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The objectives, curriculum, and role of higher education and key policy and practice issues were reassessed against the backdrop of recent and predicted demographic, economic, and political changes and trends in Great Britain. Special consideration was given to the fact that "mature" learners now constitute the majority of entrants into British higher education. A model was proposed that calls for supporting a learning society by combining the strengths of the following two traditions of British higher education: (1) the pastoral/tutorial models of Oxford, Cambridge, and the new universities of the 1960s; and (2) the vocational and community-based traditions of civic universities and polytechnics. Also developed was an agenda of actions to create a culture where learning is recognized as a universal lifelong activity, empowerment of individuals is seen as key to economic and social development, accreditation seeks to include rather than exclude, higher education is an active contributor to economic activity, diversity is recognized as strength, and the outcomes and achievements of higher education are made explicit. The action agenda contained specific actions regarding the following areas of policy/practice: learner support, curriculum, credit, quality, and resources. Appended is a list of policy group members. (Contains 52 references.) (MN)

This working paper is a product of a regional study in industrial South Wales of the determinants of participation and non-participation in post-compulsory education and training, with special reference to processes of change in the patterns of these determinants over time and to variations between geographical areas. Discussion begins with an examination of the way in which the official discourse of the learning society is dominated by a particular social theory of lifelong learning, called human capital theory. It demonstrates that human capital theory involves an unwarranted abstraction of economic behavior from social relations more widely, maintaining that participation in lifetime learning cannot be understood in terms of the narrow calculation of utility maximization. This critique provides the basis for the development of the lineaments of a theoretical account in which learning behavior is conceived as the product of individual calculation and active choice, but within parameters set by both access to learning opportunities and collective norms--parameters that vary systematically over space and time so that place and history must accordingly play a central role in any adequate theorization. The paper concludes that this kind of theoretical approach has important implications for empirical research and strategies aimed at creating a learning society. (Contains 49 references and 16 notes.) (YLB)

Since the 1960s, the world has undergone transformations in trade, industry, and technology. Some assert that the postmodern society needs organizational structures that allow for diversity, instability, unpredictability, and mobility. However, this paper argues that the headlong rush toward such organizational forms may well encourage the abandonment of commitments to longer term, more stable, and absolutely fundamental social and cultural objectives. During the last decade Australia has been greatly influenced by conservative English think tanks that advocate market solutions to social problems and the abdication of government from social responsibilities in favor of a competitive model of society in which the unfortunate would be supported by the most meager safety nets. Education in Australia is undergoing a battle for control of content, pedagogy, and assessment. The paper focuses on the reconstitution of the schools in Victoria, as it exemplifies tendencies elsewhere. The paper describes how a combination of current developments point toward great problems in the achievement of quality education: the vocationalization of the curriculum; the shifts toward competency-based education and assessment; the nationalization of curriculum and assessment; the nomination of the educational content that excludes notions of cultural difference and social justice; the reduction of resources through benchmarking; the devolution of responsibility for budget shortfalls but the centralization of control through managerial yardsticks in standards and frameworks; and the failures to recognize the complexity of learning, teaching, and schooling. Simultaneously, the reduction of collective mechanisms makes protest and the reassertion of our collective responsibilities that much more difficult. These developments constitute a major challenge to educators concerned with the construction of a culturally diverse, socially just, quality education for all. (Contains 36 references.) (LMI)

This collection of papers examines the role of adult education in encouraging active citizenship throughout Europe. "Introduction: The Project" (John Field) discusses the context in which the other papers were written and briefly discusses citizenship education and research in Great Britain. "Learning, Education, Citizenship: What Connections?" (Chris Duke) discusses the relationships between education and citizenship, the British experience in citizenship education, and possible strategies for adult educators to use to help produce competent citizens. "The Future as a Challenge and the Role of Adult Education--The Example of Poland" (Mieczyslaw Malewski) discusses the relationship between citizenship education and the consciousness of Polish society. The historical development of citizenship education in Sweden, current practices in adult education programs, and a methodology and theory for further research are examined in "Education for Citizenship in Sweden" (Agnieska Bron-Wojciechowska). "Education: A Resource in Social Movements?" (John Field) outlines a resource mobilization theory, discusses the concept of education as a resource, and presents a case study of the use and development of educational resources for purposes of citizenship education. (MN)

There is widespread agreement in Great Britain that the work force must receive more skills training if the country is to be competitive in the future. Of special concern is the 70 percent of the work force who left school at the earliest possible opportunity, and the (overlapping) 70 percent of the work force who have not received training for a long time. Barriers to training are seen as lack of time, lack of money, and negative attitudes toward learning. Recommendations can be made to government, to employers, to training and enterprise councils, and to educational institutions to improve access to skills training for all workers. Recommendations offered in this paper include the following: (1) the government should support paid learning for 30 hours per year for all adults and grant them the right to an additional unpaid 30 hours per year for study; (2) government should require employers to spend a minimum amount on employee development programs; (3) government should support adults seeking to reenter the labor market; (4) employers should audit skills of their existing staff, analyze organizational needs, and offer more job training opportunities to employees, including part-time employees; and (5) educational institutions should provide more accessibility for classes and more flexible requirements for entry and program completion. (KC)

