Rachel J. Wilde | Institute of Education, University College London (original) (raw)

Uploads

Talks by Rachel J. Wilde

Private schools are widely seen as elite institutions, yet enjoy the tax advantages stemming from... more Private schools are widely seen as elite institutions, yet enjoy the tax advantages stemming from their status as charities. To be recognised as a charity, an institution must provide `public benefit'. In recent years, debate about the charitable status of private schools has evolved from conflict over whether the status should be retained or removed to a more nuanced discussion of which practices count as public benefit and how they are justified.

A crucial issue is how the contribution to public benefit should be monitored: through self-regulation, allowing the schools to assess which of their activities provides public benefit or through mandation from the Charity Commission. This paper uses new evidence from interviews with private school head-teachers to show how they define public benefit and considers the likely future development of and limitations on public benefit under the current legislative settlement.

A key consequence of the recent economic recession in the UK has been the tightened squeeze acros... more A key consequence of the recent economic recession in the UK has been the tightened squeeze across all levels of the youth labour market, from school leavers to graduates. With the economic and social changes of the past twenty years already deleteriously impacting on youth employment, the financial crisis has further exacerbated experiences of joblessness, precarious work and protracted transitions to secure employment. Increasingly, young people from all social and educational backgrounds are thrust into the ‘borderlands of work’: ‘not quite’ jobs in terms of pay, timescale and progression.
This paper uses qualitative data from an ongoing research project exploring how young people access the labour market in different regions of the UK. We focus on two case studies at opposite ends of the qualification spectrum; a London internship programme for high achieving graduates with a prestigious management consultancy company, and a Glaswegian employability award combining volunteer work experience with basic employability skills. Both groups undertake work-like activities while not yet achieving the goal of full employment. They occupy the borders of employment, paradoxically labouring with no guarantees, in order to become employable.
Reflecting on how the global financial crisis is being dealt with at a local level, we explore how different policy responses, regional labour markets and forms of provision in London and Glasgow make a difference to how young people cope with economic problems and instability. The paper will set the political discourse against the voices of young people and their experiences on programmes developed to support them.

Early school leaving: causes, impact, remedies and policy

This paper presents initial findings from qualitative research concerning young people’s access t... more This paper presents initial findings from qualitative research concerning young people’s access to the labour market in the UK. Significant changes to the labour market, such as the decline of the manufacturing sector and the rise of the service sector as well as an increasingly globalised economy have broken traditional patterns of entry into employment (Bynner 2013: 34). In the context of high youth unemployment, research into the strategies young people are pursuing in order to gain jobs and careers is vital. With the increasing costs for education and training that is falling on young people and their families, a map of the kinds of provision and support available for prospective employees across the UK is also pertinent. Some areas of the UK retain persistently high levels of unemployment, suggesting they are not a “short-term disequilibrium phenomenon” that can be solved by a deregulated labour market, but are related to distinct regional differences and features (Ormerod 2014).
The research seeks to understand labour market entry practices in different regions. It considers what young people are learning when they engage in activities such as work experience, volunteering, internships, apprenticeships or “employability” boot camps. What kinds of traits, competencies and attitudes are required for these young people to be considered “employable”? The research has a strong focus on charting regional disparities in “structures of opportunity” by comparing local economic policies, youth unemployment initiatives and regional labour market conditions. As well as regional differences, the research also compares the experiences by young people of different class, race and gender.
The research is based on in-depth interviews with young people about their strategies for both labour market entry and career progression, and their experiences of looking for and being in work. Alongside this, ethnography based within youth employment programmes will explore the methods used in teaching skill formation, appropriate “work attitude” and to encourage professional development. Young people in six areas of the UK are involved in the study, enabling the researchers to chart differences between urban and rural settings.
Following recent development in youth studies, this research combines the transitional and cultural approaches to youth, as well as offering a critical eye on “choice biographies” and the individualization thesis, to consider the importance of place for shaping young people’s agency and opportunities.
The first two fieldsites will be studied in early 2014, ready for analysis before the BERA conference in September.

