Modernization in Vocational Education and Training in the Latin American and the Caribbean Region

Private and non governmental training offer

Something that has happened in all countries of the region is the appearance in recent decades of a private market of education and training (particularly training). The degree of development and consolidation of these markets differs from one country to another, depending on a number of factors. However, the main issue is not the number of private suppliers but their strengths and weaknesses to provide the different types of training that society and production require.

Anyway, the proliferation of this new training offer is clear evidence of the importance it has acquired at all levels, not only among enterprises, governments and the various productive, labour and social organisations, but in the population in general. Although education has always been visualised as one of the most efficient vehicles for social mobility, during a long period of the history of our countries the notion was linked to formal and regular education. To go up in the educational ladder meant having greater possibilities and opportunities of different kinds: jobs, earnings, prestige, social capital, participation. In that view, that reflected the economic and social reality of a certain period of our history, having a technical of professional career was seen with different nuances, according to the cultural values of each society and its perceptions about manual work versus intellectual activities, training for work and academic education. But it always implied, more or less, being "halfway up" in the scale of social, political and economic opportunities.

The situation has now changed radically. To begin with, we are witnessing what has been described as a "gradual devaluation of educational credentials", meaning that they tend to lose relative value (precisely as tools to have access to certain levels of employment, salary, responsibility, prestige). This has caused a veritable "rush forward", in which it is constantly necessary to reach higher levels of education in order to have access to the same opportunities. As educational offers are standardised, intermediate levels are "compressed" and lose differentiation in their capacity to provide that access to opportunities. It is increasingly necessary to reach the higher levels of qualification to be differentiated and to compete efficiently. Nevertheless, this is not the only alternative. The other one is to seek differentiation on the basis of an original professional profile, supplementing regular studies with a special combination of technical courses. This is also valid for different age groups: a young man or a young woman will do their regular studies, but insofar as they can they will try to take courses in languages, computer science, business administration, or technical training. An adult person, who perceives that the rules of the game begin to change in his work environment, and that the diplomas he obtained 15 or 20 years ago are no longer sufficient, will also try to grasp and handle those "new things" that new technologies bring with them.

Building up a unique, personal profile to have access to more and better occupational opportunities, bringing knowledge up to date so as not to lose footing in the wave of technological progress are –perhaps rather simply stated– subjective reasons in the current social, labour and technical context, that explain why there is a great demand for training courses, which to a large extent has stimulated the emergence of a private market.

Without getting to the bottom of this explosive growth of the private training offer, we must also point out that the conditions that provoked it did not exclusively stem from a "pure" market dynamics, as described in previous paragraphs, although that was also an important element. Also present in the last few decades was the advent and development of a new generation of public policies regarding training and employment; policies based on the assumption -or requirement- of the existence of a private market to reach their objectives. They resulted in programmes wherein the State had the prerogative of managing and financing, and delegated execution of training to private agents. This was no doubt a powerful incentive for the emergence and consolidation of the new offer.

An analysis of what has happened in this new sector of training offer shows that, on the one hand, it has the problem of being aimed almost exclusively at the commerce and services sector. Although this sector grows steadily in all economies, this training slant would seem to be due to a matter of costs and investments, notoriously lower to implement most courses for the tertiary sector than for industry or agriculture.

On the other hand, as already mentioned, it is a sector that grew under the protection of certain policies that subsidised and encouraged the emergence of a private offer: training and employment programmes for special population groups (young people, women, micro entrepreneurs, soldiers discharged from armed conflicts, etc.); and subsidies to enterprises for implementing training activities. This means to say, then, that the private training market is in most cases the result of a substantial change in State intervention, namely, withdrawal of the State from direct implementation, plus incentives and subsidies to the private offer.

Insofar as this change in the role of the State and this delegation of activities did not take place with a pre-existing private offer, but rather that the market emerged precisely as a consequence of changing public policies, weak spots have appeared in some places: low quality courses, lack of adaptation to the needs of enterprises, instability of training suppliers, etc.

These kinds of problems must be viewed in the context of a process whereby, in the medium term, a selection and consolidation of the private offer will take place. However, there are at least two aspects that remain unsolved, even assuming that private training offer will consolidate.

The first one is how to meet demands that are not immediately profitable. The typical case is the provision of training services for the more disadvantaged population groups. Except when –once again- there is a specific line of financing by the State, it is hardly to be expected that institutions that are mostly profit making may be interested.

To a certain extent, now comes on the scene the other type of agent that we enumerated among players in training: non governmental organisations, and others. These non profit agencies, very often pursuing the social and economic development of certain groups or communities, may offer training for that purpose. They frequently make methodological and conceptual innovations that are subsequently replicated elsewhere. But there is another problem here. As these organisations often have limited financing, and human resources that usually work on a voluntary basis, they are subject to a certain degree of instability, so that many of their experiences are successful for a while, but cannot be sustained.

Another aspect that cannot be properly looked after by relying solely on the private training offer, is the fact that in order to have sense and usefulness, training services need at present to be complemented by other activities and services. As we shall see below, only the kind of training that gets deeply involved with technological innovation and transfer, that is conceived and developed in the framework of existing social relations, and that pursues long term training objectives, will reach an optimal degree of relevance, quality and adaptation to productive and social requirements.

Consequently, both types of players –private offer through institutes and academies, and social, community and non governmental organisations– must be considered part of the new training scenario regarding execution of programmes and activities.

The Inter-American Centre for Knowledge Development in Vocational Training (ILO/Cinterfor)
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