Social violence and the trivialising effects of youth in school bullying: Extended listening to South Australian young people on bullying and violence

School bullying attracts significant research and resources globally, yet critical questions are being raised about the long-term impact of these efforts. There is a disconnect between young people's perspectives and the long-established psychology-based technical definitions of school bullying dominating practice and policy in Australia. This dominant paradigm has recently been described as the first paradigm of school bullying. In contrast, this paper explores the potential for reorienting school bullying research towards the concerns of young people and away from adult-derived technical definitions. Borrowing from paradigm two, which emphasises the social, cultural and philosophical (among others) elements of school bullying, in this paper, I approach bullying under the broad banner of ‘social violence’. This approach addresses some of the inherent limitations of the first paradigm to conceptualise social and cultural dynamics. I argue that a ‘social violence’ approach reveals that the exclusionary effects of the social phenomenon of youth continue to be overlooked. Furthermore, the term ‘violence’ in bullying research could benefit from integrating contemporary sociological insights on this phenomenon. This paper draws on qualitative insights from a small group of young people in secondary schooling in South Australia gained through prolonged listening to peer conversations in a series of focus groups. In addition, 1:1 interviews were conducted pre and post the focus group series. I argue that these participants' insights reveal the exclusionary effects of youth and the employment of bullying to trivialise young people's experiences and concern for harm. There is a need to reprioritise young people's knowledge in school bullying research and the exclusionary effects of youth alongside other social forces.     

Youth transition to employment in Vietnam: a vulnerable path

Literature suggests that educational attainment is one of the significant factors affecting youth transition to work. The process of capital accumulation through education is suggested as the key marker of social inclusion and exclusion. This paper compares the educational attainment among youth in Vietnam with their status in employment. It uses the data from the school-to-work transition survey of the International Labour Office with 2722 youth participants aged 15–29 in different geographical areas in Vietnam. The findings indicate that Vietnamese youth have to face many challenges when negotiating their transition to work, especially when the educational attainment of the majority youth is low. A wide gap between education and learners’ needs and interests, the economic burden many young people had to bear and the low level of development of the economy with a large proportion of the informal sector are the main reasons for youth in Vietnam to leave school early and to accept low quality work to earn their living. These problems need to be solved to help youth in Vietnam approach better jobs in the market.     

Rural young people’s work/study priorities and aspirations: The influence of family social capital

The transition from school to secure work has become more difficult as young people bear the brunt of the restructuring of the Australian labour market. Young people raised in a rural community are over-represented in the most disadvantaged labour market group- those who have not participated in post-school training and who have experienced long periods of unemployment. Rural labour markets feature lower paid, less secure jobs than their urban counterparts. Education is a proven way of accessing the ‘better’ jobs offered by national labour markets. Why then do young people from disadvantaged rural areas not take up education and training opportunities to the same extent as their urban counterparts? The research discussed in this paper investigated ways in which family and school/community social capital influence young people’s work/study values and priorities with regard to post-school pathways. Family networks and information that are limited and concentrated in rural areas tend to be associated with a desire to find a job before completing school, preferably located near to home. Incomplete understanding and lack of trust of educational institutions and labour markets in urban centres based on local experience may be transmitted through advice of family and friends and influence young people toward current work rather than the longer term goal of post-compulsory education. The implications for regional and national programs of educational and community development are discussed.     

Assembling the actors: exploring the challenges of ‘system leadership’ in education through Actor-Network Theory

This paper presents insights into the leadership implications of recent shifts in a range of policy contexts towards notions of collaboration and partnership. The paper draws on empirical research into the formation and operation of government instituted networks in the context of education in Victoria, Australia. From 2001, School Networks and Local Learning and Employment Networks (LLEN) were implemented by the state government to support young people in their transition through school and into employment in a context of a risk society, a context where pathways into sustainable employment for young people, and others, had become more erratic. For comparative purposes, the paper also draws on published research into the implementation of joined-up approaches, including Primary Strategy Learning Networks (PSLN), in England. Using concepts from Actor-Network Theory (ANT), the paper argues for the value of considering the full range of actors – both human and non-human, real and unreal – involved in networking initiatives and proposes some thoughts on the implications of such a sociology of associations for both leadership and governance.     