The paper posits the importance of studying impermanent social configurations. It seeks to show h... more The paper posits the importance of studying impermanent social configurations. It seeks to show how the ethnographic method is capable of investigating these forms of life. It argues that transience is a common feature of a neoliberal context and therefore it is necessary to comprehend how it affects social life. This paper further argues that experiencing constant transient change shapes persons to suit a neoliberal economy as they learn to be flexible in order to cope with uncertainty and risk. This crafting of persons is incomplete as individuals seek forms of stability through ongoing relationships.
The paper presents material from multisited ethnographic fieldwork with Endeavour (a pseudonym), a gap year charity. Endeavour’s gap year programmes are focused on the personal development of its volunteers. One of the means of doing this is to recombine the volunteers into new groups every three weeks. This teaches them how to make relationships and form strong teams quickly, as well as how to let go of previous ties. Through playful initiation rites, participants leave their old groups with tears and angst, but are able to incorporate themselves into their new ones with vigour and excitement. Prior arguments, attachments and characters are unknown, leaving volunteers free to refashion themselves. Drawing on techniques replicated in human resources management, Endeavour teaches volunteers how to conduct themselves in a unstable, risky and ever-changing environment with the minimum of disquiet.

I consider two aspects of neoliberal labour in this paper; being employed and becoming employable... more I consider two aspects of neoliberal labour in this paper; being employed and becoming employable. I will present ethnographic material that explores what is it like to labour in a neoliberal organisation, and how young people are prepared for this kind of labour by a gap year programme. Theoretically, I hope to show how an iterative approach to neoliberalism and personhood is useful for understanding the kinds of ideas and concerns bound up within these situations. I argue that a particular concept of personhood informs the notion of what it means to be a good employee and what someone needs to be like in order to become employable and that this in turn is derived from neoliberal ideology and practice.

Endeavour (a pseudonym) is a UK based charity whose mission statement is to create “a community o... more Endeavour (a pseudonym) is a UK based charity whose mission statement is to create “a community of active global citizens”.
My organisational ethnography explores how Endeavour responds to state policies and neoliberal changes to the third sector. The external pressures of changing policies and societal issues, such as unemployment, directly influence the daily work lives of employees and their relations with one another and the charity they work for. Endeavour adapts to new possibilities for funding and incorporates them into its mission statement. By constantly reinventing itself, living in a perpetual state of transience, flexibility enables Endeavour to survive. This can cause disruption, disagreements and insecurity for employees whose job roles are subject to redefinitions. Despite this, employees use the construct of `development' to make sense of these changes as part of a consistent trajectory that reconnects with the `original' and `historical' aims of the charity (although these also become contested).

This paper focuses on how funding from the Department for International Development (DfID) to raise awareness of development has recast Endeavour's role as a mediator of social relations between the state and citizens. This programme is now one of the means of creating a “community of active global citizens”. What an “active citizen” should be has come to be shaped via the state's definition of development, and more insidiously, around neoliberal visions of citizenship.

I argue that connections and relations are distinct modes of proximity. This distinction highligh... more I argue that connections and relations are distinct modes of proximity. This distinction highlights how managing proximities functions as a means to govern persons. I draw on ethnographic research at a UK based charity, Endeavour (a pseudonym). Endeavour undertakes community and environmental development projects using heterogeneous cohorts of volunteers who live and work alongside “project partners”. It receives funding from government departments, corporations and individuals. Endeavour is the nexus for those in receipt of charity (project partners), those doing charity (volunteers) and those giving charity (fund donors). Endeavour mediates this matrix of exchanges by controlling the representations of these actors to one another. These representations determine the potentialities for how and in what form relations or connections appear. Donors never meet recipients or volunteers. Donors can only be connected with recipients and/or volunteers via their relations with Endeavour as a charitable organisation. The donation does not form relations because Endeavour takes on the roles of receiver and giver in converting the donation into a project. Donor and recipient are connected, but indirectly, via the organisation. Fostering connections instead of relations ensures Endeavour has a role to play. Endeavour also closely manages volunteers’ relationships with one another and with recipients. If volunteers establish relations with recipients these are short term and do not last once volunteers return home, although a connection remains. Relations between volunteers can be dangerous because they upset “group dynamics” and Endeavour’s ability to control individuals. By manipulating the terrain in which volunteers connect, Endeavour renders them governable.

