Pathways from school to work: Can the competences acquired in leisure activities improve the construction of pathways?

The transition from school to work has been intensely examined by different disciplines. However, this transition has rarely been examined in relation to the experiences acquired by young people in their free time, from a longitudinal perspective. This article analyses the impact of one type of experience, membership in organisations, in the young people's pathways of transition. The aims are first to contribute to the theoretical debate on this transition, and secondly to develop tools for analysing quantitative and qualitative data based on an empirical study performed in Catalonia in 2005. The conclusions reached aim to drive not only the academic debate but also the political discussion on a key issue: how to act to improve the most vulnerable pathways.