Policy should be formulated and technical and vocational education
administered in support of the general objectives adopted for the educational
process as well as for national and, if possible, the regional social and
economic requirements of the present and the future, and an appropriate
legislative and financial framework adopted. Policy should be directed to both
the structural and the qualitative improvement of technical and vocational
education as stipulated in Article 2 of the Convention on Technical and
Vocational Education (1989) and further described in the recommendations of the
Second International Congress on Technical and Vocational Education (1999):
Although governments carry the primary responsibility for technical and
vocational education, in a modern market economy technical and vocational
education policy design and delivery should be achieved through a new
partnership between government, employers, professional associations, industry,
employees and their representatives, the local community and non-governmental
organizations (NGOs). This partnership must create a coherent legislative
framework to enable the launching of a national strategy for change. Within this
strategy the government, apart from actually providing technical and vocational
education, can also provide leadership and vision, facilitate, coordinate,
establish quality assurance and ensure that technical and vocational education
is for all by identifying and addressing community service obligations.
Technical and vocational education is best served by a diversity of
public and private providers. The appropriate mix can be found in many ways,
with the responsibility of governments being to facilitate choice while ensuring
quality.
Government and the private sector should recognize that technical and
vocational education is an investment, not a cost, with significant returns,
including the well-being of workers, enhanced productivity and inter-national
competitiveness. Therefore funding for technical and vocational education should
be shared to the maximum extent possible between government, industry, the
community and the learner, with government providing appropriate financial
incentives. Furthermore, the governments of least developed countries in
particular should seek bilateral and multilateral capacity-building cooperation
in technical and vocational education.
Within governments, there are often shared and overlapping
responsibilities for various elements of technical and vocational education
among departments and agencies. It is desirable that governments streamline
their own public institutional framework to the maximum extent possible to
coordinate the national technical and vocational education effort, create an
effective partnership with the private sector, and promote technical and
vocational education for the benefit of all stakeholders.
Particular attention should be given to planning the development and
expansion of technical and vocational education by:
giving high priority to technical and vocational education in national
development agendas as well as in plans for educational reform;
evaluating national short-term and long-term needs;
providing appropriate current and future allocations of financial
resources;
establishing a national body responsible for coordinating planning in
technical and vocational education based on analysis of statistical data and
projections to facilitate complementarity between educational policy planning
and employment policy.
Planning should respond to national and, if possible, regional, economic
and social trends, to projected changes in demand for different classes of goods
and services, and for different types of skills and knowledge in such a way that
technical and vocational education may easily adapt to the evolving scientific,
technological and socio-economic changes. This planning should also be
coordinated with current and projected training action and the evolution of the
world of work in both urban and rural areas.
While the education authorities should have primary responsibility, the
following groups of relevant stakeholders should be actively associated in
policy formulation and in the planning process; corresponding structures, both
national and local, taking the form of public agencies or consultative or
advisory bodies, should be created to permit this:
public authorities responsible for planning economic and social policy,
labour and employment, and for the manufacturing and service sectors;
representatives of non-governmental organizations within each occupation
sector from among employers and workers as well as of the informal economy,
small enterprise owners and entrepreneurs;
authorities or bodies responsible for out-of-school education and
training;
representatives of those responsible - both in public education and in
State-recognized private education - for executing educational policy, including
teachers, examining bodies and administrators;
parents', former pupils', students' and youth organizations;
representatives from the community at large.
Policies for the structural improvement of technical and vocational
education should be established within the framework of broad policies designed
to implement the principle of lifelong education through the creation of open,
flexible and complementary structures for education, training and educational
and vocational guidance, considering the provisions of modern information
technology in education regardless of whether these activities take place within
the system of formal education or outside it. In this respect, consideration
should be given to the following:
multi-purpose secondary education offering diversified curricula linking
education to the world of work;
having institutions of higher learning offering flexible admission and
programmes ranging from short specialized ones to longer full-time programmes of
integrated studies and professional specialization;
establishing a system of equivalencies whereby credit is given for
completion of any approved programme, and recognition is granted to educational
and/or professional qualifications and work experience;
providing articulation and pathways between technical and vocational
education and programmes of higher education for the benefit of those learners
who may wish to continue their education.
Policy should be directed to ensuring high quality so as to exclude
discrimination between the different educational streams. In this respect,
special efforts should be made to ensure that national technical and vocational
education seeks to meet international standards.
In order to ensure quality, responsible national authorities should
establish criteria and standards, subject to periodic review and evaluation,
applying to all aspects of technical and vocational education, including, to the
greatest extent possible, non-formal education for:
all forms of recognition of achievement and consequent qualification;
staff qualifications;
ratios of teaching and training staff to learners;
the quality of curricula and teaching materials;
safety precautions for all learning and training environments;
physical facilities, buildings, libraries, workshop layouts, quality and
type of equipment.
National policy should foster research related to technical and
vocational education, with particular emphasis on its potential within lifelong
learning, and directed to its improvement and relevance to the prevailing
socio-economic context. This research should be carried out at national and
institutional levels, as well as through individual initiative. To this end:
special emphasis should be placed on curriculum development, research
concerning teaching and learning methods and materials, and, where the need
exists, on technologies and techniques applied to development problems;
financial resources and physical facilities from public and/or private
sources should be made available to institutions of higher education,
specialized research institutions and professional organizations for applying
the results of this research on an experimental basis in representatively
selected institutions for technical and vocational education;
the positive results of research and experimentation should be widely
disseminated using all available media, especially information and communication
technology;
the effectiveness of technical and vocational education should be
evaluated using, among other data, relevant statistics including those
concerning part-time enrolments, drop-out rates and placement in wage- and
self-employment;
research efforts to humanize working conditions should be emphasized.
Administrative structures should provide for evaluation, supervisory and
accreditation services to ensure the rapid application of new research findings
and to maintain standards:
evaluation services as a whole should ensure the quality and smooth
operation of technical and vocational education by continuous review and action
directed to monitoring progress and maintaining standards through constant
improvement of staff, facilities, programmes and, most importantly, student
achievement;
supervisory services for the staff should encourage improvement in the
quality of teaching by providing guidance and advice and recommending continuing
education;
all technical and vocational education programmes, including those
offered by private bodies, should be subject to approval by the public
authorities;
individual institutions should have the autonomy to design their
programmes with the involvement of business and industry to suit local needs.
Particular attention should be given to the material resources required
for technical and vocational education. Priorities should be carefully
established with due regard for immediate needs and the probable directions of
future expansion in consultation with representatives from the world of work:
institutional planning should be directed to ensuring maximum efficiency
and flexibility in use;
the planning, construction and equipping of facilities should be carried
out in collaboration with specialists from industry, teachers and educational
architects, and with due regard for the purpose of the facilities, prevailing
local factors and relevant research;
adequate funds should be allocated for recurrent expenditure for supplies
and maintenance and repair of equipment;
institutions should be given greater autonomy in their administration and
financial management.