The institutional view of literature in the National Curriculum of Great Britain shows a dramatic belittlement in its revised version. It lacks a coherent literary or pedagogical rationale and substitutes a functional one in which over-simplification purports to be clarification. The institution is primarily concerned to define English literary heritage; it is more interested in control than in curriculum. For this reason, the issues of literature and learning are ignored; tests of levels of attainments are the levers of control. Opposition to Great Britain's National Curriculum could focus on three basic issues that have been the subject of advances in literary studies over the past 25 years and are either neglected or misunderstood in the National Curriculum. First, policy makers must understand that texts are no longer autonomous but are rather fluid, conditioned by the culture and personal inclinations and experience of the reader. Second, a child's reading ability is not systematic but idiosyncratic and serendipitous. Third, a prescribed canon of books is not workable. Current literary scholars regard the canon as evolutionary, subject to the shifting values being negotiated by a culture. (Contains 40 references.) (TB)

Resource-based learning (RBL) is one of the most useful, successful, and acceptable approaches to curriculum delivery, easily adapted to different styles of teaching and learning. It brings together all of the resource elements--tutor, learning resources, and student--into a learning partnership. Two essential aspects of RBL are its flexibility--that is, its ability to cope with a variety of learning styles--and its promotion of student autonomy. The introduction of RBL has practical implications for further education colleges (technical institutes). Students need to develop more autonomy in the way they study and use information, through guidance from tutors. Tutors need to develop technical, human, and conceptual skills to be able to empower students with autonomy. A framework of learning resources and space in which to use them is needed to support students and tutors, upon which students can rely for all their learning needs. The college library is central to the learning process as the provider of a wide-ranging service based on a comprehensive collection of fully integrated learning resources. The issues and problems related to the implementation of RBL are partnership, quality issues, staff development, student autonomy, learning resources framework, technology of delivery, introduction and use of forms of RBL, and provision of RBL guides. Each requires a strategy to deal with it involving tutors, nonteaching staff, students, and senior college management. (Appendixes include 20 references and sample 5-year strategic plan for a further education college.) (YLB)

Although employment has increased, Great Britain faces rising unemployment due to the large number of school leavers. New jobs are there, but many are in the service sector, traditionally for women and mostly part-time. Unions demand high starting wages that are a disincentive for employers to hire young people and pay raises that make job creation more difficult. The United Kingdom has been complacent about training. Firms are not keen to invest in training and cut back funding for training programs during recessions, and the government is skeptical about formal training systems. Four approaches are now underday to clarify what employers should be doing and to identify where training needs are and where the skilled requirements of the future may lie. These approaches are: (1) to convince managers to assume a greater role in training, (2) to improve students' perception of their future and of the jobs and skills they will need, (3) to meet specific requirements to prevent specific shortfalls in skills, and (4) to ensure the adaptability of the work force. (Questions and answers are appended.) (YLB)

A comparison of the vocational education and training (VET) offered in Japan, the Federal Republic of Germany, and the United States revealed that programs in all three nations emphasized the following aims: competence at work, commitment of all to achieve excellence, and capacity to contribute to change. Organizations in all three nations were increasingly looking for, and prepared to help develop, people with the ability to use acquired knowledge and skills effectively in changing circumstances and in an integrated system. Although the United States appeared to be well tuned to a climate of moderate change, it appeared much less reflective about the future and appeared to lack an educational strategy, especially at the secondary level. Germany had systems that work well and in a stable environment; however, change appeared to be slow. Although Japan's VET strategies have given the country a highly educated working population, the downside of its success in corporate organization and individual service for the greater good is probably an underdevelopment in the kind of creativity that flourishes with wayward individual opportunities. Great Britain's imperial past, on the other hand, appears to continue to hamper the country's progress in the area of VET. (MN)

Reviews key ideas of action research in the past 15 years, particularly those of John Elliott. Describes and comments on the main characteristics of action research. Focuses on methodological and epistemological issues related to its practice. (CFR)

The Workers' Educational Association (WEA) developed a series of recommendations in response to the British government consultation paper "The Learning Age: A Renaissance for a New Britain." The recommendations addressed the following areas: individual learning revolution; investing in learning; learning at work; realizing the learning age; ensuring standards, quality, and accountability; and recognizing achievement. Specific recommendations to Britain's government included the following: support and encourage participation and contribution of voluntary sector and community-based organizations in the University for Industry's service provision; strengthen the funding base for community and related provision for adult learners; end discrimination against older learners operating in current public funding practices; support trade unions' role and contribution in development of workplace learning; issue a code of good practice in workplace learning; require educational guidance and careers services and the University for Industry to develop appropriate advice, guidance, and support systems to meet adult learners' needs; establish direct funding arrangements for training of part-time and full-time teachers of adults; commission comparative research to identify the benefits and added value to individuals and society of all forms of postcompulsory education and training; and develop a credit accumulation and transfer system that fully recognizes the value of qualifications offered by the National Open College Network. (MN)

