Vocational education and training - VET

The paper describes Canada's most effective interventions being developed to increase the successful participation of women in apprenticeship and other skilled technical fields.

This article briefly presents the legal position for inclusion in VET both from the international perspective and from the German educational policy perspective. It considers a broad definition of inclusion which regards not only persons with disability but all individual characteristics and abilities, followed by specific information on the German VET system and its heterogeneity. A particular focus is drawn on recent measures for the inclusion of refugees and persons with disability. These changes present challenges for VET teachers. This article discusses recent research projects analysing the attitudes and thoughts towards inclusion of VET teachers  and the skills required for VET teachers in inclusive work at vocational schools. To end, initiatives of German universities which aim for better preparation of future VET teachers in inclusive education will briefly be presented along with perspectives for future research.

This paper presents the findings of a survey undertaken in selected countries in the Sub Saharan Africa and Middle East and North Africa regions (SSA and MENA) aimed at reviewing the status of employment service provision, challenges and opportunities for their development.

This paper considers the potential significance of a concept of lifelong learning in the context of digital disruption. Having noted some contemporary contrasts in the visibility of lifelong learning policy, it revisits the earlier more widespread dominance of the concept, identifying not only variety but also tensions that are inherent and constituent. Drawing on examples from England and Singapore, difficulties arising from compass, scope and fluidity of goals are discussed, illustrating how lifelong learning can lose its meaning. The paper then turns to the prospects for a new concept of lifelong learning that may be more sustainable and meaningful in a context characterised by digital and other changes to the nature of work, suggesting that such a concept must be both life-facing and work-facing.

The willingness to train is not invariably greater under an insecurity frame. Instead, we find a crucial interaction: the willingness to train is greater under an insecurity frame when training-contract terms are favourable (e.g when no payback clause is included), but smaller when training-contract terms are unfavourable. Since the positive and negative effects are approximately equal in size, in a balanced design such as ours they cancel each other out, resulting in a close to zero overall effect for the frame variable.

Conclusion: Our results suggest that, when workers are aware of the insecurity in their situation, this only makes them more willing to follow training when the risk of losing their investment is low. 

While the scholarly work on the second generation of immigrants has scrutinised both high educational achievers and marginalised groups, less attention has been paid to those in between and their aspirations.

This paper discusses a practical, multidisciplinary approach used to embed employability skills in a new postgraduate (PGT) Engineering course at the University of Bath. Informed by relevant professional bodies, key transferable skills were identified and embedded in the curriculum with discipline-specific content. Students worked on a series of hands-on activities in which they integrated and applied principles and methodologies from various areas (linguistics, information, etc.), complementary to their technical expertise, as in the working environment. This was facilitated by a multidisciplinary team comprised of Academic and Professional Services staff at the University of Bath. The organisational context and rationale for the approach presented, including the practical implementation and initial outcomes in the new PGT course, are provided.

Over the last 15 years, different countries have developed low-level vocational education and training (VET) programmes for young people who struggle to enter or complete education at upper secondary level. Switzerland introduced nationally standardised two-year initial VET programmes in 2005, Norway in 2016.

Two major challenges in professional and vocational education (VET) are low levels of relevance and coherence between the content of the educational program and developing competence in working life. This article is based on an action research project, conducted as a series of experiments at vocational upper secondary schools and during the basic course for postgraduate certificate teaching in professional education for professional educators in Norway. It was carried out with a focus on job-related professional education to meet these challenges. The project is based on a pragmatic theoretical perspective in professional didactical teaching.

Many school-age pupils are undecided about their future vocation. This often stems from a lack of occupational information or lack of vocationally related experience. The goal of this study was to develop and evaluate an intervention focused on the possibility of changing vocational interests through the simulation of vocational activities.

This joint ILO-UNESCO paper presents the results of an international literature review of how countries have introduced systems and initiatives to provide individuals with an entitlement to lifelong learning. It seeks to establish what is meant by an ‘entitlement’, and how that can be interpreted in the context of lifelong learning. The report responds to the growing international policy interest in the implementation of lifelong learning and reviews national policies and practices that attempt to apply that principle. Drawing on the examples and the challenges involved, the report concludes by recommending a set of key principles and conditions to be met and the challenges that will need to be overcome before a universal entitlement scheme can be implemented.

The purpose of this paper is to understand the key challenges, approaches and lessons of the higher educational institutions (HEIs) in the context of COVID-19.,

A survey was conducted to understand the key challenges being faced by the HEIs around the world during the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic. A total of 150 responses were collected from 65 universities, located in 29 countries.,The results show that 47% of respondents with defined universities believe their institutions lacked a permanent or dedicated emergency management office, and 41% said their HEIs lacked a general business continuity plan for an emergency. In universities with BCPs, 33% of the plans do not cover biological hazards and pandemic risk management, and 60% of the plans did not include conducting any advanced simulation exercises. More than 70% the responded said their instruction, information sharing and decision-making process were timely and open. The major challenges identified were a lack of adequate preparedness for pandemic and of pandemic-specific advanced simulation exercises. The next major challenges were the change in the mode of teaching to online lectures and working from home. Based on these challenges, a set of short- and long-term recommendations were proposed.,This was the first survey in academic institutions in post COVID-19 context. The findings will be useful for preparing for biological and other related hazards.

