Terry Hyland

The science delusion: freeing the spirit of enquiry

Rupert Sheldrake is a biologist, author, and an ambassador for a more holistic science. His previous publications include A New Science of Life (1981), The Presence of the Past (1988), Seven Experiments That Could Change The World (1994), Dogs That Know When Their Owners Are Coming Home (1999), and The Sense of Being Stared At (2003), amongst others. Most of these books build on Sheldrake’s hypothesis of morphic resonance that is described in his first two books. The Science Delusion (2012) can be understood as a response to Richard Dawkins’ book The God Delusion (2006).

Mindfulness-based interventions and the affective domain of education

Thanks largely to the work of Kabat-Zinn and associates applications of mindfulness-based practices have grown exponentially over the last decade or so, particularly in the fields of education, psychology, psychotherapy and mind–body health. Having its origins in Buddhist traditions, the more recent secular and therapeutic applications of the basic notion of impartial present-moment attention have been shown to have far-reaching implications for all aspects of learning and education. It is argued that mindfulness practice has much to contribute to the neglected area of affective education in the UK system and that – in addition to enhancing learning in the crucial sphere of the education of the emotions – it can also provide a foundation for more general cognitive development. In addition to philosophical arguments, reference is made to research studies of mindfulness-based educational practices in America and Britain.

Vocational Education and Training and the Therapeutic Turn.

The concept of ‘therapeutic education’ is being increasingly used in contemporary education policy studies to identify learning initiatives which are dominated by objectives linked to personal and social skills, emotional intelligence and building self‐esteem. Contemporary educational goals connected with such strategies have been criticised for encouraging a ‘victim culture’ which marginalises learners and replaces the pursuit of knowledge and understanding with the development of personal values relevant to a life of social, cultural and economic risk and uncertainty. In relation to vocational education and training (VET) and post‐school policy trends in particular, Hayes has argued that preparation for work has abandoned vocational/occupational knowledge and skills in favour of providing learners with personal skills for emotional labour in low‐level service jobs. This paper interrogates such analyses and questions whether the therapeutic role of VET really is incompatible with the traditional objectives of developing knowledge, understanding and values in work environments. Links are made between new emphases on work‐based learning and the ‘caring’ conceptions of learning in post‐school education. It is concluded that—although therapy should not dominate VET—an attention to the important values dimension of learning in the field does involve a therapeutic dimension of some kind.

Mindfulness, adult learning and therapeutic education: integrating the cognitive and affective domains of learning

Although it has been given qualified approval by a number of philosophers of education, the so‐called ‘therapeutic turn’ in education has been the subject of criticism by several commentators on post‐compulsory and adult learning over the last few years. A key feature of this alleged development in recent educational policy is said to be the replacement of the traditional goals of knowledge and understanding with personal and social objectives concerned with enhancing and developing confidence and self‐esteem in learners. After offering some critical observations on these developments, I suggest that there are some educationally justifiable goals underpinning what has been described as a therapeutic turn. Whilst accepting that ‘self‐esteem’ and cognate concepts cannot provide a general end or universal aim of education, the therapeutic function—the affective domain of learning—is more valuable and significant than is generally acknowledged. This claim is justified by an examination of the concept of ‘mindfulness’ which, it is argued, can be an immensely powerful and valuable notion that is integrally connected with the centrally transformative and developmental nature of learning and educational activity at all levels. The incorporation of mindfulness strategies within adult learning programmes may go some way towards re‐connecting the cognitive and affective dimensions of education.

Third way values and post-school education policy

Analyses of emerging New Labour policy and practice in the post-compulsory education and training sector have been centrally concerned with the role of ‘third way‘ values and politics in the formulation and development of projects and initiatives. Alternative interpretations of the ‘third way’ conception are examined and located against the background of some flagship schemes, particularly the New Deal Welfare to Work and the University for Industry learndirect initiatives. It is concluded that policies influenced by third way notions involve more rather than less state involvement and centralism than neo-liberal strategies of the past. This New Labour statism - arguably different from both Old Left and New Right centralism - could, conceivably, be justified in terms of achieving the socio-ethical strands of current policy concerned with social inclusion and communitarian approaches to the distribution of educational goods and services in the face of the forces of globalization.

