Session Information
Contribution
Description: The paper will present a piece of research in relation to issues of university choice in the UK. A study of the literature has found the HE system in the UK to be segregated along racial lines, with students from certain ethnic groups (black African and black Caribbean) faring particularly badly. The case study highlights six students from a sixth form college in inner London, five of whom are from the ethnic minorities cited above, and explores the ways in which they are making their HE choices. The theoretical framework of the research is that of situated learning, in particular collectivist intrepretations of Vygotsky's zone of proximal development, legitimate peripheral participation and activity theory. The paper considers the new insights that such theoretical approaches can give in aiding new understandings of the promotion of equity and social justice in relation to HE choice in the UK. The case study of the University of Glamorgan's 'Into the Future' courses will be highlighted as a means of widening participation through the interaction of activity systems. It also considers some possibilities that might enhance the Europeanisation of HE under the Bologna agreement.
Methodology: The methodology of the research was interpretivist and social constructivist in nature with an aim of constructing new meanings and understandings in relation to HE choice. This was achieved through semi-structured interviews with students before and after their career guidance interviews. Their career gudiance interviews were also observed and interpreted.
Conclusions: The study found that a range of factors (both internal and external) affected the choices that the students made. In essence it appeared that career educators are faced with a choice. They can risk confirming the status quo by focusing on discourses of realism and thereby possibly inhibit change, or they can encourage agency and support those who want to broaden their experience. At a strategic level they can also encourage partnerships between activity systems (e.g. schools/colleges and universities) to enable systems to become more open to the participation of a wider range of people. Such participation can bring about expansive change from within. Policy and governments also have a part to play in being catalysts for change e.g. Aimhigher initiative in UK. At a Eurpoean level, the Bologna agreement could eneable universities in Europe to begin to consider the ways in which as activity systems they can be open to the participation of people from within the wider European community, where lessons learnt from Glamorgan could be applied.
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