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In a contemporary world preoccupied with the protection of children, it is profoundly shocking to learn that child labour played a key part in Britain's industrial revolution. Indeed that this pioneer economic transition would not have happened in the way that it did without child labour. Jane Humphries draws this startling conclusion from a study of more than 600 working-class autobiographies. These offer unprecedented insights into child labour, family life, careers and schooling. Seen from below, through the eyes of history's everyman, the costs and benefits of industrialization acquire new edge. The impact of Humphries' work has been to change public understanding of this momentous divide by integrating humanity back into economic history and trauma back into the Industrial Revolution.
EPPSE is a Government-funded, high profile, longitudinal study with a multi-disciplinary design and numerous outputs, almost unprecedented in the UK in terms of its scale and scope. It has become a seminal study of the influence of early education on children's later development. Findings have been used in the UK and internationally for:
The two Principal Investigators at the IOE have taken lead roles in all of the above.
The Effective Provision of Pre-school Education (EPPE) project led by Edward Melhuish produced major government policy changes since 2008. EPPE is a longitudinal study focussing on the impact of early childhood education and the home learning environment on educational and social development. The government's recent decision to extend free early years provision for disadvantaged children was based on EPPE's finding (highlighted in several government reviews) that good quality early education has long-term benefits, in particular for disadvantaged children. EPPE also demonstrated the critical role of better-qualified early years staff, which has led to new policy recommendations on staff training.
In a continuing policy focus on the family, both the current coalition government and its Labour predecessor have emphasised the value of re-integrating fathers into the family unit. For over 20 years our research has helped the UK government understand the role and importance of fathers to children's development. We have made concrete recommendations about the focus (i.e., the what and how) of initiatives designed to promote fathering. Our impact includes a tenfold increase in funding for work with fathers in Children's Centres and the pivotal influence of one study in parental responsibility granted to over two million unmarried fathers.
A new methodology has been developed that enables a more flexible approach to understanding the effects of immigration on the labour market and the native-born labour force. The key finding is that the effect of immigration on wages and employment depends on the extent of the substitutability between immigrant and native born labour. This substitutability differs at different skill levels, so that immigration has a greater effect on unskilled native born workers. This new methodology's findings have informed the debate over labour market effects and have influenced the development of related policies by Government and other key stakeholders.
The evidence produced by Professor Wadsworth's research directly has shaped or influenced policy made by government. In particular, the research has been used as input into several key policy recommendations made by the Home Office sponsored Migration Advisory Committee (MAC) (of which Wadsworth is a member) to inform the coalition government's declared aim of achieving a reduction in the levels of net migration in the current parliament to the tens of thousands. The research has been cited by numerous stakeholders in the debate on the impact of rising immigration on the labour market. There are numerous examples of citations in a public discussion, consultation document or judgement.
Bell and Blanchflower's research on youth unemployment has been highly influential in affecting policy directions in both the UK and Europe during the Great Recession. It has also generated substantial public concern for a `lost generation' of unemployed young people through their sustained engagement in media and public debate.
Over 3 million UK children live in poverty. Ridge's research has shown that understanding the impact and experience of poverty from the child's perspective is essential for developing effective policies and services to improve children's lives. Through strong, close and enduring relations with policy makers and advocacy groups, her research and knowledge exchange have directly influenced national and local government policies for low-income children. Policy-makers now listen to children's perspectives as they develop policy, incorporating statutory consultation with children into key initiatives such as the Child Poverty Strategy. This has significantly improved the quality of life of children and families in poverty.
Research conducted by the Centre for the Study of Poverty and Social Justice (CSPSJ) led to a new way of assessing child poverty in developing countries. This novel method (termed the Bristol Approach) resulted in the United Nations General Assembly's adoption, for the first time, of an international definition of child poverty (2006). It also underpinned UNICEFs Global Study on Child Poverty and Disparities (2008-10), which was run in over 50 countries. In the last ten years, the CSPSJ's work has put child poverty at the centre of international social and public policy debates. Its researchers have advised governments and international agencies on devising anti-poverty strategies and programmes that specifically meet the needs of children, and have significantly influenced the way child poverty is studied around the world. The Centre has developed academic and professional training courses for organisations like UNICEF on the issues of children's rights and child-poverty. Our work has also spurred NGOs such as Save the Children to develop their own child-development indices, and so has had a direct and profound impact on the lives of poor children around the planet.
Our work on children's agency in research has had three impacts:
This approach has been replicated in Australia, Turkey, New Zealand, Norway and Qatar. The CRC website hosts 150 successful projects by children and young people, and through the Diana Award more than 1500 children were supported in their research on cyberbullying.
Young Lives is identifying major influences on children's development, from infancy to adulthood, by carrying out a pioneering longitudinal study across four developing countries over 15 years. Young Lives gathers and analyses data on how childhood is changing in diverse communities, especially through the impact of economic, cultural and policy shifts, by studying two age cohorts in each country. UNICEF, the World Bank, Plan International, and Save the Children International, among others, are using Young Lives research to design childhood poverty-reduction policies in the Post-2015 Development Agenda. The research also underpins the re-visioning of global child protection work by UNICEF, Save the Children Canada, and World Vision UK.