‘Left to your own devices’ – the missed potential of adult career guidance in Denmark

Abstract

In 2008, the European Council agreed on a Resolution on better integrating lifelong guidance into lifelong learning strategies. The Resolution promoted lifelong guidance as a policy to support people during the multiple transitions provoked by a more volatile labour market. However, when looking into the guidance policy of Denmark, the Resolution does not seem to have taken effect. Whereas, the career guidance system is relatively developed in terms of transitions from basic schooling into youth education and from youth education to higher education, when it comes to transitions during a working life, adult career guidance structures are patchy and scattered across different policy areas and institutions. The objective of this article is to investigate the potential of adult career guidance as a support structure for Lifelong Learning, career transition and labour market mobility. To this end, we draw on Holzkamp's concept of 'disruption of the cyclicity in everyday life' to analyse working life narratives. We focus on the potential contact points between the individual and public structures supporting working life transitions. This article hereby contributes to ongoing discussions concerning access to career guidance as part of a social contract underlying flexible labour markets.

Social guidance and counselling support services on the study habits of distance learners: A case of learners in Bachelor of Education programmes by distance learning of University of Nairobi, Kenya

“…The implication of this finding is that social guidance and counselling was perceived to positively influence learners in Bachelor of Education programme by distance learning University of Nairobi respect to each other that is adequate for group study. This is in line with Cort et al (2015)"s study finding.…”

“…The implication of the finding to the study is that social guidance and counselling is perceived to positively influence the development of better communication skills. The finding agrees with Cort and Anderson (2015) finding that distance education cannot help distance learners to master communication skills. Indicator (11)" Social guidance and counselling has helped me to develop self-awareness" had a mean score of 3.28 and a standard deviation of 1.329.…”

‘In reality, i motivate myself!’. ‘Low-skilled’ workers’ motivation: between individual and societal narratives

“…Although we identified interesting gendered differences, for example in the orientation of motivation iv , we determined that a vertical analysis of three men in similar positions and with similar family status, but at different stages of life and having had to deal with different structural conditions, would provide a valuable basis for our understanding of motivation and the intricate interplay between societal and individual narratives. The structural conditions refer to the time periods represented: The period from the 1980s, when the first interviewee entered the labour market, to 2000 marks a radical change in employment and education policies, from welfare to workfare, with education becoming a civic duty and unemployment a problem of individual motivation (see Cort, Thomsen & Mariager-Anderson, 2015).…”

“…This policy emphasises the rights and duties of the unemployed in order to receive social benefits. The policy also marks a change in the overall narrative about unemployment: from a Keynesian welfare state narrative, in which unemployment is due to structural conditions, to a neoliberal workfare state narrative, in which the individual is responsible for ensuring his or her own employability through LLL (see Cort, Thomsen & Mariager-Anderson, 2015). The workfare narrative implies a notion of extrinsic motivation, making it a duty to engage in education and a self-deserved/stigmatised position to be unemployed.…”

European Research Agenda for Career Guidance and Counselling

“…European research should be able to delineate the weaknesses and strengths of people with different characteristics, so as to identify risk factors, to promote specific interventions, and especially to enhance preventive actions through a new awareness by social services, practitioners, and the educational and work context. Some research has been initiated on the career-related attitudes and particular need of people belonging to cultural minorities (Leong & Flores, 2015), of immigrant workers (Schultheiss & Davis, 2015), of low-skilled workers (Cort et al, 2015), and people classified as experiencing social and economic disadvantage (Blustein et al, 2015). Other recent issues such as the development of extremist attitudes and the lack of future perspectives among Western youth should also concern researchers in the field of CGC.…”