Transforming marginalised adult learners’ views of themselves: Access to Higher Education courses in England

Hugh Busher,Nalita James,Anna Piela,Anna-Marie Palmer

doi:10.1080/01425692.2014.919842

Abstract

Adult learners on Access to Higher Education courses struggled with institutional and social structures to attend their courses, but transformed their identities as learners through them. Although asymmetrical power relationships dominated the intentional learning communities of their courses, their work was facilitated by collaborative cultures and supportive tutors, and students gained the confidence to construct their own emergent communities of practice for learning. The students attended seven further education colleges in the East Midlands of England. Data were collected by mixed methods within a social constructivist framework from students and their tutors.

Highlights

People’s identities are always shifting (Bauman, 2000) but do so especially when they encounter new or challenging situations as liminal spaces (Bhabha, 1994)
This paper considers how Access to Higher Education (HE) students pursued the project of the self (Giddens, 1991) in order to enhance their cultural capital (Bourdieu, 1990), and how these projects are shaped by their struggles as citizens in the particular socio-economic policy contexts (Foucault, 1977) since 2010, by their power-invested relationships (Handley et al, 2006) with their tutors and by their interactions with their colleagues on Access to HE courses which, possibly, generate communities of practice (Wenger, 1998)
While Access to HE has provided a valuable entry route into higher education for many mature students, there is a lack of up-to-date empirical research in England and Wales on the processes of transition and transformation that they experience

Summary

Introduction

People’s identities are always shifting (Bauman, 2000) but do so especially when they encounter new or challenging situations as liminal spaces (Bhabha, 1994). Like other non-traditional learners, they are often initially tentative about this as their previous life experiences have frequently given them little confidence for engaging in formal learning (Crossan et al, 2003) They lack confidence that their habitus (Bourdieu, 1990) will allow them to assert and develop their agency successfully in the field of formal learning in Further Education (FE) Colleges, where Access to HE courses are conventionally located. They fear their learning experiences will be riven with tensions between them as agents, others, and the social and institutional structures they encounter (O’Donnell and Tobbell, 2007). They tend to offer a collaborative ethos or culture focused around values celebrating mature learners (Warmington, 2002)

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Discussion

Conclusion