Session Information
05 SES 05 A, Children and Youth at Risk and Urban Education
Paper Session
Contribution
Transition between school and labour market represents an important issue for policymakers, actors of education and enterprises. In fact, it remains a concern mainly because of its implications shared by the educational system and its different ways of upper secondary training, politic as well as economic actors. Indeed, a growing number of young Swiss people who leave compulsory school has problems attending an education (Bachmann Hunziker, 2007) or does not directly begin an education (Pagnossin & Armi, 2008).
Transition to upper secondary is a pivotal moment in one’s education, and suffering academic failure at this turning point engenders serious consequences for one’s future, such as marginalization, precariousness and exclusion (Masdonati, 2007; Padiglia, 2007). Not graduating from upper secondary education is a major risk factor to poorness in Switzerland: without a diploma, the young have fewer chances to succeed in their professional and social life (Häfeli & Schellenberg, 2009).
In Europe, there is a varied offer of such programs aiming to sustain transition, sometimes called “second chance education” (Blanchard & Sontag, 2006). Similarly, numerous programs to support transition between compulsory school and upper secondary education have appeared during the last two decades in Switzerland, with the aim of increasing the rate of graduation from higher secondary education to 95% by 2015 (CDIP, 2011). Implemented in different cantons, these transitional programs usually take place on a period of one year and differ in terms of curricula, goals, public, supervision, and success rate. But how are the syllabuses and the teachings imagined in order to support the transition? And what needs do they fulfill?
The present paper is part of a broader research, which aims to explore the relations between the meaning building processes of students and the framework established by the transitional program. Several different angles are necessary to study both the complex phenomenon of transition and the articulation between the individual and interpersonal (or institutional) levels. Nevertheless, this paper focuses on the institutional perspective that enables to grasp beforehand the cultural and social context of a transitional program, as well as the interpersonal dynamics that take place within the transitory year and in the programs classes. According to a socio-cultural approach of development and learning, this study relies on the assumption that transitional programs might be successful and help young people with their professional and social integration if the students are accompanied in their different changing processes – social repositioning, identity transforming and meaning making (Zittoun, 2006). In addition, we assume that a program designed to facilitate the transition must provide students opportunities for reflection, for distancing from their experience and for appropriation of knowledge so that they can fully invest in the transition to further education.
The concepts of thinking space (Perret-Clermont, 2001, 2004) as well as space of appropriation (Matthey et al., 2009) enable to examine the frame in which learning occurs and help to respond to the general question: How is transition taken care by the studied transitional program? Various level of analysis are thus explored: the cultural and professional traditions within the program (system of beliefs, values, practice and theoretical models); the context (the institution and its rules, the roles of the different actors, the tasks or the meeting procedures); as well as the different specific pedagogical frames and situations (their spatial and temporal limits, their rules or the communication processes at stake). The three following research questions set the guideline for our cases analysis:
1) What are the missions and the goals of the transitional program?
2) What are the curricula and the contents?
3) What are the different learning situations and spaces for appropriation?
Method
Expected Outcomes
References
Blanchard, S., & Sontag, J.-C. (2006). Accompagner les jeunes en difficulté dans leur insertion sociale et professionnelle: rapport de synthèse du projet européen Leonardo Da Vinci: Un modèle pédagogique pour une Ecole de la 2ème chance". Paris: INETOP/ CNAM. Conférence suisse des directeurs cantonaux de l'instruction publique (CDIP). (novembre 2011). Education.ch, 3. Flick, U. (1992). Combining Methods - Lack of Methodology: Discussion of Sotirakopoulou & Breakwell. Ongoing production on social reprensentations, 1(1), 43‑48. Häfeli, K., & Schellenber, C. (2009). Facteurs de réussite dans la formation professionnelle des jeunes à risque. Berne: CDIP. Matthey, C., Padiglia, S., Zittoun, T., Ros, J., Lempen, O., & Grossen, M. (2009). Usage de textes littéraires et philosophiques comme ressources symboliques : conditions d’établissement d’un sens personnel d’éléments culturels durant les interactions en classe. Rapport de recherche SYRES n°1, Mai. Lausanne/Neuchâtel: Universités de Lausanne & Neuchâtel. (subside FNS n°100013-116040/1) Masdonati, J., Lamamra, N., Gay-des-Combes, B., & De Puy, J. (2007). Les enjeux identitaires de la formation professionnelle duale en Suisse: un tableau en demi-teinte. Formation Emploi, 100, 15‑29. Padiglia, S. (2007). Itinéraires de transition et solutions transitoires en Suisse. In M. Behrens (Ed.), La transition de l’école à la vie active ou le constat d’une problématique majeure. (pp. 13‑21). Pagnossin, E., & Armi, F. (2008). Recherches suisses sur les transitions entre la formation et le monde du travail depuis les années 1980. Neuchâtel: IRDP. Perret-Clermont, A.-N. (2001). Psychologie sociale de la construction de l’espace de pensée. In J. J. Ducret (Ed.), Actes du colloque. Constructivisme: usages et perspectives en éducation (Vol. I, pp. 65-82). Genève: Service de la Recherche en Education (actes du colloque). Retrieved from http://doc.rero.ch/record/9471/ Perret-Clermont, A.-N. (2004). Thinking spaces of the young. In A.-N. Perret-Clermont, C. Pontecorvo, L. B. Resnick, T. Zittoun, & B. Burge (Eds.), Joining society. Social interaction and learning in adolescence and youth (p. 3‑10). Cambridge: Cambridge Univesrity Press Zittoun, T. (2006). Insertions. A quinze ans, entre échec et apprentissage. Berne: Peter Lang.
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