This document presents the British government's response to the report "Learning Works," which was written by a committee charged with identifying ways of engaging individuals who have traditionally not taken advantage of educational opportunities. Chapter 1 outlines the following steps that the government proposes to take to promote lifelong learning: extend learning opportunities; make education and training more flexible and accessible; remove barriers to learning; invest in young people; improve the quality, responsiveness, and local accountability of further education colleges; secure improvements in information on learning; and rebalance the partnership for investment in learning. The following government strategies for promoting lifelong learning are discussed in chapters 2-7: widen participation in lifelong learning based on increasing access to learning and providing opportunities for success and progression; form strong partnerships to develop efficient local strategies for learning; factor the need to widen post-16 learning into the Comprehensive Spending Review; develop more equitable mechanisms for financing further education; promote and encourage good practice in widening participation and keep the qualifications framework for post-16 under close review; and stimulate the demand for learning through a coherent system of information, advice, and guidance. (MN)

This paper sets out career-related stories of people and their struggle to make sense of a life through work. They show that career management is not primarily a matching process but, for most, the making of a life the best way one can. The nine stories from five continents have these focuses: a feeling for a career; a career is other people or peer attachment; career and culture which frames belief about how things work and what is important; career over time; cultural capital or the processes of working out how things work begins in the toddler years; points of view on a career move; the inner life of a career; career as purpose knowing what to do to survive, escape, thrive, and flourish; and career learning as learning for action. The paper then argues the power of complexity, including that matching is not the first thing to do; deeper understanding is needed of what is going in the lives of people; and more ways are needed to get to grips with what is happening and what might be done to help. The paper concludes with this implication: among the many things needed to be done is local research for action, so one knows what to do, alongside people, in their communities. There are 28 references. (YLB)

This paper reviews four currently recognized modes of inquiry available to reading researchers, including both qualitative and quantitative approaches. The paper discusses empiricism, interpretive research, critical science/theory, and action research, briefly describing the purposes, goals, and assumptions underlying each mode of inquiry. The paper concludes that reading research must broaden its methodology and work towards shifting paradigms of traditional research. It argues that the most significant aspect of the research activity is to ask the right questions--questions which are pertinent, researchable, and with outcomes directed at a process of change within appropriate social contexts--and notes that a suitable paradigm can be chosen from these questions. (One figure is included and 12 references are attached.) (SR)

This paper explores the traditional European model of vocational training in light of a new focus on employability and lifelong learning that is becoming more common in Europe. It includes the following four sections: (1) an overview of some examples of vocational training systems in Europe and the proposal that they share enough to be considered a European model that includes a consensus that all young people should be given a basic vocational qualification, the involvement of all companies in vocational training, and social dialogue and a tripartite (trade unions, employer associations, government) approach to regulation of the system; (2) a description of some European trends in industries and companies that are of importance for vocational training; (3) discussion about the question of lifelong access to vocational training provisions; and (4) suggestions about the need for change in the European model of vocational training. (KC)

An overview of the achievements and limitations in British school effectiveness research is provided in this paper. In contrast to educational research conducted in the United States, school effectiveness and school improvement disciplines in Great Britain have only begun to emerge within the last 13 years. Topics discussed in this study include the effect of school size on students, differential effectiveness, the consistency of effectiveness over time, school effectiveness characteristics, the future of school effectiveness research in Great Britain, and the lack of integration between school effectiveness research and school improvement practice. A conclusion is that school effectiveness findings have been poorly translated into British school improvement programs. Both disciplines need each other, in that school improvement programs offer empirical tests of school effectiveness research, and school effectiveness research can provide sensitive descriptions of good practice. (98 references) (LMI)

This paper argues that the essential task of English Teachers, since the debut of the National Curriculum English, is not to make qualitative distinctions between literary and media texts nor to place them on some form of hierarchical scale. Media reading should be on equal footing with written literature reading; both involve active engagement with institutions. Rather, the aim should be to help students learn how to evaluate for themselves any kind of text according to content and context. Issues surrounding imaginative engagement with texts are examined, and the threats imposed by dangerous texts, such as video "nasties" and comics, or by unchallenging complacent texts are discussed. New methods are reviewed in which the development of literary response can be deployed with media texts with ease. The purpose of the National Curriculum English Attainment Target 2 (Reading) (Levels 5-10) is presented, and the impact of television soap opera dramas on audiences, particularly children, is highlighted. Non-literary texts must be as accepted as challenging for readers as literary texts. (Contains 23 references.) (NAV)

This paper reviews the current crisis in reading ability decline in British primary schools and how modern language teaching methods are remedying this crisis, specifically the problems in exam and syllabus design. It is suggested that the juxtaposition of phonic and psycholinguistic methods in teaching reading are the root of the continuing question of primacy of structure and meaning. In addition, casual reading may not be a normal pastime of modern students, they may be given insufficient time for reading lessons, and they may not be taught how to read in the first place. Texts used for reading may not allow the full development of comprehension skills. A more refined teaching approach to reading is presented in which reading is based on the type of reading that learners should be doing and when and how, rather than organized around a multitude of activities and exercises. The practical application of reading in the modern languages classroom is discussed, in particular, ways of reading and the content and form of a modern languages program. (Contains 18 references.) (NAV)