McMindfulness in the workplace: vocational learning and the commodification of the present moment

Originating in Buddhist contemplative traditions, mindfulness theory and practice – which foregrounds present-moment awareness and attention – has extended its modern secular and therapeutic applications into an exponentially expanding range of fields and disciplines including psychology, psychotherapy, mind–body health practices and education at all levels. Its potential usefulness in general vocational education and training has been explored by a number of researchers and practitioners, and its application in schools and colleges is receiving increasing attention. As with many popular educational innovations, the foundational values of mindfulness strategies have been distorted and subverted in a number of instances in which ‘McMindfulness’ programmes have been implemented with a view to the exclusive pursuit of corporate objectives and commercial profit. Such mutated examples of mindfulness-based interventions (MBIs) are, to some degree, evident in certain spheres of the field of mindfulness and work in which the present-moment attention and stress-reduction aspects of mindfulness strategies are unduly separated from the ethical foundations for the purpose of outcome-based assessments linked to predominantly instrumentalist ends. As a way of guarding against such decontextualising developments in MBIs, a conception of mindfulness at work is recommended which foregrounds the ethical and affective components of vocationalism and which is informed by work-based and apprenticeship models of learning.

Vocationalism, work and the future of higher education

The following book is reviewed. Working Knowledge: the new vocationalism and higher education COLIN SYMES & JOHN McINTYRE (Eds), 2000 Buckingham: SRHE/Open University Press 181 pp., ISBN 0335 20571 2, £ 65.00 (hb)

Vocational Education and Training

This chapter examines key aspects of VET provision which, in its primary function of preparation for working life, is arguably the most important stage of education for many people. Parallels between the subordinate and second-class status of the vocational and affective spheres of education were drawn in Chap. 7 and I intend to suggest ways of remedying the chief ills of vocational studies by emphasising the ethical, aesthetic and social–collective dimensions of work in the field. Finally, I argue that this reconstructed conception of VET can be significantly enhanced by the incorporation of mindfulness and affective strategies and principles.

Reconstructing Vocational Education and Training for the 21st Century: Mindfulness, Craft, and Values

The unfavorable comparisons between English and European vocational education and training (VET) systems made in the Wolf Report—and indeed in many national reviews of VET in Britain since the Royal Commission on Technical Education reported in 1884—point toward the low status of vocational pursuits in the United Kingdom compared with that in Continental Europe and elsewhere. In the light of these cultural differences, it is unlikely that structural, funding, or curriculum reforms alone will succeed in enhancing VET provision without corresponding changes in the value foundation of vocational studies. The reconstruction of VET requires a re-orientation of its foundational values if the reforms proposed by Wolf and others are to have any chance of lasting success. By the same token—although European and other national systems have their own peculiar problems—the global policy agenda concerned only with cognitive outcomes expressed as behaviorist skills and competences is, arguably, unlikely to meet the key challenges. A reconstructed model of VET needs to foreground the values, craft, and aesthetic features of vocationalism if the perennial problems are to be dealt with adequately. A reconstruction plan is suggested below, informed and inspired by the concept of “mindfulness”—non-judgmental, present-moment attention, and awareness—drawn from Buddhist contemplative traditions. Mindfulness-based interventions (MBIs) in areas such as psychology, psychotherapy, medical science, and education have grown exponentially over the last decade or so, and interesting work is now emerging in relation to the value of mindfulness in workplace training.

Mindfulness, Therapy and Vocational Values: Exploring the Moral and Aesthetic Dimensions of Vocational Education and Training.

The devaluation and debilitation of education in general and vocational education and training (VET) in particular has been explored and described in recent years by a wide range of critical commentators. Education stands in dire need of therapy, and this paper suggests a therapeutic process for rejuvenating and enhancing VET through attention to the moral and aesthetic values which, arguably, should underpin all genuinely vocational learning. These processes need to counter the claims made by Ecclestone and Hayes about the so‐called ‘therapeutic turn’ in education. It is suggested that such claims are exaggerated and mistakenly based on a one‐sided intellectualist conception of the educational task. On a more positive note, it is argued that the theory and practice of ‘mindfulness’ – present‐moment attention and awareness – can serve to foster moral, social and aesthetic values which can be utilised to enhance and enrich vocational studies at all levels of the system.