 Educational associations are an important early form of association outside the family and perhaps, more than any other, illustrate the fluidity of associational types. Children associate non-voluntarily with teachers (hierarchical) and with peers (non-hierarchical), and thereby learn many of the social skills needed to make good on their rights of association within the wider world. School is most often assessed with a view to its important instrumental purposes, particularly for future, work-related imperatives, but is equally a site of often intense and long-lasting intimate relationships.