Some new work is good work. Quality is ultimately defined by the individual. However, these perceptions are inevitably colored by the circumstances in which people find themselves, by the time, place, and wide range of motivations for having to do a particular job in the first place. One person's quality may be another's purgatory and vice versa. Four important changes in Great Britain's labor market are a major decline in the number of people in manual employment; a rise in skilled employment of people performing managerial, professional, and technical jobs; a rise in mixed but essentially low formal skilled employment performed by "personal and protective" workers; and the continued increase of women in the labor force. The point may be not that newer work is bad or worse because it has replaced older, more traditional industrial and manual jobs but that women do these emerging jobs. Retail has been one of the most maligned types of work, but popular perceptions have been misplaced. ASDA/Walmart has been voted the best place to work in Britain. Some reasons are its approach to its employees or colleagues and the vast range of benefits on offer to them. Retailers like ASDA have been at the forefront of business in restoring job opportunities to parts of Britain that need them the most. Britain needs more good jobs because Britains need to perform better as an entire labor market. (Contains 47 references.) (YLB)

The relationship between literacy, numeracy, and employability was examined by analyzing data on basic skills that were collected in two of Great Britain's birth cohort studies--the National Child Development Study and the 1970 British Cohort Study. The functional literacy and numeracy skills of samples of 10% of the participants in each study were assessed. The analysis showed striking evidence of the significance of literacy and numeracy gains, both in gaining employment on leaving school and also in retaining and progressing in employment. In both cohorts, more than four-fifths of the young people in the lowest literacy and numeracy categories had left school at the minimum age of 16. Most such school leavers in the 1958 cohort were absorbed into the unskilled and semiskilled jobs that existed at the time, whereas two-thirds of such school leavers in the 1970 cohort entered training schemes or became unemployed. Many of the one-third who got jobs gained little job security or occupational training. Qualifications did not fully eliminate the effect of poor basic skills on unemployment and poor numeracy skills had surprisingly large impacts on rates of employment and occupational achievement, particularly in women, for whom poor numeracy skills equated to a "10% penalty" in employment rates. (Thirteen tables/figures are included. The bibliography lists 35 references.) (MN)

The concepts of literacy and health have been evolving and broadening, and interest in the connections between the two has been growing in Australia and elsewhere. However, the scope of practices related to health literacy in the health fields and in the adult literacy education field have remained fairly static. Research has identified the following levels of health literacy and related educational goals: (1) functional health literacy (communication of information); (2) interactive health literacy (development of personal skills); and (3) critical health literacy (personal and community empowerment). Driven by the focus of research, the medical system has responded in two main ways to the difficulties of low-literate patients accessing health information and health education. One has been to develop instruments permitting rapid measurement of patients' literacy levels, and the other has been to assess the readability of medical information and rewrite it in plain language. Health materials have long been part of literacy and English-for-speakers-of-other-languages curricula in Canada, Great Britain, and the United States. Research and policy initiatives in those countries can serve as models to Australian medical service and literacy education providers interested in developing and implementing health literacy collaborations. (A bibliography listing 35 references and an annotated listing of 7 World Wide Web links are included.) (MN)

An analysis of community development in British state policy during the post-war period identifies these four discourses of citizenship implicit within successive phases of policy development: social democracy and the problem of the inactive citizen; structuralist critique and the problem of citizen action; marketization and the problem of citizen as customer; and democratic renewal and the challenge of active citizenship. Such changes in policy actively construct and reconstruct the discourses by means of which it is possible to talk about citizenship and what learning citizenship means, a process more sharply defined in the policy and literature of community development than adult education and lifelong learning. Lifelong learning must be seen as an agent that catalyzes through learning the link between active citizenship and social inclusion, an active political process often more clearly exposed in community development than in the discourse of lifelong learning. New Labor has been promoting democratic renewal. An issue is whether politicians and policymakers grasp the challenge of democratic renewal as a political process in which people in communities are regarded as critical allies and creative actors in the building of a new and inclusive kind of democracy. Community workers and adult educators can foster and sustain such an alliance and become key agents in catalyzing the vital connections among active citizenship, lifelong learning, and social inclusion. (Contains 41 references.) (YLB)

This report records the main themes of the discussions and recommendations made at a policy consultation on the Connexions Service. Section 1 examines the current use of information and communication technologies (ICT) in relation to relevant forms of personal information, advice, and guidance leading to personal development for young people aged 13-19. It reports that over 150 items of software relevant to career education and guidance (CEG) are currently available; hundreds of websites offer help and advice; and Connexions will be delivered through ICT (among other means) have a website, and issue a CD-ROM. Section 2 explores the issues and creative possibilities in developing the role of ICT as a "tier" within the Connexions Service, including its relationship with face-to-face services for young people. Key issues on service delivery are divided among these topics: access, engaging the users, meeting the demand, targeting the service, levels of service, involving young people, and confidentiality. Section 3 identifies the measures needed to assure the accessibility, impartiality, confidentiality, and quality of technically mediated services within Connexions. These issues are addressed: national or local provision, a new building or "in-fill," quality standards, and ICT and the personal advisor. Twelve recommendations are made. (YLB)