Economic Liberalisation,Qualifications and Livelihoods in Sri Lanka

Sri Lanka experienced a rapid expansion of population in the first few decades following Independence in 1948. Population growth far outstripped the rate of growth of the economy which remained mostly dependent on primary production for export and domestic consumption. Introduction of universal free education pre-dated political independence and led to rapid school enrolments. In a slow-growth economy, dominated by state enterprises, education became the main avenue of upward social mobility for many underprivileged young people. Increasing competition for education and white-collar employment in the then dominant state sector in the 1960s and the 1970s necessitated policy interventions that were not necessarily fair to all competing social and ethnic groups. In the late 1970s, the policy focus shifted from education to liberal economic reforms aimed at generating economic growth and employment creation. Early gains in terms of economic expansion were slowed down by the ethnic conflict that erupted in 1983 and continues to retard economic development in the country. While the affluent strata continue to gain from the open economic and liberal educational environment in terms of income and lucrative employment opportunities, many young people from lower social strata who possess conventional paper qualifications live in despair looking for scarce white-collar jobs. Those who have resources to invest in overseas training and/or foreign qualifications are in an advantaged position in the competition for private and transnational sector employment.     

Negotiating uncertain economic times: Youth employment strategies in England

Higher education is commonly understood as the gateway to better, higher‐paying jobs. This paper draws on longitudinal survey and interview data to explore how different groups of young people, those who left school at 18 and those graduating from higher education, negotiated pathways into employment or otherwise during the recent economic recessionary climate in England. While a mix of employment and unemployment featured in both groups, with temporary and unstable contracts more common than skilled and secure jobs, our evidence reveals that those with degrees were less likely to be in work at the ages of 22 to 23 than those who left school to enter employment at 18. In some contradistinction to popular discourses on the employability benefits of higher education therefore, entering paid work at 18 was a more effective strategy for being in employment five years later than proceeding into higher education.     

Secondary school leavers and the labour market in Swazilandes y el mercado de trabajo en Swaziland

Secondary education in Swaziland has rapidly expanded in the decade or so since independence. Alongside this achievement has been a growing apprehension that the modern sector's capacity to generate employment is not commensurate with the rising number of educated young people leaving secondary school. The emergence of a ‘school leaver problem’ as disenchanted educated youngsters remained unemployed was therefore seen as a real possibility towards the end of the 1970s. Such considerations formed the backcloth to tracer surveys conducted in 1979 which investigated the post-school experience of secondary school leavers who left school in the period 1973–1977.Some aspects of these surveys are discussed in this article which covers the experience of school leavers in finding out about jobs and training, waiting time for jobs, and estimates of unemployment. The occupations entered by school leavers are then assessed in relation to demand projections for educated manpower.These observations reveal that institutional arrangements for transferring school leavers from school to work are embryonic and for a large minority of leavers family and other influentiaal contacts are more important than qualifications in securing a job. For Form 3 Junior Secondary School leavers some credence may be given to the popular impression that unemployment is worsening but Form 5 High School leavers are experiencing little difficulty as yet in finding work. More tentatively it would appear that the marginal additions to the skilled labour force stemming from school leavers are not modifying the occupational structure in line with recent manpower projections.     

Does maternal employment influence poor children’s social development?

Various initiatives over the past 40 years have aimed to strengthen children’s early learning and social development. One policy theory—manifest in recent welfare reforms—postulates that requiring single mothers to work more outside the home will advance children’s well-being. We first examine whether young children’s social development is related to maternal employment among 405 women who entered welfare-to-work programs in 1998. For girls, age 24–42 months, we found that their mother’s recent employment duration was significantly associated with a lower incidence of aggressive behavior and inattentiveness, measured by two scales from the Child Behavior Checklist (CBCL 2/3). Yet these relationships with employment were weaker than more robust associations observed for proximal child-rearing practices, including the frequency of reading with the child, enforcing a regular bedtime, the propensity to spank the child, as well as levels of maternal depression. We then assess whether broader measures of the mother’s economic security help to predict these proximal determinants of development. We observed that food security and indicators of job quality consistently predicted the proximal factors. Structural equation models (SEM) provided additional evidence that these broader indicators of economic security, but not recent employment per se, operated through parenting practices and maternal depression to influence girls’ and boys’ social development. These results are consistent with recent findings from random-assignment experiments, showing that employment gains rarely affect child outcomes unless mothers’ income and broader economic security also improve.     

The role of educational psychologists in supporting post-16 transition: findings from the literature

The Children and Families Act (2014) has seen the extension of the role of educational psychologists (EPs) to cover the age range from birth to 25 years. EPs have had to develop and extend their practice to meet the needs of post-16 young people with special educational needs and disabilities. Research on transition from compulsory education to further education, employment or training has highlighted significant variability in practice. A systematic review of contemporary literature was undertaken to explore the potential role and contributions of EPs in supporting post-school transition to further education, employment or training. Seven studies met inclusion criteria and data were reported using PRISMA guidelines. Although predominantly speculative, the data highlight a number of roles for EPs in supporting post-16 transition, encompassing work at individual, group and systemic levels and incorporating core functions of educational psychology practice.     

