1 Challenging agendas in ESOL: Skills, employability and social cohesion [Publshed as Cooke, M. and J. Simpson (2009) ‘Challenging agendas in ESOL: Skills, employability and social cohesion.’ Language Issues 20/1, 19-30.] Melanie Cooke, King’s College London James Simpson, University of Leeds Abstract Adult migrants who are learners of English for Speakers of Other Languages (ESOL) sit at the centre of several problematic policy agendas that impinge directly upon ESOL practice. Because of the marginalised status of ESOL learners and teachers, challenging these agendas can be difficult. In this paper we examine some of the socio-political structures that affect ESOL practice in England: three ‘challenging agendas’ of skills, employability and social cohesion. We argue that teachers can respond to unwelcome policy initiatives by developing a critical stance towards all aspects of their practice. Introduction It is axiomatic that learning English is important for adult migrants to the UK (Baynham, Roberts et al 2007; Cooke and Simpson 2008). ESOL learners recognise the need for English, not only for work and integration and to alleviate the problems they encounter in their daily lives, but because English is the predominant global language and thus a valuable source of ‘cultural capital’ (Bourdieu 1986). Research shows that students are aware of the gains of attending classes to learn English: they know that the group processes of classroom learning are important, especially when the ESOL class is one of the few places where they get a chance to develop oral competence. Moreover, membership of an ESOL class can promote a sense of stability and security that is often missing from migrants’ everyday lives. These are basic facts which ESOL students and their teachers know very well. But the field of ESOL is not simply the means by which adult migrants gain valuable English language skills. It is also used as a receptacle for policy on skills education, employability and citizenship. It is invoked in public and political discourses of immigration, ethnicity and religion. And it is subject to the same pressures of audit and assessment that bedevil the education sector and much of public life today. ESOL teachers are thus caught between the need to address students’ English language learning concerns on the one hand, and the obligation to respond to the multiple pressures of policy and bureaucracy on the other. In this paper we examine three challenging agendas in contemporary ESOL: ESOL as a ‘Skill for Life’ (the skills agenda); ESOL and work (the employability agenda); and ESOL and citizenship (the social cohesion agenda). Drawing on interview data and classroom observations from a number of different studies, we maintain that these agendas come into conflict with the beliefs and values of ESOL practitioners, and we suggest reasons why, despite such conflict, practitioners can find it difficult to resist initiatives that contradict their understanding of what is necessary and important in ESOL practice. There is an underlying explanation for the difficulty practitioners have in resisting unwelcome pressures. ESOL is exposed to the whims and vagaries of policy because ESOL students are themselves relatively powerless. This leads directly to the marginalisation of ESOL as a subject and of ESOL teachers as a professional group.