The government is introducing a new, integrated support service, the Connexions Service, to provide information, advice, guidance, referral, and support for all young people aged 13-19 in England. Building on the Careers Service, its introduction should have significant implications for careers education and guidance (CEG) in schools. Currently, CEG has four components: a planned program of careers education in the curriculum; a full range of accurate and up-to-date career information; access to advice and guidance; and work experience. Careers services have been required to focus the provision of guidance on pupils with the greatest needs. A consensus view is that the gap between the best and the worst of practice had widened under focusing. These seven main themes emerge from working groups' discussions during a consultation on Connexions: communication; making connections: synergy not substitution (bringing coherence to a range of support services); engaging school senior managers and governors; clarifying roles; impact on CEG; is Connexions a service or a strategy? targeted or universal?; and Connexions as a long-term project. Students should expect the following of a universal Connexions: information, advice, and guidance; access to a network of support; equal opportunities; progress monitoring; tutorial support; impartial careers guidance; support for progression and transition; and advocacy support. Fifteen recommendations addressed mainly to the government have been made. (YLB)

Too many of Britain's workforce lack the skills needed for a knowledge-based economy. To remedy this will require the commitment, in time and resources, of individuals, employers, the education and training infrastructure and the state. Adults with the lowest qualifications have the least access to employer-funded training, especially in small businesses, although there is some evidence that the wage return from training for these workers is greater. Employers' concerns about the loss of their training investment when employees leave for a higher level job can be addressed through training loans linked to the time the employee stays with the firm after training. The costs of adult learning should generally be bourne in these ways by the parties that benefit: the societal benefits of foundational skills to be bourne by government; industry and job-specific skills to be bourne by employers; and general and transferable skills to be bourne by individuals. Building on these principles, the third Skills Task Force report recommends the following: increase the proportion of adults with at least a level 2 qualification to 85% over ten years; provide access to income-contingent loans with preferential terms of repayment for study towards a qualification; provide access to career guidance; promote informal and formal learning; encourage employer involvement through tax credits, and other incentives; encourage more employer-union cooperation; and monitor progress with an annual workplace training audit. (CG)

Challenges will be created by proposed changes to post-school education and training for people with learning difficulties and disabilities. Two important bills have been proposed. The Learning and Skills Bill (LSB) changes the whole architecture of the post-school education and training sector. LSB sets up the Learning and Skills Council (LSC) responsible for planning and funding all post-16 education and training; signals a strong emphasis on and commitment to equality of opportunity; allows LSC to secure provision of boarding accommodation; clearly differentiates between provision for youth aged 16-19 and adults over 19; and introduces a requirement for compulsory assessment of pupils with statements of special educational needs. The new Youth Support Service will be responsible for the implementation of these assessment duties. New powers to secure a wider range of learning could address a major barrier to access for learners with learning difficulties and disabilities. A key question is how the LSC will provide funding. The Disability in Education Bill (DEB) enshrines, for the first time, disability rights in education within legislation. It would make it unlawful to discriminate against a disabled person by failing to make a reasonable adjustment or to treat him or her less favorably. DEB provides a further opportunity to overcome some of the most intransigent barriers to access learning. (YLB)

Britain's new Learning and Skills Bill focuses on learners', not providers', interests. The Learning and Skills Council (LSC) opens up funding for voluntary and community bodies, and organizations from outside education, and has a duty to encourage employers to participate in the provision of post-16 education and training. Local education agencies (LEAs) may establish and maintain secondary schools that provide full-time education only for 16-19 year-olds. The role of local learning partnerships is strengthened, a welcome development given their potential for reflecting the needs of the local community. The bill restricts the power of further education corporations to set up companies for the purpose of providing education or training. Although local authorities have a greater strategic influence over post-16 learning in their local areas, the bill makes it clear that in relation to adult and community education, LEAs are required to secure provision specified by the LSC. LSCs' responsibilities mark a significant shift toward more area-based planning and higher quality. A model gives them the role of assessing needs, generating a plan to meet them, and contracting provision to deliver. Although the planning approach set out is essentially local, patterns of regional and national specialisms have been established. The bill makes it clear that when a course for 16-19 year-olds leads to an external qualification, LSC funds can only be used for programs that lead to approved qualifications. A welcome new focus is on seeking learner feedback. (Contains 37 notes.) (YLB)

The concept of lifelong learning has become important in recent years as adults increasingly need to adapt and innovate, become more flexible workers, and take more active roles in the education of their children. Most of the discussion of lifelong learning, however, is couched in terms of formal educational institutions. But informal learning may require a different vocabulary. A study using videotape clips from a range of British television and Open University programs has been used to illustrate how the concept of "curriculum" changes and functions in learning situations outside those to be found in formal institutional contexts. In more informal learning, "curriculum" can be taken to mean learning opportunities, which are organized in a particular learning situation. This definition contrasts to formal educational institution curriculums, which promulgate what things powerful groups in a particular society think students should learn and focus on subjects rather than processes. Although learning by adults outside workplace contexts or educational institutions is informal, it still can have a curriculum--a way of organizing knowledge--if a broad definition is used. Further research and reflection on issues associated with transferring the language of institutionalized learning into the lifelong learning context are needed. (Contains 20 references.) (KC)

