prospectuses or participation might be expected by potential employers. This emphasis may come to constrain the responsiveness of informal educators to individual learning needs. Under local management of schools, institutions may choose, or be obliged, to offer activities which bring financial reward to the school, with those who are unable to pay being further disadvantaged. In this extreme form, what is labelled as informal education could become as formalized as some other aspects of the curriculum. The attractions and distractions of informal education For many teachers informal education complements their work by offering opportunities for getting to know students better and for working with students of different ages across curriculum bound-aries. Some see this as a vital extension of their pastoral role. Many view informal education as a way of gaining greater fulfillment in their jobs, as a chance to share their interests with students, to engage in joint activity with colleagues and to work with other agencies. Students are attracted to informal education because it provides them with an opportunity to feel recognized for their own worth in settings in which students can influence and control the pace, as well as the content, of their learning. Many feel that they can contribute in these settings in their own way: that they are valued for what they have to contribute and feel a greater ownership of the learning experience. Informal education can offer students a chance to try out new things, to take risks and extend their experience beyond the