ABSTRACT
This chapter considers what a study of ordinary kids has to contribute to existing sociological accounts of working-class educational behaviour. It assesses the consequences of a social and educational climate which has given rise to the new vocationalism. Secondary education has for more than half a century been undergoing a serious crisis which has by no means reached its conclusion. Most observers now believe that fundamental educational change is required. The debate about what the school needs to become has been dominated by the right, whilst the teaching profession laments the demise of the post-war dream, and sociologists and educationalists wonder why they no longer dominate educational debates. The Government's desire to be 'doing something' about the comprehensive school and youth unemployment is therefore creating the ideological space it needs to reintroduce early segregation and selection, and to move towards its ultimate goal: the privatization of British education, of which the city technology colleges are a forerunner.
