In this paper I address tensions between local school-community specificities and global/national agendas. Specifically, I examine tensions surrounding aspirational discourses for social mobility with regard to students in remote locations. The outcomes of a Q methodology study carried out in one remote location offer potential lessons for other similarly situated educational contexts.

The acquisition of appropriate aspirations is reported as effectively positioning young people to engage with the globalised knowledge economy and is of benefit to them individually through accelerated social mobility (Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development, 2018). The message is that there is a seemingly endless list of contemporary employment and social advancements from which nearly all students should be encouraged to choose freely. However, straightforward alignment between continuing with education, becoming highly skilled and achieving accelerated social mobility for all those who commit to this agenda, has been called into question in isolated rural contexts. Moreover, scant attention has been paid to the experiences of young people while they are negotiating the realities of complex modernity in the places where they live (Beach et al., 2019; Pimlott-Wilson, 2017).

Young people in remote communities have aspirations (St. Clair et al., 2013) which might be shaped in ways that are not only comparatively different to their urban peers’ but also, disonant with the orthodox aspirational discourse of seeking futures in the globalised knowledge economy. While there are many influences that impact upon the formation of young people’s futures, in isolated communities teachers are likely to meet students both in and outside of school, thus having well rounded understandings of students and their family circumstances. Potentially, these teachers can have a strong influence, with students valuing interpersonal connections and developing supportive relations (Hardre et al., 2008). At the same time, educators are central to transmitting the national/global discourses to young people. In particular, school staff may be tasked with the cultivation of career aspirations in their students which might not be entirely consistent with people’s lived experiences in remote local communities.

The significant position of educators motivated my investigation of teachers’ perspectives. A Q methodology was deployed with educators working in a remote coastal area of the UK (England) to elicit viewpoints on young people’s aspirations and to understand how the teachers approached the concept. These participants were well embedded in remote communities and were likely to appreciate the challenges of schooling and post-school transitions in their rural/coastal locations. On-going analyses of the collected Q data have produced four perspectives indicating that simplistic and/or orthodox interpretations of aspiration are contested. While teachers are aware of the agenda to encourage their students to engage with and pursue a future in the knowledge economy, many appear to interpret it in light of their local experiences. . My ongoing analysis of the istudy outcomes will elaborate further on the implications e.g. for audited rates of social mobility. Subsequent returns to visit the data to carry out a more granular anaylysis will shed further light on the issues that drive some teachers in remote locations not to accept in full national/global discourses and encourage career choices that are not deemed aspirational by the main stream.

Q is a truly mixed methods approach to research with study outcomes often producing new insights (Yang & Montgomery, 2013). In this investigation, I identified teachers who were like-minded in how they considered aspirations for young people in their communities. The study outcomes were achieved by clustering like-minded teachers under factor groupings and subsequently inferring the reasoning for that cluster’s novel viewpoint. Patterns identified during the analysis were interpreted according to abduction theory (Øverland et al., 2012) whereby explanations were inferred from the observations. Recruitment to the study targeted teachers with experience of the focal issue. There were 23 participants in total and additional details e.g. about their workplaces and job roles, were collected to ensure they were working in remote communities. Personal information (participant or school/employer identifiers) was not collected. This information and commentary by the participants regarding their statement sorts were important for the later stage of interpretation. Participants carried out a forced choice sort of the 30 statements provided to them about future aspirations for young people in their schools and the remote location of their communities. They allocated these statements to a space on the Q sort grid comprising a distribution from ‘most disagree’ (-4) to ‘most agree’ (+4), with 30 spaces for the statements. Subsequently, the participants’ sorts were correlated by person and the similarities and dissimilarities (consensus and distinguishing items) between them noted. Eight principal components (PCA) were extracted with a Varimax rotation applied. Four factors were identified as best fitting the 23 sorts, which accounted for 64% of the variance. Factor scores are similar to weighted z-scores that are used for the factor array (McKeown & Thomas, 1988). The viewpoint typifying each of the four factor groupings builds on the quantitative processes of factor analyses as well as the participants’ qualitative information. Assembling these data allowed for each distinct viewpoint to be accorded an overarching heading (see below) to assist with interpretation.

Evidence has emerged that teachers in remote schools have nuanced perspectives towards encouraging young people to imagine aspirational futures. This information is potentially of use to policymakers and school leaders who might be seeking to understand why there are differential rates of transition to higher education and variations in choice of post school destinations across regions, specifically in this case, with urban and remote being the distinction of interest. Further analysis of the data will probe issues such as whether teachers’ job roles or the size of the community in which they work are associated with the particular viewpoints that have emerged. To date, the following viewpoints have been elicited from the study. These capture the diverse perspectives amongst remotely situated teachers with regard to challenging taken for granted discourses on fostering aspirations. -Build capacity in staff and students: It is important for staff to be open minded towards what a good future can be for young people with the pedagogic responsibilities of teachers not simply being about delivering qualifications for employment. -Know the community: It is essential for teachers to really understand the nature of their local society so that the full range of individual student requirements are met. -Spark curiosity for life: Teachers need to ensure that local families consider wide ranging futures for their children because in small communities, young people’s horizons can be limited. -Acknowledge the barriers to finding employment: Teachers follow the conventional aspirational agenda by engaging students with careers advice, even though there is a severe shortage of local, post-school opportunities.

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