In career guidance, advocacy and self-advocacy encompass a continuum from adviser action separately on behalf of a client, through shared activity, to action by the client alone. Wherever individual clients fall on the continuum, advocacy can be conducted in a manner that empowers them. Modeling is an important aspect of the process of empowerment across the advocacy/self-advocacy continuum. Career advisors can be active in ways that provide models clients can adopt. The national standards underpinning Britain's National Vocational Qualifications for guidance contain a five-stage model for advocacy: (1) explaining advocacy and agreeing that it is appropriate; (2) considering the client's options and agreeing which one to pursue; (3) preparing information and approaches, including contingencies for responses; (4) conducting advocacy in line with the client's wishes and preferences; and (5) ensuring understanding of and commitment to the outcomes of advocacy. According to a study of career services in England, career counselors are using advocacy as follows: address client's internal problems and external problems; partner with other agencies to help surmount barriers facing clients; help clients develop self-advocacy skills; and develop one-on-one mentoring relationships. Advocacy training for career counselors should focus on development of negotiating, motivational interviewing, and mentoring skills. (MN)

The recent history of apprenticeship in Great Britain was examined to identify the issues arising from the latest reforms and future expansion of the system. A team of university academics with strong research interests in training and skills collected information from a large body of academic work in the field of apprenticeship and training and from the contributions of participants at a 1-day seminar. The analysis established that, although the British apprenticeship model of learning and training still enjoys status, failure to modernize and reform the apprenticeship system in the 1970s-1980s has led to a serious decline in numbers trained. The Modern Apprenticeship model was deemed a sound foundation for progress, and a number of ways of further strengthening it were identified. The following policy recommendations were offered: (1) target higher numbers for apprenticeship; (2) improve training content and assessment; (3) develop new pathways leading to apprenticeship; (4) develop new pathways leading from apprenticeship to higher education and full professional status; (5) strengthen sector bodies and employer organizations; (6) encourage employer cooperation to guarantee product and service standards to the consumer; (7) guarantee government financial support for Modern Apprenticeship to all who undertake to train to the required standard; and (8) rethink apprentice status and remuneration. (MN)

Great Britain's New Deal is designed to provide unemployed individuals between the ages of 18 and 24 years with an array of counseling and guidance services called the Gateway. It will include access to independent career advice and a specialist assigned to help them overcome their particular barriers to employment. Key elements of the Gateway are as follows: early, intensive assistance to help job-ready unemployed young people into nonsubsidized jobs; additional training opportunities for individuals who are not ready for immediate employment (work with a voluntary sector organization, work with the Environmental Task Force, or full-time education and training); emphasis on placing clients into long-term employment; local community ownership and delivery of New Deal services in partnership with Great Britain's Employment Service (ES); and continued support for clients after they leave the New Deal. This document, which is designed to explain the New Deal's operational vision to ES employees, explains the following: the New Deal's aims, key elements, and delivery system; differences between the New Deal and existing services for disadvantaged youth; impacts of the New Deal on the ES; and the stages of the New Deal's operation. (MN)

How should schools treat unruly children? Answers to this question are offered, with a focus on children's rights and the abolition of corporal punishment in Britain. The case for children's rights in isolation is not promoted, but rather within the context of the rights and the responsibilities of pupils, teachers, and parents. The discussion provides an historical perspective on physical chastisement in the home and at school, an analysis of the impact of the European Court of Human Rights on the abolition of physical punishment in Britain, and a review of alternative sanctions currently being explored. The debates surrounding corporal punishment in schools are considered, particularly the efforts to reintroduce the practice despite the Court's condemnation of the practice. The emphasis throughout is on the dignity and integrity of the person, based on the international dissemination of legal norms that can serve as a mechanism of social control. But with the greater valuing of children, it is suggested that teachers must also be appreciated and should be supported by an effective school-governance system. Curriculums, too, must be revamped so that offerings will engage pupils' interests and strengths. (RJM)

Study of the history of adult education is worthwhile, despite perceived problems of studying history---ancient, modern, and postmodern. The ancient problems of historiography can best be summed up in the word "antiquarianism." Characteristics of modernity are as follows: the notion that history is progress, metanarratives, nationalist histories, and the study of history for its own sake. In postmodernity, all appears relative and fragmentary. Meaning is constructed within language; therefore, history is conceived as text. There is a very real danger that this postmodernist approach will lead down a blind alley of total relativism where history is merely what the historian makes or just a point of view. Therefore, the historian must always be aware of his or her particular vantage point and of other or different standpoints and must endeavor to engage with them. Because of the large amount of profound wisdom in the past, it would be very arrogant to ignore it. Adult educators can learn from the way many questions dealing with adult education have been tackled in the past. Two themes of special interest are the relationship of adult education to democratic participation and the effect of state funding on adult education. History suggests that a new approach to adult education should involve the less formal voluntary sector of adult education and the new social movements. (Contains 39 references.) (YLB)

