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This report explores how forms of social inequality are framed in adult education discourses across Europe and Australia. To achieve this goal, it presents an analysis of the concept of vulnerability in lifelong learning policies, at European level and national level (Austria, Bulgaria, England, Estonia, Flanders, Italy, Scotland, Slovakia, Spain and Australia). Methods of analysis include corpus-based critical discourses analysis of 68 European lifelong learning documents (1992-2018), interviews with policy makers (6), analysis of funding schemes (European Social Fund) and analysis of vulnerable groups in the lifelong learning policies of the nine countries forming part of ENLIVEN [Encouraging Lifelong Learning for an Inclusive and Vibrant Europe] including Australia.

Results show that the use of terminology related to vulnerability is not used uniformly throughout the period analysed. It is detected during the first period (1992-1999), documents refer to the most vulnerable groups as marginal or excluded. From the year 2000 the main vulnerability indicator seems to be the low labour capacities. The implicit motives suggested in relation to 'vulnerable groups' appear to be educational attainment (low qualified, early schools leavers, migrant background and age), to which are added structural motives related to their origin (people from disadvantaged social strata, poverty niches or disadvantaged areas) or to global factors (lack of employment, development of the learning society). Faced with this situation, the policies analysed propose, above all, to develop the basic skills and new competences needed to enter the world of work.

With regards to national policies, across all the countries studied within the EU as well as Australia, unemployment, alongside low levels of skills, were the most prevalent dimensions of vulnerability targeted by policy measures. By understanding the concept of vulnerability solely in relation to the labour market, young vulnerable young people are framed as lacking certain attributes - those that would enable them to be incorporated into the world of paid employment. Those attributes they do possess - however valuable to themselves personally, or to society - go unrecognized. In this context, the proposal that lifelong learning policies should focus on individual needs without addressing structural measures seems insufficient. Moreover, this situation constrains the rationale of adult education, forgetting its critical and creative dimension that seeks a deep analysis of reality in order to transform it.

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Moral panics relating to anti-social youth have accelerated in recent years, and there has been an increasing recognition that preventing problematic behaviour is more effective than sanctions once it occurs. Drawing upon General Strain Theory, this paper explores the social pressures that might stimulate anti-social behaviour and gang culture. It explores the impact of schools/youth work partnerships, focusing upon empirical data arising from a small-scale educational intervention involving vulnerable young people (aged 11-12) in Glasgow. The findings illustrate that the 35 young people who participated in the initiative gained an increase in social capital, changed their reactions to social strains and demonstrated a change in their self-reported participation in anti-social behaviour. However, the participants continued to view teachers and youth workers as two distinct groups with differing ideologies, and a collaborative 'border-crossing' pedagogy was never fully realised. The paper draws upon the insights to identify future implications for policy, practice and research.

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The best defence against social exclusion is having a job, and the best way to get a job is to have a good education, with the right training and experience. But every year some 161,000 young people between 16 and 18 are not involved in any education, training or employment. For the majority these are wasted and frustrating years that lead, inexorably, to lower pay and worse job prospects in later life. The report sets out in detail both the scale and nature of the problem. It shows that while most young people enjoy a fairly smooth transition from school to work, often passing through A levels and university, a large minority lack support or guidance, and clear pathways to take them along the way to good jobs and career opportunities. It proposes establishing a much better support service, founded around personal advisers, to guide young people through their teenage years and help them get around the problems that might stop them from making the most of learning. It proposes a clear goal for young people to aim for with a new approach to graduation that would set a demanding, but achievable, standard encompassing not only formal qualifications but also other achievements in key skills and the community.

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Prior to the onset of the [Coronavirus Disease 2019] COVID-19 crisis, there were already 760,000 young people not in education or employment in the UK. The Institute for Fiscal Studies has recently shown that young people are 2.5 times more likely to be working in the sectors most affected by the pandemic and there are fears that its economic impact will lead to an additional 640,000 unemployed 18 to 24-year-olds this year. Furthermore, more than one-in-three in this age group are earning less than before the outbreak, around a quarter of them have been furloughed and one-in-seven young people are now claiming unemployment benefits. The government has made a huge commitment to employers and their staff by creating the Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme (CJRS) and extending it until October. However, further action will be needed to protect jobs and opportunities for young people so that, as redundancies are made, young people are still able to move forward in their careers.

The [Youth Employment Group] YEG recommends that clear objectives are set to monitor progress in supporting young people during the economic crisis and beyond, including: (1) The seasonally adjusted 18-24 'Not in Education, Employment or Training' (NEET) rate (using the Labour Force Survey measure) should return to below prepandemic level in every nation of the UK by October 2021; and (2) Nobody aged 18-24 should spend more than six months unemployed before accessing a meaningful education or employment opportunity. The recommendations in this paper are intended to help the government, the YEG and all other youth employment stakeholders achieve such objectives together.

