Higher education is increasingly positioned as a private good for prospective students in England, through which they can hope to gain an economic return on their 'investment'. This paper offers new ways of thinking about the purpose of university study and the benchmarks of graduate success. Using Margaret Archer's understanding of the concept of…

This paper discusses a piece of qualitative research that explored the narratives of a group of mature women when they discussed influences on their post-16 educational decisions. This encompasses their initial vocational education and training (VET) and their choice to study higher education (HE) programmes in England. The research draws on Nancy…

This paper extends the work of Gamble, who followed Marx in seeing a reconstitution of the reserve army of labour as a key function of capitalist crisis, but it suggests a wider class reformation that includes what can be called the middle-working/working-middle class. Education and training to all levels are deeply implicated in this class…