Education level explains participation in work and education later in life

A prolonged working life is crucial for sustaining social welfare and fiscal stability for countries facing ageing populations. The group of older adults is not homogeneous; however, differences within the group may affect the propensity to continue working and to participate in continuing education. The aim of this paper is to explore how participation in work and education vary with gender, age, and education level in a sample of older adults. The study was performed in Sweden, a context characterized by high female labour-market-participation rates and a high average retirement age. The participants were 232 members of four of the major senior citizens’ organizations. We found no differences in participation in work and education based on gender. People older than 75 years were found to be as active as people 65–75 years old in education, but the older group worked less. There were positive associations between education level and participation in both work and education. Hence, this study implies that socio-economic inequalities along these dimensions are widened later in life. This highlights the importance of engaging workers with lower education levels in educational efforts throughout life. It also emphasizes the need for true lifelong learning in society.     

Preschool work against bullying and degrading treatment: experiences from an action learning project

This article deals with experiences from an action learning project against bullying and degrading treatment among nine Swedish preschools. Even though definitions of bullying and degrading treatment tend to lead to thoughts of school-age children rather than preschoolers, previous research shows that bullying occurs in preschool as well. Our data consist of documentation of improvement work carried out in the preschools that were analysed from both a peer culture perspective and a school improvement perspective. Our main results show that the preschools, by identifying challenges and actions anchored in the local context, ‘hit the target’ in their work against bullying and degrading treatment in the preschools. However, the children and their perspectives were rarely taken into account in the improvement work, which we consider as ‘missing the point’. Didactic implications for further preschool action learning projects are discussed.     

Enacted realities in teachers’ experiences: bringing materialism into pragmatism

Abstract

In this article we explore factors that constitute ‘the social’ for the teacher Susan, which at the same time highlights ethical aspects of the exercise of her profession. We meet her in a situation where she is setting grades, and our interest focuses on the relations that become of concern for her in her professional task to give the students their grades. In this exploration, we recognize the renewal of interest in realism and examine the possible links that can be drawn between transactional realism, as a pragmatic view, and the new materialism, here represented by actor–network theory. Building on a narrative from an interview with a named teacher in a daily newspaper, the empirical study focuses on actors constituting Susan’s reality when grading. Our argument is that in order to understand the complex levels of aspects that influence teachers’ actions, it is necessary to start from the local and from there trace the human and material factors that may affect teachers’ room for action. Bringing material aspects into the consideration of Susan’s situation helps us see that technology itself changes time and spaces and moves the action of grading into spaces outside her professional sphere.     

Managing the legal proceedings: An interpretative phenomenological analysis of sexually abused children's experience with the legal process

Objective

The aim of this study was to describe how sexually abused children experience the legal process, a process that includes being questioned by the police during the preliminary investigation and by lawyers and the prosecutor in the courtroom, and meeting other professionals from various agencies.

Method

Face-to-face in-depth interviews were conducted with 10 children—9 girls and 1 boy between 9 and 15 years old—who had experienced child sexual abuse (CSA). The interviews were semi structured and carried out and analyzed by interpretative phenomenological analysis (IPA). The aim of IPA is to explore the participants’ views of the world and to adopt as far as possible an “insider perspective.” IPA draws on a tradition of phenomenology and symbolic interactionism in attempting to understand how people make sense of their experiences.

Results

Five major themes emerged through the analysis: not being believed, making CSA visible, need for support, sanctions for offenders, and lack of respect for the child's integrity. Almost all the children had a feeling of not being believed. They described feelings ranging from anxiety to dread and even terror when they had to describe the CSA they had experienced. Even though the importance of support for such children is already well understood, the children stated that the support they were given was not sufficient. The children said that they wanted support from a single professional who was well informed about both the legal process and CSA. When the children were asked to reflect on sanctions against the abusers, they said that it was important that the perpetrator got treatment/therapy but they also said that imprisonment was desirable. Financial compensation was not as important to them; the damage had been done and money could not compensate for that damage. The children also said that both the lawyers and the media had treated them with disrespect.

Conclusions

It is valuable for children who have been exposed to CSA to learn that they can take part in the legal process as equal partners with the other participants, and it is evident that the quality of psychological care and support needs to be improved. The children want to be participants in the legal process rather than passive objects of that process.     

The transition from education to employment in the context of stratification in Japan – a view from the outside

In many industrial nations, the processes of transition from education or training to employment are very important. Using Japan as a case study, this article considers these processes from an external perspective. The main criterion used is the issue of stratification within the education and training system. A detailed analysis of the transition process demonstrates that there is little differentiation between school students in Japan, making Japan's a very homogeneous education system by comparison with its international competitors. However, a type of indirect and/or informal stratification results from a ranking system for educational establishments and employers, reinforced by cooperation between individual educational establishments and specific employers.     

Relevant social groups for open data use and engagement

The opening up of public sector data has provided a new data resource for the citizens. However, the use of open data and its consequent societal value has proved not to be as extensive as initially hoped for, although multiple innovations have emerged; rather it is still considered problematic, and knowledge about open data use is scarce. Therefore, the aim of this paper is to clarify open data use and engagement by people outside the public sector, especially what motives exists and how different user types align to these motives. To achieve this, a document analysis has been carried out of reported use cases identified in EU topic reports between 2014 and 2016. By applying the theory of Relevant Social Groups (RSG), which focuses on the people's interpretation of the purpose with the technology, we identified five RSGs representing overall motives for open data use: 1) Exploring for creativity, 2) Creating business value, 3) Enabling local citizen value, 4) Addressing global societal challenges, and 5) Advocating the open data agenda. We also discuss differences between the relevant social groups and the included user types, issues and implications for understanding the evolvement of the open data field, and suggests research ahead.     

State Control and Governance of Schooling and Their Effects on French,German, and Spanish Learning in Swedish Compulsory School, 1996–2011

In Swedish compulsory school, students can choose to study a modern language in addition to English, i.e., French, Spanish, or German. Since 1994, instruction time for modern languages has been extended, the learning objectives have been made more attainable, and national assessment materials have been introduced. The government made these changes so that more students would study modern languages and achieve the syllabus goals. Existing statistics, however, indicate that these changes have been ineffectual compared to earlier years. Sixteen modern language teachers were interviewed about why state policies have failed. The results suggest that political intentions have not been realized for several interacting reasons. First, the state lacks a central school administration to translate political intentions into concrete goals. Second, teachers have not perceived the reforms as important. Third, government actions are not aligned with research explanations of why students do not choose to study modern languages.     

Type of education and civic and political attitudes

In addition to increasing cognitive skills and preparing students for the labour market, one of the core tasks of education is to prepare citizens for participation in democracy. Considering the ideal of democratic equality, it is important to know the degree to which civic outcomes of education are distributed equally. One feature of the education system that can lead to differential civic outcomes is tracking, that is, the sorting of students into different types of education. In this study, we examine the relationship between type of education (general/academic or vocational) and five attitudinal dimensions of civic and political engagement between the ages of 14 and 49 years in the Netherlands. By using panel data from the Netherlands Longitudinal Lifecourse Study (n = 5,312) and applying linear fixed effects models, we can observe the effect of a transition in the type of education on the within-person change in our outcome variables. The findings demonstrate that transitions in the type of education have little effect on intention to vote, trust in institutions or ethnic tolerance. However, students making transitions in general/academic education develop higher levels of interest in politics and generalised trust than do students in vocational education or people outside the education system. This point suggests that general/academic education fosters civic and political participation.