Informal learning in times of austerityUK: Chris Pascal , Tony Bertram & Andy Cramp Portugal: João Formosinho & Júlia Formosinho

BECERA CONFERENCELearning Beyond the Classroom

MAC, Birmingham: Tuesday ,19th February 2019

Presentation 1: Chris Pascal

Austerity and Family Learning (AFL) Project: Research design and methodological

challenges

Project Aims

• The project falls under the British Academy theme ‘Urban Futures’. Itaims to consider how disadvantaged young children and families haveexperienced the impact of austerity on their local communityspaces/places where informal and family learning takes place andexplores innovative, community led practices which have kept suchleisure and recreational spaces alive and thriving.

• The project is international in scope looking at the impact of austerityand responses to it within disadvantaged communities in northern andsouthern Europe, exploring saliences across the two countries, with aview to wider transfer of the knowledge generated.

• The project aims to deliver specific academic, public, cultural and policy-relevant outputs.

Project Rationale

• The crisis in public finances in many European countries and the consequent roll back inpublic services under austerity has impacted disproportionally on the poorest sectors ofsocieties in most countries and especially families with young children, leading to adouble disadvantage for our most disadvantaged groups which is likely to have a longterm impact on school attainment and social mobility in these countries.

• The social contract between State and individual and the balance of responsibility is acontested space in public policy making and this project will make a unique and realcontribution to this debate.

• In particular, it will explore the changing relationship between central responsibilitiesand local community responsibilities in relation to support for community arts, culturaland recreational services which are used extensively by disadvantaged families withyoung children to access informal and family learning opportunities.

Special FeaturesThe value of this study is that it addresses a vacuum in our current knowledge base.

• It identifies changes in publicly-funded, local community spaces available/accessed bydisadvantaged families since the introduction of austerity in 2010.

• Uniquely, we refer to early years provision outside formal early education/childcare settings,including playgrounds, museums, parks and libraries. Decline in these environments puts at riskchildren’s cognitive, communicative, social and behavioural development. Research looking at theinfluence of early informal and family learning within free, public spaces is lacking.

• Research focusing on disadvantaged families’ views on the impact of cuts on communityspaces/places and the effect on children’s learning opportunities is lacking. Seeking their views onthe impact of austerity on family life and learning, and exploring what might be beneficial andsustainable locally, offers a unique insight into family learning.

• We want to enhance what local community action can contribute to developing publicopportunities to support informal family learning through an exploration of how creativeinterventions in surviving community venues can make the most of limited public funding toenhance informal family learning in local places. The evaluated outcomes of this intervention willprovide transferable strategies to address aspirations for greater social justice, wider communityengagement and increased social cohesion.

Specific Research Questions• How has austerity impacted on the availability of, and access to, of public, free,informal learning spaces and resources in two English and two Portuguesecommunities?

• How have character building, positive learning dispositions and the executivelearning functions of children been affected by the reduction in free, publiccommunity spaces and resources, especially for disadvantaged, low incomefamilies?

• In the face of austerity, how have communities and services maintained andsustained free, public community spaces and resources, particularly with regardto building neighbourhood community building, solidarity and creativity?

• What additional action can be taken to enhance informal family learning in free,public community spaces?

Research Methods and Plan of ActionThis exploratory, descriptive, project is a one-year, two phase, projectbeginning in February 2018 and completing in February 2019. It aimsto provide a robust descriptive account of the impact of austerity oninformal and family learning opportunities of disadvantaged youngchildren in two countries and how local community action hasmitigated the impact to sustain such learning experiences.

Building on, and extending, our strategic relationship with research, practice and community colleagues in targetneighbourhoods in England and Portugal, the study will generate quantitative and qualitative data through a multi-case study approach. Action and data collection will take place in two communities in Birmingham, England, and twoin Oporto, Portugal, already identified as being the most deprived communities and requiring structural investment toimprove human capital development.

Phase 1 (6 months)

Method 1: Neighbourhood Cultural MappingWithin the four communities we will map the shifts and structural changes in public and free communityprovision in the target neighbourhoods brought about by austerity. The focus will be museums, publiclibraries, youth clubs and publicly funded open ground, including parks and playing fields.

The mapping of neighbourhood data, which will be obtained through a mixture of documentary analysisand local interviews, will be visually presented using neighbourhood ‘cultural mapping’ (see for exampleWorld Bank Poverty Mapping) with a clear commentary on what the mapping reveals. We will use thisapproach to inform the shape and focus of the data collection in the second phase.

Examples of Neighbourhood Maps

Visualisations of MapsOur Cultural map(s) will need to show:

•Incidence of various sets of indicators•Changes over time•Use-age of facilities, etc

Phase 2 (6 months)Method 2: Family and Provider Case StudiesWithin this phase we will work with local families and existingcommunity workers and cultural/arts based services in each ward toexplore and document through focused interviews their experiencesof austerity on their services, highlighting in particular, examples ofpositive, enriching and creative responses to the impact of austerityon publicly funded community learning spaces and otherenvironmentally based opportunities linked to informal familylearning.

