Much has been written about 'performativity' and the 'audit culture' in relation to the teaching profession, but this literature has been neglectful of how these might impact educational paraprofessionals. Informed by Institutional Ethnography, this book provides a critical examination of the role, practices and everyday work experiences of educational paraprofessionals. Taking the learning mentor in English state secondary education as its starting point, the study then draws on international, historical literature to trace the genealogy of this role and examines the legacy of the paraprofessional movement in 1960s USA. Ultimately, the question of the adequacy of short-term policy initiatives in the face of intractable social inequalities is explored.

"One of the richest and truest evocations of life in a working class home in the Rhondda that I have read. Sympathy, deep perceptions of the inner lives of people, sensitivity to the influence on individuals of the extended family and life of the street...and expertise in the managing of ideas. Wonderfully successful in putting flesh on the dry bones of History." Ieuan Gwynedd Jones, Emeritus Professor of Welsh History, Aberystwyth