Basic Skills, General Knowledge and Pedagogy, 2017 and
beyond.
Introduction
As part of the Beyond
Unemployment project at Impact
Hub Birmingham I set myself the task of defining how individuals choose or
acquire employment. What skills do they develop, What expectations do they
have, what aspirations, and how do they acquire these ‘skills’?
I simplified
this musing to three fundamental questions
- What defines new/current ‘basic skills’, what skills and experiences are to be taught, what is underpinning knowledge for ‘everyday’ experience or employment needs?
- In today’s ecosystem of accessible and available information, what constitutes general knowledge?
- How are we going to modify the pedagogical approach to accommodate how people learn and what they do with that learning?
Taking the long view
Having arrived
at these three questions I began to ask myself additional questions. What are
basic skills? Is general knowledge a cultural construct? How do we teach
learning? Is employment, and the expectation of individuals, always based on
where they are educated?
I embarked on
an exploration of the roots of learning, skills acquisition and developing
expectation. I set parameters of the exploration to ‘state defined learning and
provision’, where the learning provision influences or supports employment. I
can only describe what follows as a brief romp through education legislation,
followed by a personal, political perspective of the intent of the process. I
would, however, argue that, if we are to consider how systems change in
education impacts on employment, we must first identify the system and the
principles of its foundation. This begins in the 19th Century.
19th Century Beginnings – Origin - Definitions
The majority of
education-related legislation in the early part of the 19th Century
related to factory and employment
legislation - children working in factories, children working outside school
and the age at which education would be provided to all children.
Elementary
education, created because of the 1870 Act, was not a universally equal
provision. Chitty, 2007, outlines that some school boards “significantly
altered the legislators' original concept of Elementary schooling in terms of
buildings, equipment, curricula and age range” by establishing higher classes,
or separate higher-grade schools for older pupils who showed ability and
commitment. A few Boards went still further and created a new type of evening
school for adults. Higher elementary schools often received a higher rate
of grant than the ordinary public elementary schools, on condition that they
provided a four-year course for promising children aged 10 to 15. The
curriculum included drawing, theoretical and practical science, a foreign
language and elementary mathematics.
Early 20th Century – setting the scene over 100 years
The 1902 Education Act created the Local
Education Authorities (LEA), local and accountable bodies to run education with
the new local authority structure. The Act initiated and consolidated the number
of schools for specific provision: State aid for endowed Grammar Schools,
Municipal or County Schools built upon the tradition of the ‘higher Schools’
for those who were going to remain in education. Elementary education would
remain for the rest. “From now on there was to be no confusion: two
systems, each with a distinct educational and social function, were to run parallel
to each other, and there was to be no place for the higher-grade schools and
classes which were deemed to have strayed into the preserves of secondary and
higher education. The vast majority of children were to be educated in
elementary schools where they would remain until they reached the statutory
school-leaving age”. Chitty C (2007) Eugenics, race and intelligence in education
identified in Derek
Gillard Education in England 2011
The Act can be seen as framework setting, developing
an education structure and promoting
national efficiency in the increasingly mechanised manufacturing industries. It
was focused on developing skills for the world of work, defining curriculum
content, especially at post 11 level, to meet employment need and the employment
potential of children who would inevitably end up in manufacturing or industry.
The higher-grade schools continued to offer a wider range of subjects for those
not entering manufacturing but remaining in education, progressing into lower
management roles or higher education.
The 1918 Education Act raised the school leaving
age to 14 (not enforced till 1921), and continued defining the skillsets and
employment potential/direction for school-aged children. This Act consolidated
the developmental and social role of education. It reinforced the continued
need for craft skills for boys and home craft skills for girls, based on their
employment prospects, clarifying the role of ‘Elementary’ education - basic
skills for those who would leave and go into service or industry.
Higher skilled individuals, more often
from the middle/upper classes, would benefit from the now state funded grammar
schools, and benefit from an education system beyond the official school
leaving age.
Consolidation had the effect of creating two types of
state-aided post 11 school: the endowed grammar schools, which now received
grant-aid from LEAs, and the municipal or county ‘secondary’ schools,
maintained by LEAs. Many of the latter were established in the years following
the Act, and others evolved out of the higher skill schools.