What kind of person must workers be in order to be employable in the contemporary British job mar... more What kind of person must workers be in order to be employable in the contemporary British job market? Drawing on ethnographic research with a structured gap year provider, Endeavour, this paper explores the relationship between unpaid volunteering and employability. In times of economic crisis, young people are often the most vulnerable to unemployment (Furlong and Cartmel 1997). In 2009, Endeavour received funding bursaries from the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills to allow graduates who were struggling to gain employment to participate in their programmes and increase their “employability” and career prospects. Endeavour’s programmes seek to engender personal development in their volunteers through participation in charitable work. I argue in this paper that as well as shaping persons through their personal development techniques, young people are also shaped by the way in which these programmes are organised and structured. Volunteers learn to cope with (and even enjoy) risk, uncertainty and constant changes, emerging as dynamic, flexible persons. The programmes mimic the demands of a neoliberal job market and creates workers able to thrive in a neoliberal environment.

Papers by Rachel J. Wilde

Policy Press eBooks, Oct 29, 2019

This chapter outlines the key aims of the book: first, to explore what it is like for young peopl... more This chapter outlines the key aims of the book: first, to explore what it is like for young people to undergo employability training as a pathway into work in the UK; second, to investigate the strategies and motivations of local policymakers and training providers, whose mission it is to achieve employability skills development indifferent regions of the UK; and third, through the lens of a Post-Foucauldian governmentality approach, to contribute theoretically to understanding of both policy and practice of youth employability training in the UK context. Each of these aims is introduced and the structure of the book’s chapters is presented.

Policy Press eBooks, Oct 29, 2019

This chapter provides an overview of the book by drawing out four key themes which emerged throug... more This chapter provides an overview of the book by drawing out four key themes which emerged through the chapters as of key significance for understanding youth employability in the United Kingdom: regionality, social inequality, liminality and risk. Taking each of these in turn, the chapter demonstrates how the pervasive force of neoliberalism shapes youth employment policy and youth labour markets in the diverse regions of the UK. In order to ‘get in’ and then to ‘get on’, Britain’s young people must demonstrate neoliberal qualities such as individualisation, responsibilisation and resilience to risk. At the same time, the ability to perform this version of the self is powerfully shaped by social structure.

Policy Press eBooks, Oct 29, 2019

Bristol University Press eBooks, Oct 29, 2019

This chapter explores the rise of the concept of employability and how it has influenced... more This chapter explores the rise of the concept of employability and how it has influenced policy and practical interventions to address unemployment. It explores how the concept has been understood as a threshold for labour market readiness or as a process of continual skills development necessary in a flexible labour market. It argues that employability is frequently utilised in neoliberalising forms of governmentality, shifting responsibility of gaining work onto the individual, rather than considering the various external and structural factors that affect employment prospects. A case study of an employability programme in the North East explores the practices through which the discourse of employability acts upon individuals.

Early school leaving: causes, impact, remedies and policy

Policy Press eBooks, Oct 29, 2019

Bristol University Press eBooks, Oct 29, 2019

This chapter explores the discourses of enterprise, uncovering the investment in this no... more This chapter explores the discourses of enterprise, uncovering the investment in this notion at EU, national and local levels of policy as a solution to youth unemployment. Enterprise emerges as both a driver of economic growth, as well as particular 'mindset' required of entreprenuers. Case studies of two different interventions on the South Coast that aim to increase youth enterprise reveal how different conceptions of risk and failure are intertwined with understandings of the young people's resilience. The chapter demonstrates how these schemes utilised differing technologies of governance although both required young people to take on responsibility for creating their own jobs.

