ABSTRACT
The Youth Opportunities Programme (YOP) is frequently perceived and presented as an homogenous programme, with the implication that its operation and impaet is uniform throughout. YOP is a diverse programme enveloping, amongst other things, college-based courses of varying content and duration, project and placement schemes, training workshops, and work experience with employers. The formal rationale of YOP was to develop an integrated system of training, education and work for young people out of work. The industrial structure of the West Midlands is located around heavy engineering, the motor industry and a vast number of small businesses which ‘service’ the larger concerns. The other major category of trainees for whom YOP constitutes an alternative to employment are those who see it as a ‘cushy number’.