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Communities for Work (CfW) is a voluntary programme to help those adults furthest away from the labour market into employment. The programme targets long term unemployed and economically inactive adults and 16-24 year olds not in employment education or training. It seeks to increase their employability and to move into or closer to employment. The evaluation has been delivered over three phases between October 2016 and June 2018. The first two reports were published in April and December 2017. The first report outlines the theory of change and the inherent logic model underpinning CfW. The second report assesses how the programme was set up and how it is operating. The third report builds on the theory of change to assess the emerging outcomes and impacts of the programme.

The methods included an online survey of front line delivery staff, interviews with operational managers across the Welsh Government, the DWP and Lead Delivery Bodies, reviewing the database of participants and qualitative fieldwork in 19 cluster areas.

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Education Links is an independent magazine that provides a radical critique of Australian education. For more than two decades it has been a voice for students, educators and community members working to bring about democratic and socially progressive educational change. The magazine presents a socialist analysis of a wide range of educational issues and is not affiliated with any political party. Education Links is produced by an editorial group of teachers, students and university staff.

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Contents: Editorial: education and social action; What's missing?: popular education and new discourses / Rick Flowers; Social Action Learning and Work, which contains: Why can't TAFE appreciate us?: resisting cuts in education: one story / Derek Waddell, Resisting cuts in education: using both industrial and political strategies / Keiko Yasukawa, Politicising learning in the workplace: context and method / Griff Foley, and Analysing workers' history through a 'learning lens' / Linda Cooper; Teachers Work, Students Lives and Access, which contains: The politics of education 'reform' / Richard Walsham, A facade for union bashing?: the Ramsey Report on teacher education in [New South Wales] NSW / Kelvin McQueen, 'Listen to me I'm leaving' / Robert Hattam and John Smyth, Scales of injustice: working with young people / Debra Hayes, Collaborating for social justice? / Lyn Tett, and Knowledge creation: a challenge for higher education in Ireland / Anne Ryan and Ann O'Brien; Cultural Action, which contains: From Freire to Boal / Hernan Flores, Risk and play: group devised theatre creation / Paul Murray, Theatre: art or action / Bridget Mary Aitchison, The anti-racism radio show / Ben Zion Weiss, and Kids locked up / Peter Slattery; Viewpoint: behind the rhetoric / Rowan Cahill; Loose links. Show less

Worldwide, young people are three times more likely than their parents to be out of work. In Greece, Spain, and South Africa, more than half of young people are unemployed, and jobless levels of 25 per cent or more are common in Europe, the Middle East, and Northern Africa. In the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) countries, more than one in eight of all 15- to 24-year-olds are not in employment, education, or training (NEET). Around the world, the International Labour Organization estimates that 75 million young people are unemployed. Including estimates of underemployed youth would potentially triple this number. This represents not just a gigantic pool of untapped talent; it is also a source of social unrest and individual despair. Paradoxically, there is a critical skills shortage at the same time. Across the nine countries that are the focus of this report (Brazil, Germany, India, Mexico, Morocco, Turkey, Saudi Arabia, the United Kingdom, and the United States), only 43 per cent of employers surveyed agreed that they could find enough skilled entry-level workers. This problem is not likely to be a temporary blip; in fact, it will probably get much worse. The McKinsey Global Institute estimates that by 2020 there will be a global shortfall of 85 million high- and middle-skilled workers. The education, employment, social, and political systems of these nine countries span a wide spectrum. It is observed, however, that certain preferences and practices pertain across borders. By studying these commonalities and outcomes, the report is able to define global segments of young people and employers in much the same way that consumer-product companies define segments of different kinds of shoppers. The attitudes and behaviors that matter most begin to emerge. This analysis is central to the way this issue is understood, and it represents a new way of thinking about how to address the twin crises of joblessness and the skills shortage. The journey from education to employment is a complicated one, and it is natural that there will be different routes. But too many young people are getting lost along the way.

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This article investigates the impact of the relationship between learning providers and young people who have experienced not being in education, employment or training (NEET) on the latters' agency development. Agency is defined as not only bounded but generated by intra-action with relations of force, including learning providers themselves. Providers facilitate the development of individual agency in the form of self-esteem and motivation. However, they also support activation into the labour market and, in doing so, add barriers and challenges to established institutional structures and personal boundaries. Emotional labour strategies utilised by learning providers reveal the potentially negative impact of their values, backgrounds and experiences.

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Barely 30 years on from the advent of distance learning as we recognise it today, it has already become uncommon for a learner to embark on a programme of education that does not involve frequent access to the Internet; but if a course does not revolve around the Internet, is it in any way inferior and is the learner disadvantaged? Two of the purposes of this paper are to examine two distance learning programmes, one of which involves young offenders serving long sentences, and to explore whether or not learners with restricted Internet access are destined to lose out in an educational setting. In doing so, learner anxiety and organisational anxieties and the implications for pastoral care are also examined.

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This paper explores the educational experiences of young people who had been at risk of dropping out and gained a qualification at a second chance provision. It is based on comparative fieldwork in England, Denmark and Hungary with empirical data collected from observations; and 28 interviews with former students. By listening to the voices of students, the analysis focused on the relevance of different sources of support. The findings revealed that individual study pathways and intensified guidance effort led students to pursue their career in higher education and/or in the labour market.

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