Bristol University Press eBooks, Oct 29, 2019

$Research paper thumbnail of Working and learning in client-facing interprofessional project teams as ‘fractional ontological performance’$

Routledge eBooks, Jan 10, 2023

Educational Philosophy and Theory

Centre for Learning and Life Chances in Knowledge Economies and Societies (LLAKES), 2017

This paper presents ethnographic data from a third sector organisation in 2009, as it set up a de... more This paper presents ethnographic data from a third sector organisation in 2009, as it set up a development education programme to enhance its standard gap year volunteering experience. Beginning with returned British volunteers, the organisation aims to ‘cascade’ more elements of development education into their work so that the principles of international development are embedded into its organisational mission. The stated aim of the programme is to create a community of active global citizens by building on volunteers’ experience of working on development projects, improving their knowledge of international development goals and teaching them campaigning techniques to enable them to design their own ‘actions’ to promote international development. The paper analyses the approaches of the programme, exploring the constraints and competing interests invested in the scheme by different actors and how these impact on the type of ‘global citizens’ that are crafted through this programme...

Getting In and Getting On in the Youth Labour Market, 2019

This chapter investigates volunteering, much vaunted in recent policy as a valuable means by whic... more This chapter investigates volunteering, much vaunted in recent policy as a valuable means by which young people may gain valuable experience for work and careers. The chapter argues however that policies to encourage more youth volunteering are based on a conundrum: the fact that there is no robust evidence to support the view that volunteering is a beneficial means by which to access paid employment. Case study research of a volunteering organisation in Scotland, which delivers bespoke employability training to young people which includes daily spells of volunteering in a range of voluntary sector workplaces, provides some insight into why this might be the case. Work experience placements can consist of young people ‘time-filling’ with meaningless, poor-quality work and lack of engagement by employers makes it difficult for young people to gain experience in organisations offering paid employment opportunities. However, the chapter underscores the significant contribution of train...

Journal of Education and Work, 2018

British Educational Research Journal, 2017

Journal of Social Policy, 2017

The aim of this article is to investigate the argument that choice and competition will unleash e... more The aim of this article is to investigate the argument that choice and competition will unleash entrepreneurial innovation in free schools. Free schools were introduced as a subset of the Academies by the Conservative–Liberal Democrat Coalition government, following the general election in 2010. The government made it possible for non-state providers to set up their own independent, state-funded schools in order to create more choice, competition and innovation. We conclude that a higher level of substantive innovation is taking place in regards to management practices than in respect of curriculum and pedagogical practices. Innovation in curriculum and pedagogical practices is very limited. Creating a free school offer that seems to differ from other schools appears to be done through marketing and branding rather than innovation. We argue that parents, OFSTED, and the relative isolation of free schools constrain innovation from taking place.

Journal of Social Policy, 2015

Legislative changes and a recent court ruling allow private schools in England and Wales to deter... more Legislative changes and a recent court ruling allow private schools in England and Wales to determine how to provide the public benefits required to justify their charitable status. We investigate how private school headteachers and other informed stakeholders perceive their public benefit objectives and obligations. We find that schools interpret public beneficiaries widely to include one or more of state school pupils, local communities, other charities, and general society through raising socially responsible adults. Private schools pursue their own goals through public benefit provision, and balance the advantages of public benefit activities against the costs. The schools are not constrained by the ‘more than tokenistic’ minimum set by the regulator. The findings highlight the difficulties faced by governments who seek to pursue redistributive educational policies through charitable law.

Journal of Education and Work, 2018

Getting In and Getting On in the Youth Labour Market