This document refines and develops a 1992 proposal by Great Britain's Further Education Unit (FEU) that all kinds of student achievement be documented within a common framework involving the following procedures: describing adult learners' achievements in terms of learning outcomes; grouping the learning outcomes into coherent units; defining the level and size of the units according to a common procedure; and agreeing on a credit value for the unit based on learning outcomes, level, and size. The guide is divided into four sections in which the following topics are discussed: (1) the need for a common approach in the use of learning outcomes (definition of and rationale for learning outcomes, problems in communicating and interpreting learning outcomes, FEU's proposal for a common approach, development of a common set of terms); (2) guidance on communicating and interpreting learning outcomes (use of written statements, checklist for writing learning outcomes, learning outcomes and level descriptors, use of exemplar materials, use of networking and professional contacts); (3) developing units (writing units, approving units, using approved units); and (4) learning outcomes, units, and modules (unitization and modularization, units and modules, and modular delivery systems). Appended are an explanation of terms used in specifying learning outcomes and a sample unit. (MN)

A conviction that democracy required for its citizens access to knowledge and to habits of critical thought has been recognized as a driving dynamic behind educators such as Albert Mansbridge. Britons must reshape their vision for the turn of the millennium, but they need to draw on their inheritance, on the understanding of their predecessors that democracy's promises will always fail without opportunities for the general public to learn about the issues of their time. The roots of this legacy date back 350 years to John Milton who had a view of a social contract based on human freedom and stood for an unrestricted curriculum. Respect and public support should be given to curricula negotiated by learners themselves. Signs of hope are in voluntary organizations for adult learning. They have three characteristics: they are membership bodies, they have adult learning as a major or primary function, and they are held together by some kind of collective social purpose. They may be concerned with broad policies, devoted to the interests of a defined group, or concentrated on a single issue or cluster of issues. However, voluntary organizations need a new look--a perception of adult education as a movement. Adult educators should question orthodoxies of today, include a community development dimension, increase international communication, and study ways of assessing information supplied by computer or the mass electronic media. (YLB)

Education reform in Great Britain during the last 15 years has been piecemeal, and all the pieces are not yet in place for broad and balanced post-16 education. The last 10 years of debate have achieved much common ground among the goals perceived by government, industry, and education. Three major ways of looking at the post-16 curriculum have emerged: the triple track, the all in, and the broad continuum. Some more detailed developments have also been taking place within the 16-19 curriculum: National Vocational Qualifications, General National Vocational Qualifications, education and training targets, core skills, records of achievement, credit accumulation and transfer, modularization, and the place of coursework. Closely related to curriculum development are the delivery of learning and assessment. An increasing use of more flexible approaches to learning is an important element in effective curricular change. Modular developments have, in turn, opened the way for continuous assessment, recognition of partial achievement, and construction of a framework for credit accumulation and transfer. Clear progression must be ensured from school to postcompulsory education and training at 16. Suggestions for a practical program for the 1990s can be grouped into the starting point, institutional practice, and modifications required nationally. A national curriculum must be developed that delivers both breadth and balance through post-16 education and training. (Contains 22 references.) (YLB)

During the past 25 years, self-directed, informal, and independent learning by adults has been the subject of a significant amount of research in North America but comparatively little research in Great Britain. In the United States and Canada, "self-directed learning" has become an umbrella term that has been used by different researchers in a wide range of disciplines to describe a wide variety of phenomena. Allen Tough, who began studying self-directed learning in the 1960s, identified the tasks addressed and assistance obtained during self-teaching projects and the major reasons why adults begin and continue learning projects. Tough's work generated a massive amount of interest in the topic of adults' independent learning efforts, including the first national investigation of self-initiated learning by Penland in 1979, Brockett's 1983 study of self-directed learning among undereducated adults, and several major studies of the organizing circumstances of self-directed learning. Stephen Brookfield has been Great Britain's most prolific writer on self-directed learning. His 1980 doctoral dissertation paved the way for later qualitative and quantitative studies of self-directed learning in Great Britain. British efforts to study self-directed learning have just begun, however, and much more empirical evidence remains to be gathered. (Contains 67 references.) (MN)

The structural and curricular changes currently being experienced by British further education (FE) colleges pose special challenges for FE colleges committed to providing for vocational students with disabilities and learning difficulties. Despite great progress in the area of expanding the educational opportunities available to disabled persons, much work remains to be done to ensure that core skill requirements and the demands of external written tests do not deny access to a significant number of disabled learners. The effectiveness of frameworks for the progression of students with disabilities will depend largely on the attitudes of their parents and the professionals and employers involved in their training. Partnerships remain crucial to ensuring the disabled students' progression to/achievement of National Vocational Qualifications. Formulation of flexible outcomes and individual action plans are also crucial to ensuring that disabled students have access to and achieve success in FE college programs. Regular developments in FE colleges are all relevant to learners with disabilities and learning disabilities, and advice on these topics is available in many Further Education Unit publications. (A sample action plan for FE colleges and action plan development worksheet are included.) (MN)

