parcular, they do not fit neatly with the individualisaon of problems and soluons relang to members of groups conceived as excluded and problemac.


These parcipants challenge the posioning of migrant women as passive consumers of the courses they are targeted for by those of us who collaborate in this sector to provide them. However, this is not to devalue the courses themselves: it is clear that these are highly valued. It seems especially important that there is a range of provision, both in terms of subject (with ESOL oen being the core), and in terms of formality or informality. This allows for a rich resource from which women can choose to fill their ‘bags’, and where the collecve processes of knowledge-­‐building and sharing can take place.


The nature of the hybrid spaces provided by the centres is important. They are places where women can operate in their mulple roles and where the complexity and porosity of boundaries between these roles can be recognised and valued as a strength. They are also key to the processes of building and developing these roles as well as new ones.


For me, the value and power of these individual and collecve knowledge gains go far beyond what are somemes called ‘so outcomes’; they are not in our control, they are gained and used on the students’ own terms and are just as much about acon and resistance as compliance and inclusion. Most importantly in my view, these outcomes belong to learners. They are not ours to take possession of, to be pinned down, boxed and cked. I hope that I have been able to use the data I have collected to show that the claims we oen make on learning do not reflect the complex and varied learning processes taking place in people’s lives and cannot and should not be appropriated in this way.


I hope my research serves as is a reminder to challenge the way migrant women learners are recognized in our workplaces and beyond. We should give value to the seemingly everyday, but oen powerful, processes of knowledge building they are engaged in without seeking to make a claim on them. In a praccal way, we can be thoughul about what we try and ‘capture’, and what it is not appropriate for us to make claims on, when designing and compleng ‘Individual Learning Plans’ and evaluaons for the RARPA process. And we can acknowledge that in our day-­‐to-­‐day working life, where there is lile me to talk to students in depth, there is much that may not even come to our aenon.


Mirza (2009) uses the analogy of a quilt to describe how women work – using what they have, pung pieces together, making a whole that is more than the sum of its parts, a somemes slow but powerful creave process. The image was also suggested by one of the women praconers I spoke to:


‘It’s like a patchwork quilt almost isn’t it?’


Just as powerful was the student’s metaphor of a bag for collecng and sharing knowledge. In the highly gendered sector which is adult and community educaon, these two images can support us (learners and praconers) in resisng individualisc and simplisc ideas of achievement and outcomes, and acknowledging the collecve and creave learning processes that happen within and beyond our instuons.


References


Bagley, C.& Ackerley, C. (2006), ‘I am much more than just a mum’: Social Capital, empowerment and Sure Start, Journal of Educaon Policy, 21:6, 717-­‐734.


Bellis, A & Morrice, L. (2003), 'A Sense of Belonging: Asylum Seekers, Cultural Difference and Cizenship' in Coare, P. & Johnstone, R. (eds) Adult Learning, Cizenship and Community Voices. Leicester: NIACE Brah, A. (1996), Cartographies of Diaspora. London, New York: Routledge


Churchill, H & Clarke, K. (2009), 'Invesng in Parenng Educaon: A Crical Review of Policy and Provision in England', Social Policy & Society, 9:1 39-­‐53


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