Throughout the 1920s the Hadlow committee
reports of 1926, ‘31 & ‘33 continued the refining of the education process,
defining the 3-phase system in education: 5-7 infant, 7-11 junior, 11+
secondary.
So the system is set...
From 1918 the
education system, and the curriculum
offered, was focused on supporting economic activity. Children ‘destined’ for
manual labour were provided with the ‘basic skills’ of English and maths but
were also provided with an understanding of industrial or housekeeping skills,
depending on gender.
Children from the ‘administrative’ social
classes were ‘stretched’, and experienced a wider range of skills suited to
their post-education positions within the economy. Even in this system,
education for girls still focused on housekeeping skills, in preparation for
their position as wives in the male dominated society.
There were some exceptions to the principle of education
being preparation for employment/role in society, Henry Morris being but one
example. Despite the relative wealth of the University, Cambridgeshire
was one of the poorest counties in England. Education provision was in a poor
state outside of the City of Cambridge. There was a lack of funding and no
separate secondary schools. Children of school age (3-14) were educated in
their village school, in one room and by a single teacher. Henry Morris,
Secretary of Education for Cambridgeshire in the 1920s and 30s, envisioned
integration between secondary and community education, accessible by all those
living in the villages and small towns around Cambridgeshire, coining the idea
of 'village colleges'. He described this idea as "raising the school
leaving age to ninety", and firmly believed that education, both formal
and informal, should be a lifelong process. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henry_Morris
(education)
And so we arrive at the 1944 Education Act, finally
distinguishing between primary and secondary schools, equalising funding issues
and raising the school leaving age to 15 (with powers to raise it to 16, not
implemented till 1973) - a new tripartite system, Grammar Schools, Secondary
Modern Schools and Secondary Technical Schools, and introducing Comprehensive
Schools, an amalgam of all three. Pupils were allocated to the most appropriate
school via the 11 plus, having little impact on the numbers entering the
grammar system and girls were allowed to continue in secondary education. The Act
also developed an adult education provision, benefiting from the learning and
development that had taken place in Cambridge and other authorities.
However, while there had been modifications and widening of
access, initiated by the 1944 and subsequent Acts, I would argue that the
social purpose of education, and therefore schools, had not changed. It was crucial to the perpetuation of the
social and economic order, creating parameters of achievement and by consequence
of family engagement, individual aspiration. In other words, a young person’s aspirations
within education would be based on parental educational achievement and employment
expectation within the family’s social setting. Specific curricula were developed
for particular social groups, and, while a ‘general education’ was purportedly
offered to all, some had a wider and more focused ‘general education’ than
others.
All participants received Basic
(fundamental) skills, English and maths, and General knowledge, through a
variety of core subjects: history, geography, science, etc. The depth and level
of such learning and skills acquisition was influenced by the post-educational
expectation and aspiration of the system (institutions), accepted by families
and the students. Educational institutions throughout the 3-phase system focused
on a varied skill development, cognitive and manual, relevant to:
- Manual workers: unskilled workforce.
- Skilled workers: manual activity requiring accreditation, predominantly male dominated, remnants of the ‘guilds’, and qualified through an apprenticeship.
- Middle management: Administrative and management, at a variety of levels.
- Senior management: leaders within industrial, financial or political fields, who would progress to Higher Education
Education remained gender biased. The
above categories were predominantly male focused and girls/women had restricted
access to learning and opportunity, receiving basic skills, general knowledge,
secretarial or office related skills, with supplementary learning related to
home making, housekeeping and maintenance, of a variety of levels, based on
class and expectation - work or housewife.
So where does this fit
into my initial questions?
For over 100 years education has been
influential in the employment opportunities available to people.
Over that period the nature of
manufacturing, housekeeping, secretarial and administrative work changed
little. Then came the 1980s: Wapping – the News Corporation taking on the
Unions, protected practices and old skills, the deregulation of the finance
industry, a reduction in manufacturing and the growing impact of computer
technology. If we need to choose a time where significant technological change
began to impact on employment and the role of education, the 1980s is a
reasonable point to start.
There were some computers in schools in
the early 80s, and even more by the end of the decade - none of these were of
the level that industry was beginning to use. The segmented curriculum that had
been established in the early part of the 20th century began to
crumble.