Dual Vocational Training was introduced in Spain in 2012 with the purpose to reinforce training based on employment requirements and to promote youth employment within the labour market. Since its implementation, there has been continuous growth of the presence of this modality across every Autonomous Community, with Andalusia being one of the latest regions to dualize the Vocational Educational Training (hereinafter VET) educational scheme. From the outset however, this modality has faced a number of obstacles that question its sustainability. Without losing sight of these obstacles, and with the purpose of providing arguments that justify the suitability of this model in Andalusia, this study aims to identify—from the unique perspective of three Andalusian educational institutions—the strengths of this modality and the opportunities that the Andalusian context offers. To this end, we have used the SWOT technique to analyse the opinion of a group of teachers regarding their thoughts on the Andalusian Dual VET system, from both an internal and external perspective. Workforce insertion and the quality of skills gained through training are some of the strengths that characterize this model, with the greatest opportunities derived from the needs of the Andalusian business and productive sectors. Based on the scenarios drawn, we have suggested a number of guidelines to capitalize on some of the identified strengths and take advantage of the opportunities observed.

Four dimensions are proposed – labour market, governance, education and competence – capable of identifying VET ‘families’ and intra-national variations and capturing the dynamics of VET systems. Through a multi-dimensional and multi-level framework, comparative VET research can provide a deeper understanding of how and why VET systems respond to the challenges of technological, economic and environmental change.

Our findings suggest that retrospectively and immediately situated digital VET may be the two categories of an up-to-date basic taxonomy of situated digital VET. Hence, an important question to investigate for advancing the use of digital technologies in VET is the following: Which of the two identified types of situated digital VET can facilitate which kind of vocational learning? Based on the reviewed publications we are not able to give any answers to this. Hence, there is a massive need to investigate which kind of vocational learning can be facilitated by retrospectively, and which by immediately situated digital VET. 

The research project “Open Access in Vocational Education and Training Research” aims to uncover the conditions influencing the acceptance, dissemination and use of Open Access in vocational education and training research. The project is grounded in a sociology of knowledge approach and in media theory. It comprises of two parts. First, four structured group discussions are conducted as focus groups and analysed using a qualitative content analysis. This paper focusses on this first part of the research project, the implementation and analysis of the group discussions as well as the results thereof. The second part of the research project will be based on an online questionnaire built upon these results. The questionnaire will be sent out to authors involved in vocational education and training research in the second part of the research project.

Context: Vocational training is viewed as a significant tool that increases employment outcomes and provides potential career advancement opportunities for individuals. Many countries are witnessing a shift from supply-driven to demand-driven approaches. The demand-driven approach in vocational training is often explored at the macro level and is associated with the perspectives of employers and labour markets. In contrast, this article explores the demand-driven approach at the micro level by focusing on the perspectives of individual learners within the context of their localities in order to position them at the centre of the skill development process.

Methods: This study used a qualitative exploratory research method and a mixture of focus group and face-to-face semi-structured interviews to obtain data to identify the practical problems that arise in real life contexts when attempts are made to prioritise vocational training demands in line with the needs of all the stakeholders. Based on the demand from the targeted learners, a competency-based vocational training course especially for women was designed, tested and evaluated in selected villages.

Findings: The results show clearly that the demands of the rural population varied, and their participation in the training course was highly influenced by access to a training centre, the duration of the training, economic returns and socio-cultural factors. The demand-driven approach works best in vocational training when it involves the relevant stakeholders and the target groups in the planning and designing process.

Conclusion: The findings illustrate that demand-driven approach should be context specific, responsive to individuals’/learners’ demands, relevant and flexible. 

A firm’s expectation about the future business cycle is an important determinant of the decision to train apprentices, especially as German firms typically offer apprenticeships to either fill future skilled worker positions, or as a substitute for other types of labor. The current coronavirus crisis will have a strong and negative impact on the German economy, according to the current business cycle expectations of German firms. To the extent that the training decisions of firms depend on these perceptions, we expect a downward shift in firm demand for apprentices and consequently also a decrease in the equilibrium number of apprenticeship contracts.

The research outlines how the competences emerging as relevant for teachers need to be better activated in professional settings to become strategically important. The results related to teamwork and governance competences focus on the importance of informal and extended learning contexts to teachers’ socio-relational competence development.

Identification of the service competences of family physicians is central to ensuring high-quality primary care and improving patient outcomes. However, little is known about how to assess the family physicians’ service competences in primary care settings. It is necessary to develop and validate a general model of core competences of the family physician under the stage of construction of family doctor system and implementation of ‘Internet Plus Healthcare’ service model in China.