Sally Power
Biographic Data
| ID | 265994 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Sally Power |
| GIVEN NAMES | Sally |
| FAMILY NAME | Power |
| SIGNATURE | POWER S |
| AFFILIATIONS | Cardiff University |
| ORCID | 0000-0003-3287-0003 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 73 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 395 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 73 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 1985 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2025 |
| H-INDEX | 12 |
Outsourcing Trouble
This paper explores the complex landscape of alternative provision across the UK and its implications for school exclusion. Drawing on interviews with over 400 professionals, parents, and pupils in ten selected local authorities in England, Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales, we find marked differences in the scale and nature of provision. These differences reflect the UK's diverging political economies of education. England's provision reflect…
Invoking the Discourse of Children's Rights in Campaigns Around Public Space
Increasing emphasis is being placed on the need to consider children's rights in planning decisions. However, the way these rights are claimed by adults can be problematic, especially when planning decisions are controversial and contested. Drawing on interview data with participants engaged in campaigning around the development of a green space in Cardiff, we show how the adult appropriation of children's rights to support such campaigns may not…
Psychosocial disorder or rational action? Contrasting professional and pupil narratives of school exclusion
Over the last five years, the Excluded Lives team has been examining the patterns and processes of school exclusions across the UK in order to identify those factors which may exacerbate or reduce exclusions. One of most the striking aspects is the contrasting accounts of the causes of exclusion provided by professionals and pupils. Drawing on interview data from 29 school-based professionals and 16 excluded pupils in Wales, the paper analyses th…
Formal school exclusions over the educational lifecourse in Wales
For the first time, this paper takes a dynamic approach to studying formal school exclusions and their association with educational outcomes. In particular, we study every instance of school exclusions over a key part of a pupil’s education lifecourse between Year 6 (end of primary school) to Year 11 (end of secondary school). Using a single population cohort of all pupils in maintained schools in Wales, we show that the frequency of formal schoo…
School exclusion policies across the UK
Previous comparative research has revealed recent high and rising school exclusion rates in England and a contrasting picture of much lower and reducing rates in Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales. In this paper, we examine findings from new research into school exclusion policies across the four countries of the UK. This interrogates for the first time how the problem of ‘school exclusion’ is framed within these four distinct policy contexts. …
The royal Welsh agricultural society
Privilege, place, and patronage
This article explores the complex relationship between civil society, social inequality, and nationhood through examining the motivations of elite members of Welsh civil society as they volunteer to serve on the boards of a wide range of Welsh charities. We interviewed nearly 60 trustees and patrons, all of whom enjoyed successful and influential careers in business, politics, or public service. Their narratives reveal diverse vocabularies of mot…
Recent Trends in Formal School Exclusions in Wales
England. This has been used as an indicator of Wales' commitment to the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, which foregrounds a rightsbased agenda that would argue school exclusion is a consequence of broader socio-economic structures than individual actions. However, simple analyses may mask a different picture of school exclusions in Wales. In this article, we study more detailed information on formal school exclusions by looking at 'inst…
Rights, rules and remedies
Wales is often compared favourably to other countries because of its commitment to the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child and lower levels of school exclusions. Systematic analysis of policy documents reveals the dominance of a rights-based discourse in approaching the challenge of school exclusions, which are explained in terms of socio-economic circumstances rather than individual pathologies. However, the analysis also reveals silences a…
Confronting the ‘Coming Crisis’ in Education Research
This paper examines the current crisis in education research and how we might confront it. It begins by arguing that the ‘coming crisis’ facing empirical sociology identified by Savage and Burrows (2007 Savage, M. and Burrows, R. (2007). The coming crisis of empirical sociology, Sociology, 41 (5), 885–899. 10.1177/0038038507080443.[Crossref] , [Google Scholar]) applies equally – if not more so – to empirical education research. Education research…
Classroom exclusions
