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Unless you have been on the library equivalent of a desert island, you will know that the BBC AIV system and the Domesday Project Video Discs were released at the end of last year. We bought the system in March but only now do we feel ready to release it for general use. The bibliography (not exhaustive) at the end of this review lists several articles which describe the technical aspects of the system in detail. Similarly other references (and BBC television programmes) have highlighted the immense co‐operative effort which went into collecting the data on the discs. We do not intend to repeat all this information, although a brief description follows. What we would like to do is to give the subjective impressions of a group of librarians, working in a particular library, setting up and exploring the system. We would hope that rather than being seen as any form of definitive assessment of the system, this brief expression of points of view will encourage others to agree (or disagree) with our opinions, give us the benefit of their own experiences and pass on any handy tips they have picked up.

The achievement of professional status is, for teachers, an elusive ideal. Yet the supporting arguments are apparently straightforward and sensible. A homogenous group can always achieve far more than an individual in terms of advancing and exploiting knowledge, promoting research, establishing an ethical code, and raising standards in general. At the same time of course, those involved invariably benefit from a higher social status and a more powerful bargaining position in their salary negotiations.

The current role of the approved social worker (ASW) will be changed to that of the approved mental health practitioner, who may be a nurse or other mental health professional, if proposed legislation comes into force in England and Wales. This has implications for service users, carers and the mental health workforce. This article draws on literature and a conference discussing this change attended by practitioners and policy‐makers. It considers the complexity of the ASW role and the implications for the AMHP, and sets the related issues in the context of integrated working.

Pamela Graddon recently left BLRDD, having been promoted to head of the Industrial Property Section in the British Library's Science Reference and Information Service (SRIS). Her responsibilities in BLRDD for information technology are now being dealt with by Derek Greenwood who previously workedin the SRIS. Dr Elizabeth Dron, who joined BLRDD earlier this year, has left the British Library on promotion to take up a post in the Department of Environment.

What is Electronic Publishing? Electronic Publishing (EP) is the application of communications technology to distribute information. In the context of libraries, it typically means large, often textual databases, stored on powerful computers, from which information is selectively retrieved using terminals linked to the computers via the telephone system.

Vine is produced at least four times a year with the object of providing up‐to‐date news of work being done in the automation of housekeeping processes, principally in the UK. It is produced and substantially written by the Editor who is based at the Polytechnic of Central London and supported by a grant from the British Library Board and opinions expressed in VINE do not necessarily reflect the views and policies of the British Library. The subscription for 1984 to VINE is: £23 for UK subscribers, £26 to overseas subscribers (including airmail delivery). Second and subsequent copies to the same address are charged at £14 for UK and £16 for overseas. VINE is available on either paper or microfiche copy and all back issues are available on microfiche.

Because of high drop‐out rates among the students entering vocational education in Denmark retention of students has become pivotal to Danish educational policy. Thus vocational educational training (VET) colleges have been asked to work on implementing different kinds of retention initiatives and as a result, most colleges have established extended basic courses aimed at students with personal, social and/or academic difficulties. This paper aims to explore the emotional aspects of vocational educational teachers' work and present a preliminary analysis of the notion of care as socially situated within the vocational educational system.

This paper derives from a study based on fieldwork at a VET college offering extended basic courses. During the fieldwork nine weeks of participating observations and 13 interviews with teachers were conducted.

The paper provides empirical insights into the emotional practices and the management of emotions related to prevention of dropout within an educational setting. It shows how emotional practices can provide both teachers and students with positive identities and make out a productive force that prevents students from dropping out. However the management of emotions also involves a range of dilemmas and ambivalences revealing the difficult limitations related to an institutionalization and professionalization of human care.

Because of the chosen research design more studies on the emotional aspects of prevention of drop‐out from both the perspective of teachers and students are needed.

The emotional dimension of retention remains to be recognized and critically discussed more widely among stakeholders at different levels within the VET system and policy makers within education. Handling both the possibilities and the pitfalls of emotional practices requires that teachers are not left alone feeling responsible for the fate of their students.

The paper contributes with descriptions of how emotions can be productive forces preventing students from dropping out of education. At the same time it identifies a need for further critical examination of the emotional aspects of teachers' working life.

The field experience placement is an integral part of teacher education programmes. It is ostensibly meant to provide a place for teacher candidates to enact pedagogical theory gained during coursework under the supervision of an experienced host teacher. In reality, the field placement is a source of considerable tension for teacher candidates, as they struggle to reconcile their prior assumptions about teaching and learning and their prior identities as students with the demands of school culture that requires teachers and students to act in particular ways. The field experience is emotional work that has a considerable impact on the development of new teachers’ identities. In this chapter I will focus on how two new teachers learn during the field experience placement, with a particular emphasis on the roles of emotion and the development of professional identity in learning to teach. Cultural–historical activity theory (CHAT) will provide a useful lens to interpret some of the challenges of learning to teach during the field placement.