The Role of Celebrity in Young People's Classed and Gendered Aspirations

There are growing concerns in the UK that celebrity is impacting negatively on young people's aspirations. Politicians and teacher unions have spoken out on the 'dangerous effects' of celebrity, expressing fears that young people just want fame (as footballers' wives or Reality TV stars) rather than achievement based on hard work and skill. This study builds on recent research suggesting that celebrity informs young people's educational and career aspirations in complex ways. It will explore how accounts of aspiration within celebrity (e.g. stories of success, talent and self-realisation) shape young people's imagined futures.

The research questions are:
- What discourses (powerful and conflicting social stories) of aspiration circulate in celebrity representations?
- How do young people take-up these discourses in talking about their own aspirations?
- How do discourses of aspiration in celebrity and young people's take-up of these relate to social class and gender?
We will focus on social class and gender because a large body of research shows that these are central to young people's educational and career aspirations and choices.

This youth-centred study will combine individual and group interviews with online forums and celebrity case studies. We will work with 144 young people in six English comprehensive schools that cater for students from a range of class and ethnic backgrounds (two schools in each of: London, a rural area in Southern England and a city in Northern England). At the start of the school year, we will access 24 participants per school, half in Year 10 (aged 14-15) and half in Year 12 (aged 16-17). Just prior to Years 10 and 12 students make key option choices about their futures (pre- and post-GCSE), and these age groups are highly engaged with celebrity as well as being the focus of public debates on celebrity. We will conduct four group interviews in each school with six participants in each. These will explore how young people talk about their own and other people's aspirations and how celebrity features in their life. We will return at the end of the school year to conduct individual interviews with 48 selected participants (eight per school). These interviews will look closely at how individual students' educational and career aspirations relate to celebrity and to their social class and gender.

Between school visits, we will invite participants to join an online forum (one per school). We will use these to generate topical discussions about celebrity and aspiration, e.g. asking who should win X Factor and why. We hope participants will also initiate discussions. During this time we will also conduct case studies of 12 celebrities, including those who generate positive and negative reactions from participants. We will select men and women from a range of class backgrounds and fields (e.g. sport, music, Reality TV). We will analyse discourses of aspiration in each celebrity's coverage in three media outlets over six months and selected other material (e.g. Twitter feed, autobiographies).

This will be the first UK-based empirical study to examine celebrity's significance in the construction of young people's aspirations. It will have theoretical significance for scholars in education, sociology and media and cultural studies. It will have practical significance for the new Careers Education, Information, Advice and Guidance services, policymakers concerned with young people's aspirations, media educators and youth media commissioners. We will engage users through: conference presentations, academic and practitioner journal articles, an accessible project website and social networking strategy, an advisory group of representatives from key fields, communication events, a practical Toolkit for careers advisors and educators, active engagement with the media including via a press release, and Research Briefings summarising the findings and their implications for policymakers.

The research will benefit a range of non-academic communities. We have identified CAREERS EDUCATION, INFORMATION, ADVICE AND GUIDANCE (CEIAG) PRACTITIONERS as our primary user group. The study will provide careers educators and careers advisors working with young people in schools and colleges with knowledge of the role of celebrity in shaping young people's aspirations, in turn enabling them to engage with celebrity productively within their practice. To ensure a long term impact we will produce a glossy, colour 28-page Toolkit based on the research findings, with recommendations and practical ideas and activities. We will send two copies to all English Local Authorities (to be reviewed in light of the transformation of CEIAG services) and make it available online.

Our secondary user group are POLICYMAKERS in the Department for Education (DfE), Department for Work and Pensions and Department for Business, Innovation and Skills concerned with young people's educational and career aspirations and participation, and the relationship to wider inequalities. These are persistent concerns within educational policy (see Case for Support). This study will provide original evidence of how class and gender shape young people's educational and career aspirations through its unique and timely focus on the role of celebrity within this. To ensure long term impact on government, and think-tanks and policy networks with similar concerns, we will produce two policy-oriented Research Briefings (Interim and Final). Additionally the research could inform the work of government policymakers working on decisions following the latest review of the sexualisation and commercialisation of children. We will proactively intervene in evolving policy debates by writing to news outlets when relevant stories break.

In the long term, YOUNG PEOPLE will benefit from improved, evidence-informed careers advice and education, and from policies on educational and work aspirations that better take into account their needs, desires and social positioning.

The research will also be relevant to MEDIA EDUCATORS and YOUTH MEDIA COMISSIONERS. Media educators include teachers delivering media education and consumer literacy education in secondary schools, within Citizenship, PSHE, Media Studies, Sociology and English as well as practitioners working for cultural organisations with educational remits (e.g. the British Film Institute) and charities (e.g. Media Trust). They will benefit from understandings of how young people engage with celebrity that they can use in their work to help young people make sense of and make informed judgements about celebrity culture. Youth media commissioners in broadcasters who have education remits (e.g. Channel 4 and the BBC) will benefit from knowledge about how young people use their outputs and how they can enhance the educational aspects of these. We will seek long term impact on their work through publications of our findings in bespoke articles for key online and offline practitioner and media outlets.

Further details of our impact strategy are given in the Pathways to Impact.

We have built user engagement into every stage of the project, including gaining feedback on the proposal from members of key groups. In addition to the long term impacts above, we will seek immediate impact on the work of individuals who engage directly with the project through:
- Regular advisory group meetings with seven representatives from user groups.
- An interim practitioner workshop.
- A final communication event for invited stakeholders.
- Bespoke presentation of findings to participating schools.
- An accessible project website with regular updates, publicised via key networks and complemented by a social networking strategy.

We will keep the website live beyond the life of the project, including accessible versions of findings and implications for policy and practice (e.g. the CEIAG Toolkit and Research Briefings, see above).