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Using data from the NIACE 2002 Adult Learners Survey [survey report indexed at TD/TNC 74.137] and the ESRC Learning Society Programme, this article considers the prevalence and socio-economic determinants of work-based learning. The focus area is industrial South Wales, where the growth and sudden demise of the coal and steel industries provides a useful case study of the purported link between skill and economic success. The article is not able to present much clear evidence in favour of the economic strand of the learning society. Successive policies have not actually been conducive to real increases in training opportunities. Work-based training is not rising, is not being funded by employers in the main, and is predictable to a large extent from long-term social and family characteristics of each individual.

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This paper presents the results of a large-scale survey of undergraduates in England, concerning their envisaged career choices and how they made them. This gives a more complete account of those who do and do not want to be teachers than usual in the existing literature based primarily on prospective/existing teacher accounts. The paper looks at the issue of shortages, the reasons why people might be deterred from teaching, and summarises the methods used in our new study, followed by the results. The results cover descriptive analyses, and a comparison of responses from those who considered being a teacher (or not), those who had applied to train as a teacher (or not), and those intending to teach. These results are put together in two logistic regression models, one predicting/explaining who considered teaching, and the second explaining who then intends to become a teacher. Conclusions are drawn in the final section.

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The current government has placed lifelong learning high on its agenda, both for reasons of economic benefit and to increase social inclusion. At ‘half-term’, what are the prospects for a ‘pass’ in this course? Using data from a new National Institute of Adult Continuing Education (NIACE) survey of adult participation in learning, and early results from participant observation of the setting up of a virtual college as well as published findings from pilot studies for the University for Industry, this article considers the challenges facing the government in widening participation through the use of digital technology. The ‘problem’ of widening access to learning opportunities for all, is not a new one and it is unlikely to be the one with a simple technical fix. The conclusion drawn here is that the emerging use of digital technology is likely to replicate the existing inequalities in access to learning. Despite the fine efforts of those involved, and some ingenious technical and distributional suggestions, the recommendation must therefore be that we all try harder.

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There is widespread international concern that young people from disadvantaged backgrounds and some ethnic minorities are less likely to continue education or training after compulsory schooling, or are less likely to follow the highest-status and prestigious routes. Based on work done in the UK, this paper presents the results of a systematic review of evidence from 1996 to 2011. The review identified only 14 intervention studies with a robust evaluation, intended to encourage participation and retention in post-compulsory education for disadvantaged ethnic minority groups. Of these, the most promising approaches were the use of extrinsic motivation for behaviour and attendance (payment by results), and the close personal engagement of adult mentors. Both were tried in the USA, and so the paper concludes that they should be adapted for contexts elsewhere, including the UK, and tested carefully. Given limitations of funding for research, other approaches should not receive priority.

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This paper reports on evidence, drawn from fifty years of survey data, of the importance of social background in determining participation in adult education and training. The study finds that over the period initial education has lengthened but later participation in formal learning has decreased in frequency, duration and the proportion funded by employers, and thus later training is more determined by socio-economic characteristics, especially gender. Show less

This paper illustrates the social determinants of lifelong learning histories as uncovered in a large-scale survey and interview analysis carried out as part of the [Economic and Social Research Council] ESRC Learning Society Programme, and previously reported in this journal. The statistical ‘determinants’ of adult participation in learning as described there, such as family background or gender, are examined here in terms of individual stories as well as theoretical models derived from earlier phases of this project. The two forms of data and their analyses appear to accord, suggesting perhaps that concepts of structure (determinants) and agency (choice) are not mutually incompatible in explaining patterns of adult learning. Choices are anyway made within subjective opportunity structures (which include notions of what is ‘appropriate’ for each person).

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We study transitions between different types of formal and informal employment using retrospective job histories from a new survey in Bangladesh. Workers transitioning between jobs are most likely to remain in the same type of employment, although there is still substantial churn across employment types. Private wage employees have higher probability of transitioning to a new job, and changes in earnings and benefits suggest evidence of upward mobility. Nevertheless, there is also non-trivial risk of downward mobility, especially for those transitioning into casual employment, which has the lowest level of earnings and benefits and the highest levels of exposure to workplace hazards and violence. Overall, the informal sector appears to include subpopulations consistent with both the traditional view that it is a segmented portion of the labor market with few prospects of upward mobility, and with the alternative view that it is a dynamic, entrepreneurial alternative to wage employment.

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The role of information and communications technology (ICT) in widening participation in lifelong learning, and thereby establishing the UK as a bona fide ‘learning society’, is now enshrined in a series of multi-million pound government initiatives such as the University for Industry, learndirect and UK Online. Although politicians and educationalists have been quick to herald such initiatives as revolutionising postcompulsory education and extending learning opportunities to ‘anyone’ on an ‘anytime, anywhere’ basis, there has been little empirical analysis of how ICT is actually impacting on patterns of lifelong learning in the UK. With this in mind, the present paper presents an analysis of data from the 2002 National Institute of Adult Continuing Education (NIACE) survey of 5885 households, focusing on learners’ access to technology and the role that technology is playing in facilitating learning.

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This article takes as its background the shift over time in Britain towards models of target setting in education which are based almost entirely on measurable outputs. The original 'headline' targets proposed by the National Council for Educational Technology were of a very different nature, as are those of many other developed nations. The article outlines some alternative models involving targets for both inputs and processes, and the use of targets which are exhortative rather than directly measurable. It is suggested that the main reason these more 'qualitative' targets have disappeared from British policy-making is that they are not considered to be directly measurable. This is contrasted, at least in some accounts, with the more visible output indicators. However, the substantive purpose of this article is to show how weak the claim is that we can ever adequately measure even these privileged targets. The article therefore argues that if a policy of target setting is to be pursued, and given other findings from the authors' study in Wales this is far from clear, then more sophisticated models than those in current vogue may be required. The expense involved in setting up such an extension to our already heavily audited society may be unjustified - for it is surely better to spend money on improving lifelong learning even if we cannot measure that improvement definitively, than to have an accurate metric revealing a picture of stagnation or worse.

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The Internet has recently been heralded by both politicians and educators as a ready means of promoting 'lifelong learning' and widening the numbers of adults participating in education. Yet, despite such enthusiasm, the use of technology to attract adults to lifelong learning is only now beginning to be implemented on a widespread basis. Thus much of the technology-based vision of a 'learning society' remains empirically unproven. This paper, therefore, concentrates on the longer established efforts being made in Wales to use the Internet as a gateway for learning opportunities for adult learners. Focusing on a Web-based Welsh language program over a 12 month period the paper empirically examines the role of the Internet in providing effective access procedures to adult learning and, moreover, gains a sense of who such methods are attracting and what learners are beginning to use the Internet for. In particular the paper examines: how the program was presented on the Internet; when learners were using the Internet-based learning program and what they were using it for; and, finally, who was accessing the learning program via the Internet and how usage of the program reflected the wider goals of extending participation beyond those social groups already engaged in learning.

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