The Changing Landscape of Higher Education – challenges and opportunities for youth and community work education. Alan Smith

An introduction to my research My research is focused on how youth and community work students construct their professional identity. As a starting point, it draws on the work of Etienne Wenger (2008) in Communities of Practice: Learning, Meaning and Identity and in particular on ‘Identity in Practice’ (Pp 149 – 221)

Identity in Practice As a starting point: “Who we are lies in the way we live day to day, not just in what we think or say about ourselves ... Identity in practice is defined socially ... it is produced as a lived experience of participation in specific communities.” (Pg. 151) “As trajectories, our identities incorporate the past and the future in the very process of negotiating the present.” (Pg. 155)

Identity Formation (adapted from Wenger, 2008) Personal History Education Community / Communities Lived experience of chosen practice Investment in future (self and profession) ‘View of the world’ ‘Process of Change’ (Temporary) ‘Professional’ Identity Graduateness Participation / non-participation Transformative process and practice Creating a shared history / continuity Local-Global interplay

So how does this fit with the changing landscape of Higher Education? From September 2010, Youth and Community Work became an all graduate profession, giving it that longed for ‘professional status’ and equity with teaching and social work. The timing could not have been less beneficial, thrown into the maelstrom of austerity politics, changes to University funding and Institutional disregard for professional uniqueness and histories.

External factors – Workforce Change Public sector cuts, major job losses and project closure has removed the most experienced supervisors / established projects where students can help ‘create a shared history / continuity’ as identity formation. (Old / New working together ?) Just as the professional body requires 3 years of practice experience / professional formation

External factors – Workforce Change Reduced numbers of existing qualified workers to supervise students more experienced = most expensive = ‘first to go’ Workforce modelling – new methods of delivery, inter-professional working and emerging ‘new / semi-professions’ (CWDC) – supervision by non-professionals (Lived experience of chosen practice?)

External factors – University funding Withdrawal of HEFCE ‘block funding’ and full-fee loans for undergraduate study. Assumes a model of ‘the free market’ but then manipulates this through imposing the ... Student Number Cap (SNC) to limit the overall numbers and availability of places, and then manipulates this again by allowing exemptions for the ‘brightest students’ – ABBs and above (Will this impact on the student’s ‘view of the world’ ?)

Internal factors – paranoia / inertia In the new ‘marketplace’ of Higher Education, Institutional decisions are made based on flawed data-sets (NSS / KIS) driven by a managerialist agenda dominated by quantitative data. Manipulation of market position is achieved by increasing ‘tariff points’ and recruiting Doctoral-level staff, at expense of professional experience. (Limiting the opportunity for shared history / continuity)

Internal factors – paranoia / inertia To achieve the SNC becomes the market driver, courses which interview take longer and are less competitive internally (Personal History needs time to tell ...) Manipulation of Key Information Sets (KIS data) to ‘add up’ to the agreed sector norm, as opposed to the ‘actual’ experience (This may achieve graduateness, but creates a generic and diluted professional identity)

So where does that leave my research? These multiple policy changes seem to offer competing challenges to a profession that is founded in it’s ‘working class traditions’ (Nicholls, 2012) Youth and Community Work courses have a view of the trajectory, the ‘community of practice’ but have lost ‘ownership’ of the start of the journey, cohorts have and will change.

So where does that leave my research? The fundamental elements of the ‘profession’ remain intact, and the opportunity to practice them remains, but is in a process of change. Our graduates need to engage in that ‘local-global interplay’ and create a new ‘shared history’ that ‘transforms process and practice’ which in itself represents ‘Identity Formation’.

Bibliography Fook, J., Ryan, M. & Hawkins, L. (2000) Professional Expertise: Practice, theory and education for working in uncertainty London: Whiting and Birch Ltd Nicholls, D. (2012) For Youth Workers and Youth Work: Speaking out for a better future Bristol: Policy Press Wenger, E. (2008) Communities of Practice: Learning, Meaning and Identity New York: Cambridge University Press