Review: Education should go beyond the classroom

It is said that one in three young people in Sweden get involved in rock bands. Many of the facilities to do so are provided by the State, in the belief that such activity provides positive learning in the so-called soft skills that are increasingly required in contemporary society. Other countries appear to be less persuaded, despite a groundswell of assertion that new learning methodologies are needed for the flexible, globalised world. Advocates of non-formal learning still face an uphill struggle to persuade policy makers of even its complementarity to more established, formal learning strategies in mainstream education and training institutions. They will be delighted with this book, a research-led comparative study of community-based training programmes in music, art and drama. The authors argue forcefully for the positive secondary learning outcomes of such provision. They point to generic skills such as the ability to work in groups, mutual responsibility, self-motivation and confidence. This is the very stuff of the prevailing lifelong learning agenda that is being peddled, too often rhetorically, across Europe.The book pulls few punches in challenging traditional forms of education and training. They are, the authors maintain, fundamentally out of touch with the current realities of youth transitions and the constantly changing labour market. Young people cannot be prepared for futures that are elusive to pin down. There needs to be a paradigm shift in approaches to learning so that they deal with young peoples current priorities and concerns and equip them with the life-management skills to go forward positively in an uncertain world. Particularly for more disadvantaged young people, the training (or rather learning) issue is to open up young peoples minds to the possibility that they might have a future.The three projects discussed in Germany, the UK and Portugal, three very different contexts for youth transitions suggest that they have supported young people in identity development, instilled motivation and provided vehicles for learning. They may not get young people jobs, but they offer hope. They represent models of good practice that, the authors contend, may currently only exist on the fringes of prevailing training practice but could, and should, be spread out into a broader training landscape. Young people can only find themselves if policy makers provide the foundations upon which they can do so.Reviewed by Howard Williamson, senior research associate at the School of Social Sciences, Cardiff UniversityCommunities of Youth: Cultural practice and informal learning By Steven Miles et alPublished by Ashgate 2002. Price 37.50, 42 pages. ISBN 0 7546 1976 1