A short, innovative book that outlines what we know about the declining state of social mobility in the UK and proposes what we should do to reverse this downward trajectory and make Britain a more mobile and just society.

A short, innovative book that uses examples and evidence from around the world to analyse the concept of fake news and outline what we know about it, before proposes what we should do about this dangerous phenomenon.

The Irish border is a manifestation of the relationship between Britain and Ireland. When that relationship has been tense, we have seen the worst effects at the Irish border in the form of violence, controls and barriers. When the relationship has been good, the Irish border has become - to all intents and purposes - open, invisible and criss-crossed with connections. Throughout its short existence, the symbolism of the border has remained just as important as its practical impact. With the UK’s exit from the European Union, the challenge of managing the Irish border as a source and a symbol of British-Irish difference became an international concern. The solution found in the UK-EU Withdrawal Agreement gives the Irish border a globally unique status. A century after partition, and as we enter the post-Brexit era, this book considers what we should know and do about this highly complex and ever-contested boundary line.

Schools do amazing work to support children from disadvantaged backgrounds. But this book will enable them to do more. Disadvantage comes in many forms, but cultural poverty, where some students have relative knowledge gaps compared with their more affluent peers, can be addressed successfully by schools. The Working Classroom explores how working-class students are disadvantaged by a flawed system and what schools can do to close the gap. Written by two experienced authors with a deep understanding of the challenges that poverty and low aspiration can bring, and a passion for social justice, The Working Classroom examines how and why we must seek systemic changes. The book focuses on actions within the control of teachers and school leaders which will ensure that we create a socially just education system - one that builds on the rich heritage of the working-class, rather than seeing their background as a weakness. It offers practical ways for students and families to build on the best of working-class culture, whilst also empowering teachers, students and parents to change the system. The Working Classroom provides teachers with useful methods to improve the cultural capital of students from disadvantaged backgrounds that can be easily replicated and implemented in their own setting. Backed up by practical case studies that have a proven impact in schools with high levels of deprivation, this book will enable teachers to audit their current provision and encourage them to adopt new systems and practices so that they, and the wider school, will have a greater impact on the lives of working-class students and their families. Suitable for both teachers and leaders in a secondary school or sixth form college setting who seek to support social change in education and anyone in the corporate or non-education world who wants to practice effective altruism or philanthropy.

Teaching and Learning to Unlock Social Mobility for Every Child is a topical and insightful text that guides readers through evidence-based practice that will improve outcomes for all involved in education, increasing social mobility and inclusion in every sense. In the past 30 years, how children and young people learn has changed considerably as challenges of social mobility become more apparent. Cultural and social economic disadvantage is evident, as is the need to focus on mutuality in education, whereby all children and young people are valued regardless of their background, challenges or needs. In this context, Teaching and Learning to Unlock Social Mobility for Every Child is the first work to capture and clearly explain practical teaching and learning approaches that can be used in any school. It circles around the creativity and technology of pedagogy, exploring an educational agenda that is genuinely rooted in social mobility for all children. Written accessibly and full of case studies, this book is intended to guide practitioners and stakeholders at all levels of education from school leaders to researchers, students and teachers. It will help them to impart the skills and capacities which children and young people require to drive their future social mobility and address the challenges they will face on their own terms.

In Break the Caste, George Gerharz unmasks common American misperceptions of poverty, inequality, and social mobility. Based on personal experience from five decades of anti-poverty work and current research, he proposes solutions to inequality, lack of mobility, and poverty and examines how the American social order and corporate powers create these problems. In this book, he provides four strategies to create a more equal and economically mobile nation.

Class is not only amongst the oldest and most controversial of all concepts in social science, but also a topic which has fascinated, amused, incensed and galvanized the general public. But what exactly is a ‘class’? How do sociologists study and measure it, and how does it correspond to everyday understandings of social difference in the twenty-first century? In a time when inequality has dramatically returned to the social scientific and political agenda, this accessible and lively book explores these questions and more. It takes readers through the key theoretical traditions in class research, the major controversies that have shaken the field and the continuing effects of class difference, class struggle and class inequality across a range of domains. This new edition covers the latest research and scholarship and includes extended discussions of race, the rise of national populism, and the reconfigurations of class in a global age. This book will appeal to students and scholars across the social sciences and anyone wanting to get a handle on this provocative concept.

First Published in 1990. What are a woman's chances of 'getting on in life'? How many shopkeepers' daughters make it to senior politcal pots- more or less, than shopkeeper's sons? What do we mean when we talk of a 'successful woman'? Up until now, we have know very little about female social mobility as studies have mostly been concerned with men. For the first time, this collection presents a compressive account for women's social mobility, built up by exploring how family background, work career and experience of marriage connect into a mobility profile. Starting from conventional questions, such as, what are the rates of inter-generational mobility, how do qualifications shape entry to work, and how does first job relate to later career achievement, the chapters begin to modify the perspective inherited from male mobility models. Is marriage in itself a form of mobility, and if so in which direction? What is the effect of child-rearing on careers? And how do household arrangements modify both occupational participation and the class position of married woman? Our models of the British class structure become increasingly open to question when tested against female mobility experiences. Based in the new tradition of mobility studies, which is now concerned as much with employment as with class in a narrow sense, this study offers a fresh perspective on the idea of social mobility itself. Its conclusions and proposals for new ways of seeing mobility, for example as a person-based profile, are equally relevant to students of social stratification, social structure and socio-economic change, as well as those who seek to understand the place of women in society today.

This book explores higher education, social class and social mobility from the point of view of those most intimately involved: the undergraduate students. It is based on a project which followed a cohort of young undergraduate students at Bristol's two universities in the UK through from their first year of study for the following three years, when most of them were about to enter the labour market or further study. The students were paired by university, by subject of study and by class background, so that the fortunes of middle-class and working-class students could be compared. Narrative data gathered over three years are located in the context of a hierarchical and stratified higher education system, in order to consider the potential of higher education as a vehicle of social mobility.