June 22, 2009

Composition Matters: Multi-Context Informal Mentoring Networks for Low-Income Urban Adolescent Girls Pursuing Healthcare Careers

June 22, 2009

An article by Packard, B.W., Kim, G.J., Sicley, M., and Piontkowski, S., in Mentoring and Tutoring: Partnership in Learning, 17:2, pp 187-200 Packard et al investigate the way in which mentoring networks influence teenage girls in choosing healthcare as a potential career. The authors find that girls who are from disadvantaged backgrounds benefit greatly from […]

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June 22, 2009

Informal Mentors and Education: Complementary or Compensatory Resources?

June 22, 2009

A report by Lance D. Erickson, Steve McDonald and Glen H. Elder, Jr. Sociology of Education 82: 344-67 This article gives findings from a study of the effect of informal mentoring on the educational attainment of adolescents and relates this to inequalities in socio-economic background and personal, interactional and environmental resources upon which young people […]

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January 21, 2008

The Work Experience Placements of Secondary School Students: Widening Horizons or Reproducing Social Inequality?

January 21, 2008

A report by Hatcher, R. and Le Gallais, T., Birmingham City University This report examines whether the distribution of work experience (WEX) placements among secondary school age students is differentiated by class and gender, the processes by which this may occur and whether this therefore impacts on the widening of students’ horizons and future employment […]

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August 22, 2006

Disadvantaged Young People Accessing the New Urban Economies of the Post-Industrial City

August 22, 2006

An article by Carl Raffo, Journal of Education Policy, 21(1), pp.75-94 Raffo seeks to explain the growing polarization between an emerging post-industrial service base and high skill city economy, and the continuing educational and socio-economic underachievement of marginalised urban young people who struggle to access these changing labour markets. Raffo pulls together findings from four research […]

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June 22, 2005

Gender Equality in Work Experience Placements for Young People

June 22, 2005

A report by the London Metropolitan University (Dr Becky Francis, Ms Jayne Osgood, Dr Jacinta Dalgety, Dr Louise Archer), commissioned by the Equal Opportunities Commission This report analyses the magnitude of gender differences and socio-economic bias in the uptake of work placements for various occupations, comparing its findings to national data records of gender distribution […]

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June 22, 2001

Changes in Social Capital and School-to-Work Transitions

June 22, 2001

An article by Rob Strathdee, Work, Employment and Society, 15(2) pp.311-326 In this article Strathdee focuses on the job seeking methods of a group of eleven poorly qualified male school leavers and their fathers, using semi-structured interviews to shed light on the value of social networks in school-to-work transitions in New Zealand. He takes as […]

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September 22, 2000

Disaffected Young People and the Work-Related Curriculum at KS4 – Issues of Social Capital Development and Learning as a Form Cultural Practice

September 22, 2000

A paper by Raffo, C. and Hall, D., University of Manchester (presented at the British Educational Research Association Conference, Cardiff University, 7-10 September 2000) This paper presents a sociological critique of the M-Power programme, part of the work-related curriculum aiming to re-engage ‘disaffected’ young people in education, and suggests that instead such programmes and their […]

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June 22, 2000

Youth Transitions and Social Exclusion: Developments in Social Capital Theory

June 22, 2000

An article by Carlo Raffo and Michelle Reeves, Journal of Youth Studies, 3(2), pp.147-166 This article matches the theoretical aspects of social capital with lived experiences of socially disadvantaged young people in Manchester. The authors conclude that young people who are able to develop strong, effective and fluid individualized systems of social capital stand the […]

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