This paper examines the under-researched phenomenon of classroom exclusions and their implications for school exclusions. Responses from nearly 1500 secondary school pupils indicate that being expelled from the classroom is a common phenomenon. On average, one-third of pupils have been asked to leave the classroom at some point in the previous year. However, it is more common in some schools, and for some pupils, than others. Most often, excluded…
The cultural making of the citizen
This paper examines the complex relationship between the state, civil society and education through comparative research with young people in France and the UK. Survey data derived from two cohorts of school students in South Wales and Lyon reveal strong differences in their levels of civic and political participation. While our Welsh students have higher levels of ‘civic participation’, as measured in terms of charitable work and volunteering, o…
Conceptualising the sociology of education
This paper presents an account of the development of the sociology of education in the UK, by means of an analysis of papers published in the field’s flagship journal, the British Journal of Sociology of Education and its US equivalent, Sociology of Education. In particular, we examine the representation of two contrasting traditions in addressing social inequalities: ‘political arithmetic’; and the more recent ‘cultural turn’. We find that in th…
A tribute to Geoff Whitty
It is hard to come to terms with the scale of loss caused by Geoff Whitty’s untimely death – a loss that will be felt on many levels – from the academic to the professional to the personal. There i
Young people, family relationships and civic participation
This article examines young people’s civic participation and the extent to which this is influenced by the family. Although literature on young people’s civic participation is abundant, the role of the family in influencing this participation is largely absent. Drawing on survey data collected from 976 young people aged 13–14 in South Wales, we outline the extent and nature of civic participation and how this varies according to relationships wit…
Civil society
This article explores the complex and contradictory positioning of the family within civil society literature. In some accounts, the family is seen as the cornerstone of civil society. In others, the family is positioned firmly outside – even antithetical to – civil society. This paradox arises from the ways in which civil society is variously defined through a series of binary oppositions – in relation to each of which the family sits uneasily. …
Not in the classroom, but still on the register
There has been growing concern about the rising numbers of students being excluded from school in England – a trend that is often set against the declining levels of exclusion elsewhere. In Wales and Scotland, for example, numbers of students permanently excluded from school have fallen dramatically. However, we argue that simple system-level comparisons might be misleading. Drawing on data derived from interviews with headteachers in Wales, this…
Private tutoring in Wales
This paper seeks to contribute to the growing research base about the extent and significance of ‘shadow education’ through drawing on data from a national survey of over 1000 key stage 2, 3 and 4 pupils in Wales and over 200 of their parents. Wales provides an important lens to look at shadow education because of the political commitment by the Welsh Government to universal public education and equality of outcomes. Our data indicate that the in…
Sara Delamont
Sleepless in school? The social dimensions of young people’s bedtime rest and routines
There are increasing concerns that social pressures, such as family changes and social media, are ‘invading’ the sanctuary of the bedroom with the result that students arrive at school tired and stressed. This paper seeks to examine whether these concerns are justified and contribute to the growing literature on the social dimensions of sleep through examining the rest and routines of two cohorts of young people aged 12–13 and 14–15 years old. Ou…
Editors' Report
Heroes' and 'villains' in the lives of children and young people
This paper explores the responses of nearly 1200 children and young people in Wales who were asked to identify which three famous people they most admired and which three they most disliked. Analysis of these young people's responses reveals a number of sociological and educational issues. Their selections confirm other research which has highlighted the importance of celebrities in the lives of young people. Their ‘heroes’ and ‘villains’ are dra…
Giving, Saving, Spending
This article explores children's responses to a single question: ‘If someone gave you £1 million today, what would you do with it?’ Although such an exploration might seem trivial, we argue that their responses provide important insights into children's values and priorities. One‐third intend to spend it all, one quarter to save it. But the largest group claim that they would give all or some of the money away. Their responses highlight the diver…
Credentials, talent and cultural capital
This article examines student accounts of credentials, talent and academic success, against a backdrop of the enduring liberal ideal of an education-based meritocracy. The article also examines Bourdieu's account of academic qualifications as the dominant source of institutionalised cultural capital, and concludes that it does not adequately account for comparative differences in the social structure of competition and ideological shifts in class…