Educational choice (vouchers) and social mobility

A quantitative approach to study the impact of vouchers is thought to yield more meaningful results than theoretical arguments. This paper makes use of a model of the behavior of young people and schools to simulate the effects of vouchers of varying sizes on students in different income categories, living in three communities — poor, average and wealthy — under two assumptions about how public schools spend their resources. The first assumption is that public schools minimize their offerings to individual students (i.e. maximize their surplus) in order to further objectives not valued by students. The second assumption is that public schools act as competitive firms, maximizing their educational offerings to individual students.Findings from the simulation are neither uniformly positive nor negative. They do not support the argument that poor young people will be better off with a voucher system. Even in the most favorable case — when public schools maximize surplus — a systemic choice system would not come close to equalizing educational opportunity across income groups.     

The Balance between Vocational Secondary and General Secondary Schooling in France and Australia

Some of the most difficult problems facing governments today are linked to their increasing involvement in the global economy. One of the most pressing problems faced by developed economies is chronically high youth unemployment. As labour markets have tightened, the jobs which have disappeared, and look unlikely to re-emerge as labour markets become more buoyant, are the jobs which young people have traditionally held - unskilled entry level jobs. The creation of the French Baccalauréat Professionnel saw the development of a programme that balanced the needs of a vocational qualification with those of a general education. This paper will look briefly at the background to the debate between general education and vocational education, in particular the low status of vocational education. The paper looks at the manner in which two developed countries in different hemispheres, France and Australia, have attempted to solve an increasingly complex problem: the transition from school to work. It suggests how the McGaw Report [(1997) Shaping Their Future ( Sydney, Department of Training and Education Co-ordination)] tackles this problem of high and low status educational pathways in Australia. The use of 'school-workplace learning' in Australia represents a relatively new specific programme, highlighting the NSW government's direction in school to work transition. In France the Baccalauréat Professionnel (Bac Pro) will be used as an example of a diploma that provides a useful bridge between the vocational and general education streams.     

Disciplining the conduct of young people in compulsory education policy and practice

Disciplining and pastoral power are central to the strategies and practices of intervening in the lives of young people deemed at risk of disengaging from school, or not completing their compulsory education. As an expression of power concerned with young people's welfare and self-improvement, disciplining and pastoral practices push young people towards greater responsibilism and employability. From 2004 to 2008, the State Government of Western Australia embarked on legislative change and policy implementation to increase the minimum compulsory school leaving age from 15 to 17. This facilitated a programme of interventions with some groups of young people deemed at risk of not meeting the newly minted minimum education requirements. Drawing on governmentality theory, research into this policy identifies and problematises its disciplining and pastoral practices. Interview data and policy documents are analysed to reveal the way that practices with young people, although framed as empowering and benign, worked to further connect them with the imperatives of neoliberalism.     

顺应全球化:发展中国家高等教育的变迁与改革

随着全球化经济就业模式的变化及对技能的需求 ,高等教育的内涵出现了变化。旨在满足国家优先发展战略的自上而下的高等教育投资政策已难以满足大众的迫切需求 ,基于个人和社会需求的自下而上的决策观更能满足人才、职业全球流动性日益增加的社会现实。根植于学术研究的知识生产模式难以在新形势下发挥作用 ,而与自下而上的政策建构相适应的知识生产模式 ,将有利于发展中国家在国际高等教育市场中保持竞争力     

Individualisation and social exclusion: the case of young people not in education,employment or training

The characteristics, experiences and long-term prospects of young people outside the labour market and education have attracted widespread international attention in recent decades, and the specific category of young people not in education, employment or training (NEET) has been a policy concern for the UK Government since 1997. This paper examines the analytical and empirical basis of our knowledge of NEET young people, in the light of more general conceptualisations of social exclusion and the individualisation of social risk. It relates the NEET category to a conception of social exclusion in which the central policy focus is on moving young people across a boundary between participation and non-participation, and inequalities within education and employment receive less attention. This focus, allied with discourses of individualisation, obscures the structural basis of inequality in education and training. However, the paper argues that the research evidence shows that individualised approaches based on personal and cultural characteristics of NEET young people are inadequate to understand this group and frame policy. The paper proposes that stronger versions of social exclusion need to be used in constructing solutions which acknowledge the basis of NEET issues in wider social inequalities.     

