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Inequality in educational attainment is a serious and increasing problem in Scotland and the rest of the United Kingdom, and youth mentoring is gaining popularity as an intervention to address this issue. However, evidence for the effectiveness of mentoring is weak, and research suggests that a large proportion of mentoring relationships end prematurely, which can be harmful to young people. This article draws on data from the Glasgow Intergenerational Mentoring Network, an ongoing research and development project facilitating mentoring for secondary school pupils in socially disadvantaged areas, employing retired professionals as volunteer mentors. Case material is presented to discuss the nature of mentoring and the role of the mentor. This article conceptualizes volunteer mentors as relational experts, relational learners, and nonrelational mentors. The implications of these categories are discussed in terms of recruitment, training, and support of mentors, to facilitate ethical and effective mentoring relationships. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

ABSTRACT This article explores the experiences of education, training and employment services for people with learning difficulties, examining the operation of the social market across these different spheres. It begins by discussing some broad features of the market within the public policy arena and the particular models adopted in post-school education, training and community care. Subsequently, drawing on the research project The Meaning of the Learning Society for Adults with Learning Difficulties the authors interrogate the accounts given by different professional groups of the way in which the market works in practice and juxtapose these with the experiences of people with learning difficulties whose lives were explored through ethnographic case studies. The authors conclude that the choices of those with the most significant learning difficulties are restricted because of their impairments, but some degree of choice is possible for all. For most people with learning difficulties, choices are restricted not so much by their impairments as by the ethos and structures of the services they use. It appears that potential or current economic activity is used as a gateway to consumer citizenship and those who are deemed to be of only marginal economic value have access to a restricted range of services which tend to be allocated rather than chosen. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article describes a project which examined the mental health needs of young people with learning disabilities in Great Britain. The project, entitled "What's Happening?," monitored learning disabled young people with experiences of anxiety or depression through interviews, photographs and video diaries. The Foundation for People with Learning Disabilities commissioned the University of Strathclyde to conduct the study.

This article draws on findings from an Economic and Social Research Council funded research project entitled ‘Disabled Students and Multiple Policy Innovations in Higher Education’ (R000239069). It begins with a brief review of theories of social justice and their implications for widening access policies for disabled students. Social justice may be conceptualised in relation to the distribution of social goods and cultural recognition. Related to distribution, data from the Higher Education Statistics Agency are used to analyse the progress which has been made in expanding the number of disabled students in higher education and the wider social characteristics of disabled students. Related to recognition, the article considers changes which have been made at the institutional level to make the academic environment more conducive to the inclusion of disabled students. It is noted that new public management has often been used as the vehicle for achieving social justice goals. Whilst progress has been made in relation to redistribution and recognition, the adoption of managerialist strategies has had some negative effects. For example, dyslexic students who tend to be male and middle class have been the greatest beneficiaries of the expansion, whereas poorer disabled students and those with more significant impairments have been less likely to be included. In addition, the adoption of a categorical approach for the purposes of social audit does not fit readily with disabled students' conception of self. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Higher education in the UK has been through a period of major change since the mid-1980s. A massive expansion in the number of students has been coupled with a reduction in the unit of resource, increased inter-institutional competition and greater accountability. Within this demanding context, pressure has also been applied to institutions to improve accessibility for disabled people, through funding council mechanisms, quality assurance procedures and, more recently, changes in legislation. Drawing on the findings of an ESRC-funded research project, Disabled students and multiple policy innovations in higher education , involving a survey of higher education institutions, the article describes and discusses the current state of policy and provision for disabled students in higher education in Scotland and England. It concludes that, while there are definite signs of progress in the development of provision for disabled students, many areas need much further attention. A particular area of concern is teaching and learning. Effecting real change in this area means addressing questions which challenge conventional notions of effective teaching and learning practice. It is argued that improvements in provision for disabled students in this area would mean improvements for all students. Disability is still seen as a fairly distinct policy area, mainly addressed by student support services. Further significant progress can only be made if disability is embedded into all institutional policies and procedures. Its relocation, particularly in the area of teaching and learning, however, will demand a significant commitment on the part of all institutions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article draws on work undertaken as part of the Economic and Social Research Council's Learning Society Programme. The project from which data are drawn, entitled 'The Meaning of the Learning Society for Adults with Learning Difficulties', focused on lifelong learning opportunities available to people with learning difficulties and experiences of these services. The article begins by examining theories of late modernity, their use by feminist and disability studies theorists and their relationship to ideas of a learning society. Subsequently, using case study material, it is argued that the identities of people with learning difficulties are not chosen freely from a range of options but are socially ascribed. The status of learning difficulties is used as a dominant category to justify deprivation of basic political and economic rights. In addition, the lives of people with learning difficulties are structured by gender and class, and these intersect with the category of learning difficulties. For both women and men, the advantages of middle-class social and economic capital are overridden by the negative category of learning difficulties. In relation to gender, men with learning difficulties are more likely to receive post-school training, but in inappropriate areas of the labour market. Their domestic needs are also likely to be attended to by others, but in the absence of employment, they find themselves without any valued social role. Women with learning difficulties are also likely to be excluded from the labour market, but are more likely to be involved in reciprocal, albeit limited, social relationships. It is concluded that postmodernist theories are inadequate to describe the structuring of the lives of people with learning difficulties. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Analyzes empirical research through the concept of social capital and people with learning difficulties in Great Britain. Re-focusing of the transition from school to adulthood for people with learning difficulties onto education and training; Social capital theories; Marxian theories of social capital and their implications for people with learning difficulties.