Editors’ Report
Marketization and privatization in mass education systems
Credentials, talent and cultural capital
This article examines student accounts of credentials, talent and academic success, against a backdrop of the enduring liberal ideal of an education-based meritocracy. The article also examines Bourdieu's account of academic qualifications as the dominant source of institutionalised cultural capital, and concludes that it does not adequately account for comparative differences in the social structure of competition and ideological shifts in class…
The role of networks and connections in educational elites’ labour market entrance
Self, Career and Nationhood
There is increasing interest in the emergence of a 'global middle class' in which high achieving young graduates increasingly look to develop careers that transcend national boundaries. This paper explores this issue through comparing and contrasting the aspirations and orientations of two 'elite' cohorts of graduates. Interviews with students at the University of Oxford, England, and Sciences-Po, France, reveal very different ambitions and alleg…
Unravelling a ‘spun’ policy
The term ‘spin’ is conventionally used to refer to the process and products of purposively managing information in order to present institutions, individuals, policies, practices and/or ideas in a favourable light and thereby mobilize support for them. Attempts to manage news and political communications are not new. However, the New Labour Government in the UK is frequently presented—by the media and political opponents—as being obsessively conc…
Education markets, the new politics of recognition and the increasing fatalism towards inequality
This paper explores the complex ways in which the marketisation of education and the associated publication of performance data have contributed to the emergence of a new politics of recognition which has paradoxically served further to naturalise educational inequalities. Of all the reforms associated with subjecting education to market forces, it is the publication of ‘league tables’ of raw performance data which has sparked the most controvers…
New Labour's education policy
On coming to power in 1997, the New Labour government promised to move beyond the ‘ruthless free-for-all’ of the neo-liberals. However, rather than revisiting the ‘stifling statism’ of ‘Old Labour’, the government has claimed to be developing a so-called ‘third way’ in which policies are put forward on the basis of ‘what works’ rather than being driven by any one ideological approach. Through drawing on Giddens' outline of ‘first’, ‘second’ and ‘…
Not in the classroom, but still on the register
There has been growing concern about the rising numbers of students being excluded from school in England – a trend that is often set against the declining levels of exclusion elsewhere. In Wales and Scotland, for example, numbers of students permanently excluded from school have fallen dramatically. However, we argue that simple system-level comparisons might be misleading. Drawing on data derived from interviews with headteachers in Wales, this…
From redistribution to recognition to representation
This paper attempts to analyse current developments in education through exploring shifts in the politics of education over time. Rather than looking at education policy in terms of political provenance (left or right) or ideological underpinnings (the state or the market, the public or the private), the paper compares education policies in terms of the domains of social injustice which they address. Based on Nancy Fraser's theorisation of differ…
Bernstein and the Middle Class
This paper explores Basil Bernstein's insights into education and social class, and in particular the relevance of his work for understanding the British middle class. Bernstein is one of the few sociologists of education to recognise and explore differences and tensions within the middle class. We begin by exploring some of the influences of Bernstein's theorisation of social class in general, and outline his main ideas on the relationship betwe…
Reading education action zones
Explores the conceptualization of social justice embedded in the education-action-zones policy recently implemented in England. Although zone populations suffer three types of social injustice, the initiative recognizes economic disadvantage, but inadequately acknowledges cultural and associational injustices. Cultural remedies cannot be imposed under these circumstances. (Contains 22 references.) (MLH)
The deployment of social capital theory in educational policy and provision
Heavily influenced by Putnam's particular variant of social capital theory, the New Labour government in the UK has introduced several initiatives designed to raise educational achievement by building the social capital of families identified as socially excluded. One such initiative was the Education Action Zones (EAZ) policy. Whilst this policy has recently been eclipsed by other initiatives designed to enhance education in areas of disadvantag…
Schoolboys and schoolwork
