Varia n°152

The democratization of student pathways in terms of residential autonomy and type of higher education: A new form of school and social polarization

Noémie Olympio, Valérie Germain

The aim of this article is to question the forms of student youth by considering two cardinal elements of student life: the type of studies and residential autonomy. It aims to analyse how these two dimensions combine in the young person trajectory in order to understand different typical pathways. In a context of rather stable massification between the 1990s and the 2000s, we seek to question the degree of democratization of these student paths from one generation to the next. Our results highlight new inequalities and show a trend of school and social polarization of pathways over time. On the one hand, some of the young people have significant highmore chances of having independent accommodation and integrating selective pathways, and on the other, another part of the youth, under family dependency and in vocational studies, cumulate school and social vulnerability.

“Learning by doing” : another model of training ?

Pierre-Yves Bernard, Pauline David, Céline Jacob

French initial vocational training underwent a process of schooling from the middle of the 20th century, under the influence of the school form model. This study analyzes the case of a private sector initiative, still too little known, which appeared at the end of the 19th century and is now expanding in France : production schools. By practicing an apprenticeship in school, but in real production conditions, they break with the school form of vocational training. The survey shows, however, that they fit into the institutional landscape through the preparation of national diplomas.

The experience of the individualization of training paths : between self-construction and identity tensions

Goucem Redjimi

This contribution seeks to understand how the experience is constructed within the framework of individualized training courses. The objective is to take this questioning out of the sole fields of education and the learning context to focus on the experience itself is the objective here. Based on the analysis of around forty interviews conducted with socio-cultural facilitators engaged in a VAE process (validation of acquired experience), this article puts the construction of this experience into perspective and reveals how it puts in tension the subjectivity of individuals or, conversely, participates in the dynamics of identity construction.

Civic service : a french scheme of youth aspiration de/re-construction

Gérald Houdeville, Romain Perrier, Charles Suaud

This qualitative survey among young former civic service volunteers shows either a raise, a decline or a persistance of their professional aspirations. These effects are produced according to the structure of the school, social and economic resources of these youths. A low level of qualification does not always mean that the civic service is only a enchanted interlude : positive relationship with the tutor can open ajusted but real futur prospects for the less educationally fitted volunteers.

Between resilience and renewal : OPCA on the eve of the reform on "the freedom to choose one’s professional future"

Anne Moysan-Louazel, Gérard Podevin, Carole Tuchszirer

This article proposes to highlight the profound renewal of the context in which the OPCA have been moving for 20 years, until the threshold of the 2018 reform which will see them transformed into OPCO. The observation of four OPCA makes it possible to observe a structural transformation of their interventions and service offerings over the course of legislative reforms ; reforms that will be sources of multiple tensions before which the OPCA will show a real capacity to adapt. Then emerges the figure of an OPCA which has become a real intermediary on the labor market. This major change, which has often gone unnoticed, will disturb the professionalism and identity of the profession of adviser within these organizations. Also, the relative success of this institutional conversion comes largely from their ability to ambidexterity.

Business schools alumni complex career changes : rupture and re-activation of interiorised dispositions

Ludivine Le Gros

Atypical career changes from highly qualified former executives generate media interest since a few years but were not analysed in a sociological perspective. This article aims to understand these improbable trajectories, relying on 14 interviews from emblematic cases of radical career changes after graduation from a top French business school. Despite the fact that these career changes can be considered as real biographical ruptures and are presented, more or less intensively, in an opposition between past and present ; we can still identify some continuity. This continuity appears in the re-activation of inherited dispositions from the business school socialization during the career change process, finally showing some sociological consistency.