This study examines international approaches in technical and vocational education and training (TVET), and determines their suitability for developing countries. TVET systems in Germany and the United Kingdom are presented to illustrate the diverse paths in developing such systems. These are juxtaposed against the Asian experience, as exemplified by the People’s Republic of China and the Republic of Korea. Through these case studies, key lessons pertaining to the role of the state and private sector involvement are extracted for developing TVET policy.
This report was prepared with the primary objective of drawing insights on how Asian economic giants India and the People's Republic of China leveraged education and skills development to advance economic growth. The analysis presented similarities and differences in human capital development strategies and their outcomes that helped define development pathways between the two countries. It also outlined the prospects for human capital development in the sustainability of the two countries' economic growth. The report was completed in 2014 under the Development Partnership Program for South Asia: Innovative Strategies for Accelerated Human Resource Development in South Asia (TA-6337 REG).
Many students across the globe seek further education for future employment opportunities. Vocational schools offer direct training to develop the skills needed for employment. New emphasis has been placed on reskilling the workforce as technology has infiltrated all aspects of business. Teachers must be prepared to teach these new skill requirements to allow students to directly enter the workforce with the necessary competences intact. As the labor market and industry are changing, it is essential to stay current with the best teaching practices within vocational education courses to provide the future workforce with the proper tools and knowledge. The Research Anthology on Vocational Education and Preparing Future Workers discusses the development, opportunities, and challenges of vocational education courses and how to best prepare students for future employment. It presents the best practices in curriculum development for vocational education courses and analyzes student outcomes. Covering topics such as industry-academia collaboration, student satisfaction, and competency-based education, this major reference work is an essential resource for academic administration, pre-service teachers, educators of vocational education, libraries, employers, government officials, researchers, and academicians.
This book provides comprehensive and up-to-date coverage of research on technical and vocational education in China. It discusses various aspects that range from such conventional topics as teaching at different levels, development history, regulations, policies, curriculum, specialty setup, teaching, faculty and management; to the status quo, transformation and current trends; as well as quantity expansion and quality improvement, all of which highlight the unique characteristics of technical and vocational education in China. This book is intended for researchers and graduate students, and will also help international readers to grasp the general situation regarding technical and vocational education in China. Combining rich content and a broad scope, the book will undoubtedly offer a valuable key to understanding China’s technical and vocational education in the 21st century.
This book explores the holistic development of vocational education in Chinese education system. It investigates the vocational education policy development, student development, allocation of teachers’ resources, financial mechanism and system, students’ financial aid, examination and enrollment, private vocational education system, and school-enterprise cooperation. In addition, this book critically examines and epitomizes the contextualized China’s vocational education reform from multiple dimensions. This book also offers an in-depth explorations and analysis of current Chinese vocational education reform comprehensively. This is a highly informative and carefully presented book, providing academic insight for scholars and researchers who are interested and work in research on China’s vocational education reform in China as well as the administrators and stakeholders in Chinese education system and graduate students who majoring in the field of educational policy.
This book brings together a broad range of approaches and methodologies relevant to international comparative vocational education and training (VET). Revealing how youth in transition is affected by economic crises, it provides essential insights into the strengths and weaknesses of the various systems and prospects of VET in contexts ranging from North America to Europe, (e.g. Spain, Germany or the UK) to Asia (such as China, Thailand and India). Though each country examined in this volume is affected by the economic crisis in a different way, the effects are especially apparent for the young generation. In many countries the youth unemployment rate is still very high and the job perspectives for young people are often limited at best. The contributions in this volume demonstrate that VET alone cannot solve these problems, but can be used to support a smooth transition from school to work. If the quality of VET is high and the status and job expectations are good, VET can help to fill the skills gap, especially at the intermediate skill level. Furthermore, VET can also offer a realistic alternative to the university track for young people in many countries.
Development of this text has been based on the notion that workforce education and development (WFED) systems—such as, secondary and postsecondary vocational and technical education (VTE), career education and guidance, human resource and organizational development (HROD), and adult training and retraining including literacy programs—have essential roles to play in supporting both individual and national efforts to successfully participate in and reap the benefits offered by globalization. While this assumption has intuitive appeal, not everyone believes that vocational preparation programs result in positive outcomes. Psacharopoulos (1997), an outspoken international critic of vocational education and training, argues that WFED programs often have a low rate of return on a country’s investment when compared to that of the general academic curriculum. He contends that WFED initiatives often fail because too much emphasis is placed on these efforts to address myriad complex issues, and that decision makers do not utilize the available evidence about VTE to make prudent, informed choices. Instead, major players in the global economy like the World Bank tout basic academic education as an essential priority for developing countries wanting to enter into global markets and exchange.
This book examines educational development and reform in contemporary China and focuses on some of the major issues facing education in both rural and urban areas, across the spectrum of primary, secondary, higher, adult and vocational educational pathways. The book reflects on Chinese educational strategies at a time of rapid development of the market economy and the need to promote the modernization of education. It also considers how social reform and educational changes go hand in hand and discusses the right to education irrespective of gender, nationality, particularly examining the case of children from migrant families. From the rapid development of preschool and compulsory education to the modernization of the university system, this book highlights China’s ambition to create a top tier education system, fostering talent to match its requirements in a fast moving employment market and knowledge economy.
In this book, the authors pursue quantitative, qualitative and mixed methods approaches, conducting hundreds of large-scale surveys and in-depth interviews in 679 schools, 67 counties and 13 provinces throughout China. They also conducted longitudinal case studies in five municipalities and provinces to better reflect education reform and development in different education levels or sectors. The authors used national statistical data from the 1970s to 2013, as well as a wealth of first-hand documents and data from different levels of educational departments in schools, counties, municipals and provinces and “grass-roots” input from 253 teachers, principals, education administrators and students. The authors applied SEM, HLM, GCM, and many other statistic techniques and qualitative methods to analyse the data and materials in order to explore correlations between development and reform, internal and external factors in educational reforms, as well as strategies for resolving core issues. Their findings indicate that institutional reforms concerning financial investments, allocation of teaching resources, allocation of facilities, curricula design systems, and political, economic, social system reforms all contribute to the development of different levels and types of education in different modes and to different extents. Topics of particular interest include five case studies conducted in five different municipalities and provinces that showcase the nation’s education reform and development in a specific model and on the basis of substantial data. Further, milestone events regarding educational reform and development that have taken place in China since 2013 are examined. As a unique feature, the book also includes 353 diagrams and tables on the development and reform of education in China, offering extensive and up-to-date information on a part of the world that often remains difficult to access. The book provides an expansive and in-depth examination of the nation’s education reform and development, from its historical roots to the present, and combining official and “grass-roots” standpoints. It will help readers to understand why and how Chinese education could lead students to win in international comparisons like PISA while at the same time often being the target of scathing criticism, as well as how the nation is now working to provide a better education to serve the world’s largest population.
