This month I am speaking at a European and International Research Symposium, called Evaluating the Impact of Arts and Cultural Education on Children and Young People with my colleague David Parker from Creative Partnerships (CP). We will be reporting on the methods we have developed to be able to capture the impact of this programme and how we have tried to move the research and evaluation framework for CP towards a more meaningful understanding of impact and effect. The paper we wrote as well as a video of the proceedings is available through the symposium website.

My current project is describing and theorising the business support provided by WAC Performing Arts and Media College to new or young businesses. This initiative is aimed at start-ups in the creative and/or cultural industries and offers mentoring and incubation facilities. Most of the businesses are led by young people from ethnic minorities. As part of the The Last Mile ( an EQUAL project) I am analysing the effectiveness of these sorts of interventions and thinking what it means to be in business as a creative career choice, since it is obvious that most of the businesses supported are more than just attempts to earn income or make money.

I am speaking at the DREAM conference on Odense in September. I will argue that informal learning has become a way of describing the value of digital technologies but that the term has no real meaning – there is only learning . If we are really serious about changes to the nature of learning in the current era, then we have to find ways to make informal learning mean more in policy terms

I have just finished my chapter for the 2006 Review of Research in Education for the American Education Research Association. The chapter takes a critical look at how theories of learning have been used to rationalise, justify or explain the meaning and pleasure of media culture amongst young people in contradistinction to school. I want those people who think that media culture has won the ‘competition with schools to think again about what this means for the politics of education. Publication details for Volume 30 can be found here.

My Hawke Research Institute working paper has just been published. It offers a description of and a contribution to a theory about the sector of out-of-school (non-formal) educational provision for young people. Focusing particularly on arts and culturally based activities, it surveys the forms and structures of such provision and explores how it is used in a range of policy contexts, especially those aiming to redress social exclusion and promote economic regeneration. This is contextualised within a consideration of how out-of-school education could form part of the overall ecology of education provision offered to young people in the community. It draws on examples of study, research and evaluation from around the world and is aimed at education administrators, academics, researchers, practitioners and social policy makers, and attempts to offer a coherent overview of a crucial but neglected part of what should constitute the educational sector in the global, post-industrialised world.

In May 2006, I will be working in Adelaide, UniSA again developing the New Spaces Project. This involves working with government and the University to etablish and build up non-formal learning centres, as well as strategically developing the University as a centre for research and study in this field.

I’d like to thank Steve O’Hear for helping to put together my new website. Enjoy.