NN46, September 2011
Towards a New Global World of Skills Development? TVET's turn to Make its Mark
Policy Brief
By NORRAG
A few decades ago technical and vocational education and training (TVET) formed a central part in the development strategies of many developing countries. Due to the emphasis on basic education TVET became marginalised within the educational landscape, and constrained by negative perceptions, which portray TVET as a low status, low quality educational pathway.
The years 2011-2012 will be TVET’s turn. The Education for All (EFA) Global Monitoring Report (GMR) for 2012 is dedicated to skills development, the last of the 6 EFA Dakar Goals to be analysed in depth. Concurrently, UNESCO has decided these are the years in which to develop a World TVET Report which will be the main document at the Third International Congress on TVET, scheduled for Shanghai on 14-16 May 2012.
In this issue, there are contributions from bilateral and multilateral agencies on several different dimensions of skills development, and it is clear from several other contributions that aid agencies are crucially involved in the support of TVET reform, but the sheer variety of TVET reform possibilities seems to lead to an equally varied landscape of TVET interventions.
Training for what?
The classic questions “Who should be trained for what?” and “How should this be organized?” are still very much valid today as they were decades ago. Context specific approaches such as the ‘Light vocationalisation in general secondary education’ in Latin America have been tested with some success but a more generally applicable approach has not come within reach.
Around the world there are large numbers of young people who are unemployed, a shortage of a skilled labour force; economies that are not growing fast enough to provide jobs, and education systems that are not supplying adequate skills to the economy. The contributions make clear that technical and vocational skills development is a complex process which has to deal with heterogeneous groups of ‘learners’– some are early drop-outs, some with incomplete school qualifications and some with complete but poor school qualifications -, and varying social and economic contexts.
It is also clear that TVET by itself does not create jobs. However, there are many supply-led, largely government programmes based on the assumption that teaching ‘vocational’ skills will lead to employment resulting in economic growth and development. What to do then if no jobs are being created? De Mauro Castro gives four pieces of advice in his paper: 1. Better targeting of whatever training is offered. 2. Teach basic skills, instead of specific trades. 3. Make academic education more practical and relevant. 4. Teach for self-employment.
Many argue that it makes sense to give students not only skills for work or skills for employment but also a whole range of generic skills and soft skills that are felt to be crucial to both work and leisure. TVET should not just deal with job preparation but also be concerned with socialization and empowerment. Also the World Bank is of the opinion that in this century it is necessary to have multiple skills: cognitive, social and emotional, as well as technical and professional. Lifelong training is recommended to enable workers to move into the labour market. Comprehensive programmes need to be developed for people with a low educational background, especially for women to develop the necessary skills to achieve their social and economic inclusion.
Great variations
Another of the messages to come out of this special issue of NN is that the cultures
and traditions of TVET are hugely different at the country or even regional level. Most of Latin America has its own ‘dual system’ of school-based technical education as well as institution-based training beyond schools. Informal apprenticeship is not very different between Francophone to Anglophone West Africa, but both are light years away from ‘systems’ in Eastern and Southern Africa. The on-the-job training of casual labour to become skilled is very widespread across much of South Asia.
A number of papers dwell on the relationship between skills development and poverty reduction which is neither simple nor automatic, especially since an overwhelming majority of skilled individuals are found in the neglected informal skills and employment systems. In Pakistan, for example, the informal sector alone provides 73% of all employment outside of agriculture. Reaching those who will enter the informal sector or are already working there with training that will improve their economic and social position and general wellbeing is very challenging. Experience shows that also for marginalized groups skill training becomes effective and productive when considered as part of a larger empowerment agenda; or linked with related livelihood skills.
Given the vast amount of non-formal and informal learning taking place in the informal sector, discussions take place about the need for recognition and certification of skills which can help the disadvantaged to learn further and to enhance their employability and mobility. But how to organize this in a framework that will work? Some sceptics believe that the efforts do not outweigh the benefits and some fear that such a system – designed to enable flexibility in education tracks - could actually lead to new inequalities - denying the disadvantaged access to the ‘powerful knowledge’ they need.
What we need to know
In his contribution Majumdar observes two tendencies related to research undertakings in TVET. First is the tendency of existing TVET systems to confine research priorities to the immediate needs of the labour market that results in traditional supply-demand orientation of TVET. Second is the tendency to ignore the broader socio-economic needs that TVET can more effectively address. This results in drawing a narrowed view of research priorities in TVET that further dilutes the potential of TVET to effectively assess social dimensions in skill formation and to forecast the needs of the society and the economy in the context of a holistic development, independent of what the labour market dictates. Thematic issues which may have had impact on the future shaping of TVET concerns are less attractive to be discussed, less understood, and therefore are less prioritized.
In order to maximize the contributions of TVET to social and economic development a more diverse conception of TVET is required which encompasses a multiplicity of purposes, providers, settings and learners.
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Cite article as: NORRAG - Network for Policy Research, Review and Advice on Education and Training (2011) ‘Policy Brief: Towards a New Global World of Skills Development? TVET's turn to Make its Mark’, in NORRAG NEWS, Towards a New Global World of Skills Development? TVET's turn to Make its Mark, No.46, September 2011, available: http://www.norrag.org
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