In the 1960s, most individuals engaged in adult education in Great Britain were romantics in the sense that they considered the impetus of the field to be not just to remedy deficits, make up for inadequate educational resources in the broader society, or meet new needs but also to make learning part of the process of social change itself. Self-selection was advocated as the only student selection criterion, and the number of social and recreational courses provided increased significantly. In January 1970, the British government's Inspectorate held a retreat devoted to critical analysis of the knowledge, insights, and competencies expected of professional adult educators. Such critical analysis marked a break with the liberal romantic tradition. The mid-70s also marked the beginning of a change in attitudes toward adult education that eventually evolved into a "modernist" philosophy/policy endorsing formal, work-related, instrumental opportunities at the expense of broader educational opportunities. An adult education system in which lifelong learning is incorporated into a broad educational system that is considered the focal point of individual and social development leading to a "truly learning society" has been proposed an alternative to the narrowly concentrated adult education now supported and encouraged by the British government. (MN)

What is the value and what are the consequences of students gaining access to "critical" academic discourses about the media? Ideally, the acquisition of an academic discourse should make it possible for students to reflect on their own experience in a systematic and rigorous way. Nevertheless, a critical discourse about the media may sanction a rationalistic approach to popular culture, which fails to engage with children's subcultural experiences and their emotional engagement with the media. It may result in a superficial irony, or indeed a contempt for popular pleasures, which is merely complacent. In Great Britain, the implications of this debate in terms of developing a critical pedagogy in media education remain to be explored. The Vygotskyan perspective may offer a productive alternative to the rather sterile opposition between advocates of progressive and conservative approaches to critical pedagogy. While acknowledging the central importance of children's existing knowledge and the need for active learning, it also stresses the necessity of students acquiring and participating in dominant academic discourses. While it is true that giving children access to privileged discourses is vital, it is equally important that they should learn to interrogate them. The claim that academic discourse is inherently scientific and thus superior to the ideology of popular discourse must be open to question. The concepts and methods of analysis that teachers introduce to students must be seen, not as neutral tools for the acquisition of knowledge, but as themselves ideological. (Fifty-one notes are included; 59 references are attached.) (PRA)

The current discourse about access can be changed by using three adjectives: old, wide, and deep. Regarding the first, since the 1870s, when the professionalization and specialization of knowledge took off in so many fields, inequalities in education have actually increased where it matters most--who knows how much of what is available to be known. Second, the conversation must be widened beyond education. Increasingly, the discourse in Britain has widened into a cultural, historical one concerning patterns of class development. Third, access also stretches down deeply into where people, including old people, live and die, into their very selves. A dream or vision for education begins and ends with the individual. In this vision, education is market led; experience is used to make courses relevant to experience; learners replace teachers; and learners produce their own pathway or choice of courses that together make a degree or whatever aggregate it is that they want. General emancipation can drive access as a fully social movement alongside the economic imperative it undoubtedly is. Three quick benchmarks are as follows: (1) learners need access to the best; (2) the worlds of education and training must be brought together; and (3) access cannot be other than awkward and painful. Finally, access depends on funding. (A list of 32 notes is appended.) (YLB)

An organizing framework is presented that can help integrate the large mass of apparently disparate work on written language. The starting point of the paper was collections of articles of reading, writing, and literacy, which seemed not to have a conceptual framework. Ways are discussed that knowledge from linguistics as an academic discipline and from other sources might be transformed into an educational research program. The problem of how the discipline might be reorganized into something new by linguists and educators working collaboratively is examined. The proposed organizing framework is referred to as the constituents of an educational theory of language, with specific reference to the British Association for Applied Linguistics conference. Two sets of points are identified as axiomatic: (1) the distinction between written and spoken language is an extreme idealization; and (2) a particular cluster of language characteristics (standard, written, formal) is fundamental to the British education system. It is suggested that the relationship between the social institution of the education system and the concepts of written and standard language must be analyzed. An educational theory of written language must include the following components: an institutional basis, a sociocultural basis, a developmental aspect, a way to handle descriptive information, a theory of language variation, a language policy and planning component, and ways to relate language studies to pedagogical and classroom practice. Each of these aspects of the theory is discussed in some detail. Contains 70 references. (LB)

This paper discusses the financial support of libraries in general, and encourages information professionals to do more to communicate the value of libraries and library services to politicians and others involved in the distribution of public funds. Nineteen references are cited. (FM)

Originally presented as lectures at Georgia State University in 1982, these three papers address the themes of multiethnic societies in the United States and Great Britain. In the first paper "Identity, Conflict, and Survival Mechanisms for Asian Americans," the author discusses how the observable patterns of mobility through education and community development are consequences of meaningful action and interaction among millions of Asian Americans over time. Cultural identity and the process of assimilation of Caribbean Americans is the focus of the second paper. The barriers to assimilation faced by many Caribbean migrants have caused many of them to question the viability of this goal and to turn to ethnic bargaining as a way of competing for political strength and survival in the United States. The third paper examines British racial and educational policies in the 1960s and 1970s. The evolution of Britain into a multiracial society has been marked by ambiguity in policy that has been both welcoming and resistant (and sometimes racist). British education has, most of the time, paid lip service to the goals of multiracism, while being less than positive in its pursuit. (RM)