This paper discusses the educational biographies of a group of young men who, at secondary school, had been part of a larger sample of pupils identified as ‘academically able’. Through examining their personal accounts of schooling, we argue that processes of gender identification have significant implications for the ways in which academic ability is perceived, developed and displayed. In particular, the development of masculine identities may f…
Giving something back? Sentiments of privilege and social responsibility among elite graduates from Britain and France
This article explores the complex relationship between transnational elites and civil society through examining the contrasting orientations of two cohorts of 'elite graduates' from Paris and Oxford. Both cohorts believe their privileged status has been earned through hard work and ability. But they are also aware that they have benefited from advantages not available to all. Perhaps because of this, they express the need to 'give something back'…
Educational Pathways into the Middle Class(es)
Although the close relationship between education and the middle class has long been recognised in the sociology of education, its various dimensions have rarely been examined in detail. Through investigating the educational histories and occupational destinations of 199 recruits into the middle class, this paper explores whether there is any clear connection between educational pathway and occupational location. In particular, it analyses the co…
Schools, Families and Academically Able Students
Over the past few years, we have been gathering data on the educational careers of a previously researched group of students who were identified as ‘academically able’ in their early teenage years. The 347 young men and women who have taken part in this later research attended 18 different secondary schools and are now in their mid‐twenties. This paper attempts to make sense of their school experiences using Basil Bernstein's theorisations on the…
Implementation research and education policy
This paper offers a brief guide to implementation research and some of the conceptual and methodological issues it raises. In the course of reviewing investigations of the import of aspects of the 1988 Education Reform Act, it also considers the issues posed for education policy studies in a context where the ‘centre’ is connected to a dispersed and differentiated periphery
Paving a ‘third way’? A policy trajectory analysis of education action zones
Presented at its launch in 1998 as the quintessential 'third way' welfare policy, the English education action zones (EAZ) experiment was one of a number of area-based initiatives in the UK designed to tackle social exclusion in disadvantaged localities. The policy was premised upon the idea that different bodies—public, private, voluntary, and community—should work together to deliver 'joined-up solutions' to 'joined-up problems'. This paper rep…
Researching the impact of education policy
During the 1980s, a range of policies were introduced that sought to reform the British education system along market principles. The scale and range of policy legislation has been matched by heightened sociological interest in education policy and has generated a number of empirical investigations and critical analyses of the effects of such policies at ‘ground’ level. This paper looks at some of the resulting analyses and argues that they conta…
Private tutoring in Wales
This paper seeks to contribute to the growing research base about the extent and significance of ‘shadow education’ through drawing on data from a national survey of over 1000 key stage 2, 3 and 4 pupils in Wales and over 200 of their parents. Wales provides an important lens to look at shadow education because of the political commitment by the Welsh Government to universal public education and equality of outcomes. Our data indicate that the in…
In the grip of the past? Tradition, traditionalism and contemporary schooling
This article theorises the nature of tradition, in particular the role it plays in the formation of identity and the legitimation of authority. It draws on recently concluded research carried out in England involving a sample of self-governing grant-maintained (GM) and local education authority (LEA) maintained secondary schools to illustrate the various ways in which a particular version of a traditional education, sometimes influenced by interp…
Managing the state and the market
Within the field of education management studies, recent reforms promoting devolution and choice are often seen to provide exciting new opportunities. It is claimed that the ‘new’education management, with its emphasis on site-based decision-making and consumer accountability, will enable headteachers and principals to ‘take control’ of their schools and make them more productive environments in which to work and study. However, our review of res…
Classroom exclusions
This paper examines the under-researched phenomenon of classroom exclusions and their implications for school exclusions. Responses from nearly 1500 secondary school pupils indicate that being expelled from the classroom is a common phenomenon. On average, one-third of pupils have been asked to leave the classroom at some point in the previous year. However, it is more common in some schools, and for some pupils, than others. Most often, excluded…
Civil society
