. Structural equation modelling suggested a linear model in which leadership influenced teamwork, teamwork structure; structure burnout; and burnout feelings about difficult patients. Finally, cluster analysis identified two significantly distinct groups of wards: the larger of which had particularly good leadership, teamwork, structure, attitudes towards patients and low burnout; and the second smaller proportion which was poor on all variables and high on burnout. The better functioning cluster of wards had significantly lower rates of containment events. Conclusion: The overall performance of staff teams is associated with differing rates of containment on wards. Interventions to reduce rates of containment on wards may need to address staff issues at every level, from leadership through to staff attitudes