Study of School Gates Employment Support Initiative (Research Report No 747)

A report of research carried out by the Institute for Employment Studies on behalf of the Department for Work and Pensions This report presents qualitative findings from the study of the School Gates Employment Initiative. This mostly involved qualitative research in 13 of the 25 pilot areas which included interviews with school heads, Regional Development Agency (RDA) leads, Jobcentre Plus, local authorities (LAs) and devolved administrations, parents and parent support staff in schools. It also involved two semi-structured group discussions with local partners at two practitioner events in November 2010, as well as a review of evidence presented in the Management Information (MI) and the quarterly reports from the pilot areas. The findings of this report strongly support the notion that schools, Jobcentre Plus and LA employment advisers can play a potentially important role in moving parents from low incomes towards work. School Gates’ reach to potential second earners and parents on low incomes, many of whom are not on benefits and are new customers to Jobcentre Plus, has been a key strength of the pilot. Many parents engaged in the pilot were also lone parents, some of whom were also not in receipt of benefits. In this way, many school sites have provided a critical mass of families within these target groups for Jobcentre Plus and other LA employment advisers to engage with

Benthic and hyporheic invertebrate community responses to seasonal flow recession in a groundwater-dominated stream

Natural hydrological variability in lotic ecosystems can include prolonged periods of flow recession. A reduction in discharge is accompanied by abiotic changes in benthic and hyporheic habitats, often including reductions in s habitat availability. Whilst the benthic invertebrate community response to low flows is well documented, little research has considered how the composition of the community within the hyporheic zone is affected. We examined benthic and hyporheic invertebrate community composition during flow recession in a temperate karst stream, at sites with contrasting historic flow permanence regimes. Changes in the benthic invertebrate community composition primarily reflected changes in habitat availability associated with discharge variability; in particular, the population density of the dominant amphipod, Gammarus pulex, increased as the area of submerged benthic sediments declined. Concurrent significant increase in the hyporheic abundance of G. pulex, and moderate increase in the proportion of the total G. pulex population inhabiting the hyporheic zone were recorded. It is postulated that G. pulex migrated into the hyporheic zone to reduce exposure to intensifying biological interactions in the benthic sediments. Increase in the hyporheic abundance of G. pulex was particularly pronounced at sites with historic intermittent flow, which could be attributed to downwelling stream water dominating vertical hydrologic exchange. The increase in G. pulex abundance reduced community diversity in the benthic sediments, but had no apparent detrimental effects on the hyporheic invertebrate assemblages