This article explores the complex and contradictory positioning of the family within civil society literature. In some accounts, the family is seen as the cornerstone of civil society. In others, the family is positioned firmly outside – even antithetical to – civil society. This paradox arises from the ways in which civil society is variously defined through a series of binary oppositions – in relation to each of which the family sits uneasily. …
Markets and Misogyny
This paper has arisen from a concern that much recent policy-related research on markets displays misogynistic tendencies. In both the media and academic accounts it would appear as though the blame for social and educational inequalities can now be laid at the door of women – particularly middle-class mothers. Through examining competing perspectives on how we might understand this attribution of blame, this paper argues that their guilt is best…
Somatostatin for Gastrointestinal Haemorrhage
Pastoral Care’ as Curriculum Discourse
This paper explores the significance of the recent development of pastoral care as a distinct category of secondary school provision. It argues that existing accounts of the rise of pastoral care fail to take on board the relationship between changes in the school curriculum and their wider context. It also suggests that the separation and construction of pastoral care as distinct from the ‘academic’ is only one dimension of, and can only be unde…
Grant‐maintained schools
Grant-Maintained Schools
Researching the impact of education policy
During the 1980s, a range of policies were introduced that sought to reform the British education system along market principles. The scale and range of policy legislation has been matched by heightened sociological interest in education policy and has generated a number of empirical investigations and critical analyses of the effects of such policies at ‘ground’ level. This paper looks at some of the resulting analyses and argues that they conta…
Opting into State Control? Headteachers and the Paradoxes of Grant‐maintained Status
This paper reflects on the significance of two paradoxes of opting out within which grant‐maintained (GM) school headteachers are entangled, and to which they contribute. Discussion of the first paradox focusses on the way GM status, rather than eliminating ‘producer interests’, creates a new one in the form of headteacher control which assists the policy's implementation and the realisation of other educational reforms. Examination of the second…
Opting for grant‐maintained status
The grant-maintained (GM) schools policy, which is one of a number of government initiatives aimed at reforming and restructuring state education, was announced in the Conservative party manifesto for the 1987 general election and subsequently incorporated into the 1988 Education Reform Act (ERA). Operating as autonomous institutions, outside the control of the local education authorities (LEAs) from which they had elected to 'opt out', GM school…
Parents, Pupils and Grant‐maintained Schools
The 1988 Education Reform Act allows schools to ‘opt out’ of local education authority (LEA) control and become ‘grant‐maintained’ (GM). Advocates of the policy claim that ‘freeing’ schools from LEAs will enable them to become more responsive to parents and, through diversifying the education ‘market’, expand parental choice. The policy's critics, on the other hand, fear that it will contribute to a divisive system of education and ultimately dim…
Grant Maintainted Schools
Grant-maintained schools and the great reform of education the grant-maintained schools policy the uptake of the policy local education authorities and opting out going grant-maintained experiencing grant-maintained schools - pupils and parents opting out and the education marketplace - two case studies self-governance, diversity and developments
Implementation research and education policy
This paper offers a brief guide to implementation research and some of the conceptual and methodological issues it raises. In the course of reviewing investigations of the import of aspects of the 1988 Education Reform Act, it also considers the issues posed for education policy studies in a context where the ‘centre’ is connected to a dispersed and differentiated periphery
The Detail and the Bigger Picture
This paper attempts to understand recent changes in schools through the use of state‐centred theory. It does so in the light of concerns expressed by Jenny Ozga that much research on education policy and practice ignores the ‘bigger picture’. Through using case study material, this paper argues that state‐centred theorisations of education policy may provide little help in explicating what is going on in schools. The paper suggests that, rather t…
The Pastoral and the Academic
Reconceptualizing pastoral care the emergence of pastoral care the discourse of pastoral care Elmfield School - case study of the pastoral and the academic pastoral and the academic - messages from the boundary Kings Marsh School - integrating the pastoral and the academic pastoral care and the academic curriculum - curriculum theory and professional practice
In the grip of the past? Tradition, traditionalism and contemporary schooling
This article theorises the nature of tradition, in particular the role it plays in the formation of identity and the legitimation of authority. It draws on recently concluded research carried out in England involving a sample of self-governing grant-maintained (GM) and local education authority (LEA) maintained secondary schools to illustrate the various ways in which a particular version of a traditional education, sometimes influenced by interp…
