This paper examines recent changes in the Scottish apprenticeship system of skill formation for joiners through an occupational skill ecosystem lens. Building trade apprenticeships in Scotland are based around a social partnership model more akin to 'dual systems' than typical arrangements elsewhere…
In order to promote effective pedagogical practices for students' work-based learning, we need to understand better how students' learning at work can be supported. This paper examines the factors explaining students' workplace learning (WPL) outcomes, addressing three aspects: (1) student-related i…
In this article, we are interested in how employment - or employability - is connected to citizenship, and how the ideal subjectivity of worker-citizens is discursively constructed in curriculum texts. The 'worker-citizen' is a social construction that connects closely the notion of worker and the n…
This paper analyses the workplace learning experiences of young male retail employees. Deeming formal education highly unattractive, the pursuit of lifelong learning and continuous development for such people relies on workplace learning. Their experiences, however, over several years and across var…
This article examines the goals of employers when they organise work placements for students. It explores how far, in cooperating with polytechnics, employers adhere to a connective model of students' work experiences within their organisations. The paper makes use of a quantitative study based on e…
This paper reports on recent research into enterprise skill profiles and workplace training practices in the Bangladesh manufacturing industry. The article presents survey and interview data for 37 enterprises across eight manufacturing sectors collected during a study for the International Labour O…
The paper is based on a study of apprentices in retail and motor vehicle maintenance in England and Germany, exploring their perceptions of themselves as learners over time and in particular learning environments. The study combines biographical interviews with participant observation in colleges an…
While many studies of work-related learning (WRL) in the English 14-19 curriculum have examined the impact on young people of WRL programmes and initiatives, this article explores why employers become involved with WRL, the mechanisms by which engagement takes place and the opportunities and challen…
This article focuses on a range of macro-level issues that frame debates about industry/education interaction in the UK. It explores a number of features that underpin the structure of the debate, including the declining 'Britishness' of much of British business and the emergence of business as a fo…
The paper discusses five work-related secondary school courses in Canada, providing an empirical account through which a new way of conceptualising vocational education is developed. Using a case study approach, we identify the mutually reinforcing dimensions of education - from policy to the course…
Successive governments, agencies and employer organisations have stressed the need for school leavers to be better prepared for working life, in particular, to achieve what are frequently termed employability skills; schools are expected to contribute to this policy agenda. Some academic commentator…
The idea of learning outcomes seems to increasingly dominate education policy internationally. Many claims are made about what they can achieve, for example, in enabling comparison of qualifications across countries, improving the recognition of prior learning and improving educational quality. The …
This paper gives a critical assessment of the relationship between learning outcomes and the governance of education and training systems. Learning outcomes are defined as an instrument that might work at different levels with different meanings and different results: at the level of education and t…
Enhancing school-to-work transitions for youth is a policy focus of secondary schools in most OECD countries. This paper examines one organisation's efforts to encourage high school youth to consider careers in health care by providing them with summer internship opportunities. We adopt an embedded …
This article explores the impact of student self-financing systems on inequalities of access to higher education (HE) through comparative analysis of two national systems, those of England and Australia. The analysis of the historical development of HE in each nation identifies a set of comparative …
Countries around the world have witnessed educational expansion at all levels, leading to the massification of tertiary education and training. Tertiary education has become a major factor of economic competitiveness in an increasingly science-based global economy and a key response to shifts in nat…
This paper discusses the findings from a one-year ethnographic study of young people attending Entry to Employment (E2E) programmes in two local authorities in the north of England. The paper locates E2E within the broader context of provision for low-achieving young people and of UK government poli…
A theoretical approach is formulated that connects various theories of why education has an effect on labour market outcomes with institutional settings in which such theories provide the most likely mechanism. Three groups of mechanisms are distinguished: education as an indicator of productive ski…
Not having clear pathways, or the social means and personal capacities to make a productive transition from schooling, can inhibit young people's participation in social and economic life thereafter. This paper advances an analysis of how policy documents associated with senior schooling from across…
