‘The barriers between work and play have broken down’: industrious ‘alternative’ education 1970s–1980s

Abstract

This article examines aspects of the turbulent history of a small community-organised alternative school (the Education Reform Association (ERA) school, 1971–87), for the purpose of better understanding schooling as a site for the making of late twentieth-century ‘industriousness’. Focusing on how the school’s organisers aimed to challenge traditional routines of schoolwork, we propose that viewing the school’s history from the perspective of the labour of teachers, parents and children can shed fresh light on historical shifts in the complex relationship between school and work and also on a significant period (1970–80s) in ‘progressive’ school reform activism.