Theoretical and Conceptual Frames

Wellman (2001): Community Typology• Community Lost, Community Saved, and Community Liberated • Changing social ties in a networked society (technology)• From Face to face, Place to place, Person to person

Recent urban sociology theorises the dimunuation of ‘face’ and ‘place’ networked communities towards ‘virtual’ communities where technology enables dispersed networks of individual ‘persons’ rather than localised networks of faces and places ie the demise of the importance of place and face ie neighbourhood communities and networksBUT This proposed trajectory of community/social networking seems not to work when you are poor, not mobile, technologically limited and so tied to face and place networks in local neighbourhoods (which are becoming increasingly impoverished)

Thematic Analysis

Acknowledging the unique ‘situatedness’ of each neighbourhood case study, we will interpret the data by looking over time for key themes and saliences across the four cases:The Past: • Sanctuary, belonging and community• Open access to public spaces and places • Informal learning opportunities for family members – adults and young childrenThe Present: • Loss and insecurity• Limited access to public spaces and places• Unsafe spaces and places The Future: • Hopes and aspirations for the future• Community led possibilities

Emerging Findings from Lee Bank Neighbourhood, Case Study 1

TONY BERTRAMCENTRE FOR RESEARCH IN EARLY CHILDHOOD

BIRMINGHAM, UNITED KINGDOM

PRESENTATION 2

Informal learning in times of austerity

Overview of Neighbourhood Case StudyLee Bank, Birmingham

• Lee Bank is a neighbourhood within the Ladywood Ward less than a mile from the City centre and bounded by arterial roads, main railway lines and canals

• The area’s name has changed three times in last 10 years: • Lee Bank, Attwood Green, Park Central

• This presentation will briefly summarise:• Data sources• Historical changes• Demographic changes• Emerging themes from the evidence

Overview of Case Neighbourhood Data Sources

• Existing Data bases: ONS, NHS, SOA, Ward Data (Ladywood), BCC• Neighbourhood Cultural Maps• Respondents:

• Parents• Centre Staff and Managers• Other Stakeholders: including Voluntary Sector Provider, NHS, Police, Parks

Authority, Housing Association, Academy Trust, Parental Support, Perinataland Breast Feeding Support, Family Learning, Community Art Group

Lee Bank History

Walking distance from City, Victorian 4 storey tenement, back to back slums, next to the relatively rich Calthorpe Estate

In 1960s/1970s social housing, very densetower blocks built. Four of these 20 storey blocks, provided 464 flats. The buildings were poorly built and very rapidly deteriorated. Lee Bank Middle Way, adual carriageway with over and under passes

Lee Bank History

In 1980s/1990s a radicalisedIrish & African Caribbean Lee Bankcommunity became vocal

At the Eurovision Song contest held in Birmingham in 1998, they demonstrated onthe Town Hall roof with a RECLAIM LEE BANK poster

Largest regeneration programme

Lee Bank History

Largest regeneration programme in UK outsideLondon began in late 1990s with EU money, conditional on change of ownership of property

Changed composition from: 70% public housing, to 30% - accusations of ‘social cleansing’ and gentrification

Lee Bank Demographics

• Birmingham has the youngest population of any UK City. Across Birmingham, 43% of children (6,887 out of 16,506) born in 2017 had mothers born in another country (Poland being the most frequent)

• 9.1 per cent were born to mothers born in Africa (especially Somalia and Nigeria)• 6.4 per cent were born to mothers from the “new” European Union countries Poland, Romania,

Bulgaria and Baltic States• Only six wards in the City have birth rates above death rates.

• Ladywood ward has the youngest (avg 31 years/median age lower at 27), most diverse and highest % of HE qualified population of all City wards.

• Almost 40% of residents were born overseas with migrants from China, India, Jamaica, Iran, Ireland.

• In 2017 the End Child Poverty campaign group named Ladywood as having the worst levels of child poverty in the UK. The group claimed 47.3% of children within the constituency were living in poverty - with low income families struggling to fund even basic essentials.

Themes Emerging• Respondents’ descriptions of real societal change• Respondents’ feelings about those changes, losses and gains• Respondents’ current use and access to informal learning spaces for

adults and for children; opportunities and barriers; impediments and enablers

• Respondents’ feelings on ‘safe spaces’ for interaction with others, and for their young and older children

• Futures and aspirations

‘It takes a village to raise a child’

• Hilary Clinton’s book (1996)• At the Republican National Convention, Republican Party nominee Bob Dole said: ‘.. with all due respect, I am here to tell you, it does not take a village to raise a child. It takes a family to raise a child’.• Change, austerity and a neoliberal orthodoxy.

To find out more:

https://www.earlylearningausterityproject.org/

Thank you