Introduction: Geographies, Histories and Practices of Informal Education

Abstract

In a 1943 survey of British youth work, Arthur Morgan described a range of youth clubs and organisations as ‘training place[s] in the social art of citizenship’ (p.102). Seventy years later, these types of voluntary and publicly funded spaces of non-formal or informal education ‘beyond school’ continue to occupy an important place in civil society as part of young people’s leisure activities, learning and wider socialisation. Simultaneously, these spaces are seen as addressing the needs of the state, as they are used to mobilise wider political and policy-based discourses around participation, citizenship and engagement. For example, in 2014 the coalition government of the United Kingdom continues to roll out its National Citizen Service (NCS) scheme — ‘for the lessons they can’t teach you in class’ — via a network of recently established charities and social businesses such as Catch22 that run alongside pilot programmes with long-standing youth organisations such as the Jewish Lads’ Brigade founded in 1895. In bringing together these varied youth partnerships, the very make-up of the NCS represents a kaleidoscope of informal education spaces in the United Kingdom and a sustained focus on ‘training places’ for children and young people.