The curriculum which is offered, and which
remains as the core provision of schools, is resolutely entrenched in the
‘classical’ subjects developed over that 100 years: Maths, English, Science,
foreign language, history, geography, arts activity, some Physical activity.
Additional subjects, including computer science, may not be part of the
traditional offer, but the pedagogical approach remains very traditional in
planning and content (curriculum), if not in delivery.
Schools and learning structure are treated
as a palimpsest. A blueprint of delivery, established in the 1870-1901
Education Acts has been built upon and modified, irrespective of exterior
processes and influences. The technology personally available to and being used
by students and school children at home is far superior to that which they are
using at school. The pedagogical
approach has modified over the years, but still remains teacher/institution-lead,
with the content and process dictated by external bodies, with some political
influence. Access to IT and data means that people today learn in different
ways to suit need and circumstance.
While we are aware of student-centric
learning, a variety of learning issues and intelligences e.g. Howard Gardner, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theory_of_multiple_intelligences, the process remains focused on
restricted research and regurgitation of data and information.
Finally, the nature of employment has
changed, not just because of the onset of technology, but also because the
nature of employment always changes, influenced by need, market forces, price
and access to market. Governments don’t decide what employment is available, business
does. The length of time an individual can expect to be in one form of
employment has changed.
Education that prepared people for the
employment appropriate to their class or status is no longer appropriate to a
system that, while existing in elements of social order, does not have the same
authority as it used to have. New opportunities and a new economy require new
skills.
So back to my initial questions
We cannot define employment. In a society
dominated by capitalist principles, employment is created by those that control
the wealth and manufacture products and services to be sold. What we can do is
provide individuals with skills to survive and live within the process.
Education does not need a system change -
it has already done that over the years. It requires a complete redesign. We
need to address the questions our ancestors pondered almost 150 years ago. We
need to identify a skillset for individuals, acknowledge the social and economic
circumstances, as they did then,
identify solutions, and develop a system,
a new system, as they did.
We need to acknowledge that the system
they designed fulfilled the role they, and others, intended. But the nature of
employment opportunities, and the role of education in furnishing a workforce
with relevant skills, and the employment market with appropriately skilled
individuals, has changed forever. We cannot legitimately use or internally
change an education system that was designed to fulfil roles conceived 100+
years ago if we want to facilitate agency in an employment situation which has
changed exponentially, and keeps on changing.
So, my
questions aim to begin that process, addressing fundamental skills. Should they
be wider than English and maths? What is general knowledge and do we understand
how and what people learn?
- What defines new / current ‘basic skills’, what skills and experiences are to be taught, what is underpinning knowledge for ‘everyday’ experience or employment needs?
- In today’s ecosystem of accessible and available information, what constitutes general knowledge?
- How are we going to modify the pedagogical approach to accommodate how people learn and what they do with that learning?
Ted Ryan August
2017
Irrespective of GBSLEP’s relationship to DWP, and any previous delivery, an examination of ESIF calls for employment related funding from a variety of ESIF areas will identify the same issue.
Coventry and Warwickshire, Leeds, Lancashire have had calls focusing on improving basic and lower skilled employees as well as market relevance of Education and Training provision.
Other core Cities, Sheffield, Greater Manchester, Liverpool focus on NEETS; intensive support to engage with and compete in the employment market, higher skills and workforce development.
Provision is designed around the funding available and the definition of employment within that funding.
My point remains
“Unemployment is clearly defined as not being in paid, ‘sustainable’, employment. Such projects and definitions deal with absolutes, you are in paid, ‘sustainable’, employment (over 16hrs per week) or you are not.
Funding programmes and delivery priorities are but conduits through which Governments and societies develop skills and provide access to the labour market. Their purpose focuses on removing an individual from state benefit rather than developing appropriate skills for an individual to choose how they participate in economic activity, activity that may have a social impact as well as a fiscal footprint.”
My hope for Beyond (un)employment sessions is that while we explore provision we begin to look at impact and not just output.
Impact on the individual – how they change how they adapt to the new economic world, what are the new basic skills they require.
An analyse of why, having spent millions on employment programmes in some areas, do individuals remain in poverty and unemployed.
How do we provide individual focused programmes, which encourage knowledge and skill development when the funding and measurement says JOB = 16hrs+.