In the light of changes the government has launched as part of its welfare to work initiatives, this text explores apprenticeship. The authors set the historical context and discuss the theoretical and practical aspects of acquiring the necessary knowledge and skills for competence.

Ople has traditionally been an 'alternative' to mainstream routes through school and college / university. However, significant changes in recent years remain relatively unexplored and under -researched. Drawing on contributions from a range of countries this e-book on Apprenticeships explores some of the challenges that the apprenticeship system faces in the countries represented as their economies and societies evolve, and the measures that are being taken to address these challenges.

In a context of considerable interest in apprenticeship in recent years, Cedefop and the OECD decided to explore its future from the perspective of a number of megatrends, including sociodemographic changes, the accelerated adoption of emerging technologies and new forms of work organisation.

In the past two decades, advanced capitalist countries have seen sustained growth in labour market participation along with a growth in the number of jobs workers tend to have in their working lives. Over a slightly longer period we also see that participation in both formal educational attainment and a range of non-compulsory learning/training has grown. However, labour market discrimination based on gender, age, disability and race/ethnicity remains a serious issue in virtually all OECD countries. ‘Challenging Transitions in Learning and Work’ presents a critical and expansive exploration of learning and work transitions within this context. These transitions are challenging for those enmeshed in them and need to be actively challenged through the critical research reported. The impetus for this volume, its conceptual framing, and much of the research emerges from the team of Canadian researchers who together completed case study and survey projects within the ‘Work and Lifelong Learning’ (WALL) network. The authors include leading scholars with established international reputations as well as emerging researchers with fresh perspectives. This volume will appeal to researchers and policy-makers internationally with an interest in educational studies and industrial sociology.

In this book, some of the world's foremost 'experts on expertise' provide scientific knowledge on expertise and expert performance.

The last decade has given rise to a strong public discourse in most highly industrialized economies about the importance of a skilled workforce as a key response to the competitive dynamic fostered by economic globalisation. The challenge for different training regimes is twofold: attracting young people into the vocational training system while continuing to train workers already in employment. Yet, on the whole, most countries and their training systems have failed to reach those goals. How can we explain this contradiction? Why is vocational training seen to be an "old" institution? Why does vocational training not seem to be easily adapted to the realities of the 21st century? This book seeks to respond to these important questions. It does so through an in-depth comparative analysis of the vocational training systems in ten different countries: Australia, Canada, Denmark, France, Germany, Korea, Mexico, Morocco, the United Kingdom and the USA.

The Reader's Guide to British History is the essential source to secondary material on British history. This resource contains over 1,000 A-Z entries on the history of Britain, from ancient and Roman Britain to the present day. Each entry lists 6-12 of the best-known books on the subject, then discusses those works in an essay of 800 to 1,000 words prepared by an expert in the field. The essays provide advice on the range and depth of coverage as well as the emphasis and point of view espoused in each publication.

Educational theory and practice have long been dominated by the requirements of formal learning. This book seeks to persuade readers through philosophical argument and empirical examples that the balance should shift back towards the informal. The arguments and examples derive from informal learning in diverse situations, such as leisure activities, as a preparation for and as part of work, and as a means of surviving undesirable circumstances like dead-end jobs and incarceration.

Community Practice and Urban Youth is for graduate level students in fields that offer youth studies and community practice courses. Practitioners in these fields, too, will find the book particularly useful in furthering the integration of social justice as a conceptual and philosophical foundation. The use of food, environmental justice, and immigrant-rights and the book’s focus on service-learning and civic engagement involving these three topics offers an innovative approach for courses.

Combining a critical analysis of the organizational and employment context of workplace learning with an understanding of theories of learning, this text focuses on new ideas and on understanding the social context of the workplace.