The support of lay tutors in trade union education

Problems of scale lead to the use of lay tutors in education for trade union members. These tutors need support from their organization. The design of this support is far from easy. A Dutch research project reveals some of the problems of providing support for these educational volunteers. Some results of this research are reported in this article. First, attention is devoted to some ideas about trade union education, based on British and Dutch literature. Second, the article concentrates on the investigated practices: local trade union education in the Netherlands, lay tutors and their tasks. In order to decipher the role of support activities, the elements of a model of volunteer activities are proposed. With a view to the diffusion of Dutch experience, a model of the support activities of trade unions related to the tasks of lay tutors is described. Five support environments for lay tutors are subsequently sketched. Although some aggregation has been achieved, the level of knowledge remains quite low. Fundamental knowledge on support does not, as yet, exist. Knowledge is still far too limited to be able to provide advice on which environment to choose in a specific situation. Creating finely tuned support for lay tutors cannot be reduced to making a choice or to the combination of certain elements. If creating support is not the same as making a choice, this implies a design task. To assist efforts in designing support activities for lay tutors ten recommendations are made. Finally, their quality is briefly discussed.