Not Drowning but Waving? Comprehensive education in the 1990s
Retrospectively, it is possible to see in 1965 the spirit of modernity at its height. Science was breaking boundaries that would herald a new era. The USSR and USA were locked into battle to conquer space. On the domestic front, Britain witnessed the appearance of exciting new products and inventions-the hovercraft, folding bicycles, microwave ovens, UHT milk, PVC. Ambitious engineering projects were being completed-Dungeness Power Station, the S…
Managing the state and the market
Within the field of education management studies, recent reforms promoting devolution and choice are often seen to provide exciting new opportunities. It is claimed that the ‘new’education management, with its emphasis on site-based decision-making and consumer accountability, will enable headteachers and principals to ‘take control’ of their schools and make them more productive environments in which to work and study. However, our review of res…
Schoolboys and schoolwork
This paper discusses the educational biographies of a group of young men who, at secondary school, had been part of a larger sample of pupils identified as ‘academically able’. Through examining their personal accounts of schooling, we argue that processes of gender identification have significant implications for the ways in which academic ability is perceived, developed and displayed. In particular, the development of masculine identities may f…
The assisted places scheme
The Conservative government that was in power in Britain from 1979 to 1997 introduced a range of policies designed to restructure education provision. The Assisted Places Scheme was one of its first major reforms, enabling academically able children with limited financial means to attend private schools. Although subsequent provisions have focused more on the marketization of the public sector, the scheme was identified by the Conservative Govern…
Schools, Families and Academically Able Students
Over the past few years, we have been gathering data on the educational careers of a previously researched group of students who were identified as ‘academically able’ in their early teenage years. The 347 young men and women who have taken part in this later research attended 18 different secondary schools and are now in their mid‐twenties. This paper attempts to make sense of their school experiences using Basil Bernstein's theorisations on the…
Are Markets and Standards Democratic
New Labour's education policy
On coming to power in 1997, the New Labour government promised to move beyond the ‘ruthless free-for-all’ of the neo-liberals. However, rather than revisiting the ‘stifling statism’ of ‘Old Labour’, the government has claimed to be developing a so-called ‘third way’ in which policies are put forward on the basis of ‘what works’ rather than being driven by any one ideological approach. Through drawing on Giddens' outline of ‘first’, ‘second’ and ‘…
Destined for success? Educational biographies of academically able pupils
The research reported here has explored the different pathways and prospects of a group of young people considered to have been ‘destined for success’. The 347 men and women involved in this research were all identified as ‘academically able’ when, in the mid‐1980s, they joined 18 different secondary schools that ranged from inner‐city comprehensives to some of the most prestigious independent schools in the country. Their retrospective accounts …
Marketization and privatization in mass education systems
The right to know
Successive Conservative Governments and now the Labour administration have emphasized the importance of parental participation. In particular, establishing rights of access to information has been a central feature of recent education policies designed to make schools more accountable to parents. However, as with all reforms, the way they are experienced ‘on the ground’ is likely to be significantly different from the rhetoric surrounding their i…
Educational Pathways into the Middle Class(es)
Although the close relationship between education and the middle class has long been recognised in the sociology of education, its various dimensions have rarely been examined in detail. Through investigating the educational histories and occupational destinations of 199 recruits into the middle class, this paper explores whether there is any clear connection between educational pathway and occupational location. In particular, it analyses the co…
Reading education action zones
Explores the conceptualization of social justice embedded in the education-action-zones policy recently implemented in England. Although zone populations suffer three types of social injustice, the initiative recognizes economic disadvantage, but inadequately acknowledges cultural and associational injustices. Cultural remedies cannot be imposed under these circumstances. (Contains 22 references.) (MLH)
Political science (59 works) · Sociology (58 works) · Law (37 works) · Law (31 works) · Economics (26 works) · Pedagogy (24 works) · Global Educational Policies and Reforms (23 works) · Politics (22 works) · Psychology (22 works) · Public Administration (18 works)