Page 4 - euroguidance-insight-newsletter-2011-autumn

Interview with Prof. Ronald Sultana: “Guidance is a Political Activity”

Professor Ronald Sultana is Director of the Euro-Mediterranean Centre for Educational
Research at the University of Malta and a well-known expert in the field of career guidance. His
interest in career guidance began quite early. He was still at school when he knew a career
guidance counsellor whom he admired a lot. He wanted to be like him when he grew up. In
1982 he started to study career guidance and counselling at the Reading University in England.

Having finished his studies, he initially worked as a guidance counsellor at Maltese schools.
Shortly afterwards he went to New Zealand in order to write his Ph.D. on a subject very closely
related to career guidance, namely on the “transition from school to work”.

Sultana’s first involvement in guidance on an international level was a project organised by one
of the European Commission’s agencies, the Turin-based European Training Foundation which
started when Malta was about to join the European Union. This project invited one expert from
each of the 11 candidate and accession countries to write a report about the situation of career
guidance in the respective countries. Professor Sultana was asked to write a synthesis of all the
eleven reports which catapulted him into the career guidance international arena.
Professor Sultana, has there been a volume called “Inside/Outside It is much more than that. It is also about
anyone who influenced your professional Schools: Towards a Critical Sociology of challenging structures that promote and
life? Education in Malta”. Together with a reproduce inequalities, and which
Yes, there was Abel Giglio, one of the group of students I analyzed various perpetuate in-justice. Guidance is
pioneers of career guidance in Malta and aspects of life in Maltese schools from the therefore also advocacy, particularly on
President of the Malta Union of Teachers. perspectives of equity and social justice. behalf of marginalised groups.
He was a person I had very much looked
up to. Tony Watts is an-other one to be Internationally, it is the series of studies I What is in your view the link between
mentioned. He is an internationally carried out in developing countries, career guidance and lifelong learning?
renowned expert in career guidance and particularly in Palestine which was a rather There has been a major shift as to how
Professor at the Cambridge University. challenging study. career guidance is looked at to-day. Of
Tony liked my approach in career course the value of focusing on key
guidance, which takes into regard both It made me consider the theoretical transitions is still recognized but often it is
the sociological and psychological insights. approaches in career guidance developed also seen that such programmes suffer
We worked together in several projects in in Western countries with a more critical from the ‘too little, too late’-syndrome.
the last decade. He has become very eye. Here we are talking about a situation
important in my life in terms of being an where young people and adults have Nowadays we are rather talking about
academic mentor whose work I read and limited choices due to the political and ‘lifelong guidance’, which is an ap-proach
use. socio-economic situation in their country. to recognise that people require
Yet, when you try to think of the information, and possibly also advice and
Being an internationally known expert, relevance of career guidance in this guidance throughout their lives.
you have published several books. What situation, you can see the value of
book are you proud of the most? opening up pathways and options for The reason for this is simple: modern
It is the book “Education and young people in that particular context. economies – at least in theory – require
National Development” which is a Here, the link between career guidance, people to have a number of jobs
study on vocational education. I politics and power is very visible. It makes throughout their lives. This is not true for
really put my heart and soul into also clear that guidance is a political everybody, because there are a lot of
this piece of work. It took me five activity, and not just a ‘technical’ one in people who find a job and stay in it the
years to write it. I did a lot of terms of finding the best fit between rest of their lives, but it is increasingly true
research, i.e. historical and field people and jobs, or in helping people for an increasing number of people, and
work inclusively surveys and construct their career pathways. indeed this is one of the key features of
interviews. I am also quite proud of the ‘new capitalism’.