The role of part-time employment among young people with a non-university education in Spain

For some people, a part-time job is merely an intermediate state that serves as a stepping stone to further employment and makes labour market integration easier. Yet, part-time work also appears in highly unstable careers. The present research aims to determine the role of part-time employment for young people with non-university studies. Using the Survey on Transition from Education/Training and Labour Market Integration (ETEFIL-2005), we build the monthly sequence of labour states for young people from when they finish their non-university studies until the time of the survey. The analysis allows us to conclude that part-time work is fairly atypical in the early stages of a career but that those who have part-time jobs spend quite a long time in them. In addition, we identify several patterns in the use of part-time work, the ‘integrative’ pattern proving to be the most prevalent. Factors such as education and early preferences are seen to have a major impact on career paths.     

Listening to ‘the thick bunch’: (mis)understanding and (mis)representation of young people in jobs without training in the South West of England

Young people in jobs without training are ubiquitous but invisible, working in shops, cafes, and other low‐waged, low‐status occupations. Commonly elided with young people who are not in education, employment or training, they are positioned as the ‘thick bunch’ with empty and meaningless working lives. The main purpose of the research was to explore the experiences of this group of marginalised and socially disadvantaged young people through a deeper understanding of their interests and enthusiasms inside and outside work. These young people have been (mis)understood and (mis)represented. A more holistic and nuanced approach that is not uncritically founded upon a set of neo‐liberal stereotypes and assumptions, and instead recognises the complexity of their lives, would offer new opportunities for understanding and representation of their interests. Our findings challenge the conflation of identity with work and the notion that only certain forms of employment create meaning.     

Inspire to aspire: raising aspirational outcomes through a student well-being curricular focus

Australian Government policy initiatives to increase young peoples' participation in higher education are pursued in this paper. It argues that pedagogy and curriculum have a direct influence on student engagement. The interrelationships between pedagogical practices, curriculum based on a well-being framework, and the shaping of subjectivities and aspirations of young people in a region characterised by socio-economic challenge are explored. This 2-year case study used action research by university academics, school-based teachers and school students in an R-12 school in the northern suburbs of Adelaide, South Australia. Findings drawn from narratives, field notes, student work samples and professional conversations, situate well-being as central to young people's self-awareness of their aspirations. The themes of: Pedagogies and learning activities; Relationships, caring and connections, and; Places, spaces and belonging help to arrange the argument that concludes that young people living in low socio-economic areas do have aspirations for the future. Furthermore, the educational implications highlight the significance of the role of the teacher within the social and emotional domains which connect student life-worlds within their particular contexts, building cultural capital and broadening capabilities, self-awareness, aspirations and achievement.     

Theories in Practice: School-to-Work Transitions-for-Youth With Mild Disabilities

Systematic research into the school-to-work (STW) transition of young people with mild disabilities, a relatively new emphasis in education, has produced a wealth of information about factors associated with adult employment. Further, legislative mandates and recent educational reforms related to transition and access to the general curriculum have generated useful policy discussions about how schools can best support young people with disabilities to overcome documented barriers to work. However, theoretical perspectives embedded in and generated from research, policy, and practice on STW transitions of young people with disabilities are rarely discussed. The intent of this article is fourfold: (a) to summarize current research and models of practice on STW transition within the field of special education, (b) to identify implicit yet infrequently named theories in our research and practice, (c) to make connections to STW theories outside special education, and (d) to suggest how emerging perspectives can shape future research.     

What happens to pupils permanently excluded from special schools and pupil referral units in England?

There is widespread consensus in the research and policy‐related literature over the last decade that young people who have been permanently excluded from school are at a far greater risk of a variety of negative outcomes than young people who have not had this experience. These negative outcomes include prolonged periods out of education and/or employment; poor mental and physical health; involvement in crime; and homelessness. This article presents evidence from a small‐scale qualitative study of destinations and outcomes post‐exclusion for a group of young people considered to be at particular risk of such negative outcomes: namely, those who have been permanently excluded from special schools or Pupil Referral Units (now known as short‐stay schools). The specific focus of this paper is on the 24 young people's educational trajectories pre‐ and post‐exclusion; the reasons for their exclusion from school; and on what forms of alternative provision were available to them after their permanent exclusion.     

加拿大原住民劳动力就业政策:回顾、意义与启示

促进并帮助原住民就业、接受技术培训,是加拿大政府要解决的首要任务之一。自1989年起,加拿大《通向成功之路》及其一系列就业与培训政策的出台,对于提高原住民就业水平、获得资金支持、健全社会保障制度以及增强原住民自治等方面均起到关键性作用。在回顾加拿大原住民就业政策发展与演化的基础上,论述了实施这些政策的经验教训与意义,并对我国少数民族群体就业提出启示。