Harry Cohen
Making Learning Work Project
The history of education in England is a story of a struggle: a struggle to extend opportunities to those who were excluded, and this is particularly true of the education of those we no longer describe as “working class”.
At the beginning of the nineteenth century, there were those who argued that “the poor” could not benefit from elementary education, in some cases because it would produce a disinclination for what one writer called “the laborious occupations of life”.
Later, scholarships to grammar schools and universities meant that a few were able to participate in an education intended for the better-off, but for too long the belief persisted that it was possible to divide young people at a particular age and that this division into separate types of “ability” was scientific and absolute. Even now, those who advocate comprehensive education have to argue its worth.
Such a view of education takes no account of the idea that people might grow and develop or that the boundaries between so called “academic” and “vocational” subjects are hard to define. After all, what are medicine and law except vocational subjects? Changing the view is vital if we are to make the best use of people’s talents, and if they are to grow as human beings.
No learning is ever wasted and all of us will need to learn throughout life whether we need to learn throughout life, whether we need a new skill for work, or want to take up a hobby or learn something of a new language before we go on holiday. Learning keeps our minds active; it opens us up to new ideas and new ways of doing things. It benefits the individual and society.
That is why I particularly welcome the “Making Learning Work Project”. It gives opportunities to those who may have missed out earlier in life. It makes learning accessible by bringing it into the workplace and it encourages the belief that all of us can continue to learn throughout life.
