School-to-work transitions in times of crisis: the case of Spanish youth without qualifications

Abstract

Nederlands

In dit artikel over de school-werk-transities van Spaanse jongeren wordt verslag gedaan van een grootschalig onderzoek waarbij 580 laag-/kortgeschoolde jongeren zijn bevraagd (een deel kwalitatief; een deel middels survey). De respondenten zijn grofweg tien jaar gevolgd; vanaf hun schoolverlaten totdat ze 26-28 jaar waren. Het effect van de drop-out is evident voor de arbeidscarrière van de participanten; ook vertonen ze extra kwetsbaarheid in de economische crisis van de afgelopen jaren. Meer vrouwen dan mannen waren werkloos. In de discussie wordt ingegaan op de moeilijkheid om terug ‘aan te haken’ via onderwijs en de beperkte aandacht van het beleid voor deze problematiek.

Engels

This article focuses on the school-to-work transitions of Spanish youth. Herein, we study the pathways followed during a 10-year period by young people who dropped out of school without achieving any qualifications and who did not achieve any at a later date. This is a population aged 26–28 years old with an educational level of ISCED 0–1. The study adopts a plurimethodological approach that includes an initial qualitative phase whose main instrument was the biographical interview and a second phase with a quantitative focus in which data were collected using a questionnaire. The results show the effect of dropping out of education without qualifications on the pathways of the youths as well as their greater vulnerability in the current period of economic crisis, which results in a high percentage of the population that has no employment, education or training. This effect is even greater among women. This study highlights the difficulties associated to returning to education, the reproduction of educational exclusion in the population that did not obtain the diploma corresponding to compulsory secondary education, and a lack of public policies to support this specific population.