2.3.1 Rationales
2.3.2 Approaches
2.3.3 Purposes
2.3.4 Cost effectiveness
2.3.5 Some conclusions
Educational assistance for technical and vocational education has a long history. It has always had attractions to policy makers since it seems to offer to kill several birds with the same stone. Thus justifications for investment are frequently couched in terms of one or more of the following overlapping categories:
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increased relevance of schooling to likely occupational futures reductions in youth unemployment as a result: of the acquisition of employable skills increased economic development arising from improvements in the quality and skill levels of the working population poverty reduction through giving access to higher income occupations to those who do not succeed academically transformation of attitudes amongst youth to favour occupations where there are some employment prospects |
Foster (1965) in the seminal study that produced the "vocational school fallacy" was one of the first to point out the second best nature of vocational training as a way of increasing the relevance of schooling to occupational futures. His study in Ghana argued that academic schools were in fact perceived as vocational since they led to the most desirable modern sector jobs and that vocational schools would inevitably be regarded as inferior and orientated towards vocations that were unattractive-a second best option unless conditions in the wider labour market changed.
The second justification has suffered from another kind of fallacy. Training, especially that directed towards waged employment, does not of itself usually produce jobs. It may redistribute who gets the jobs and it may over time contribute to increased productivity, expansion and more employment. But this is unlikely to be its first impact except where there really are acute shortages of skilled labour which constrain production.
The third justification has the force of human capital theory behind it. In so far as a more educated and trained workforce will be more productive, and in so far as the other factor inputs necessary for production are available in sufficient quantities, appropriate training can increase production and productivity and thereby accelerate economic development. This will only happen if the training is appropriate, those who benefit from it use the skills they have acquired in their livelihoods, and there are enough job opportunities for relevant employment to be possible.
Poverty reduction may occur through investment in training if indeed it is the poorest members of the community who gain access to training opportunities of comparable quality to those available to other sectors of society. Where such opportunities simply shadow, with lower quality, those available in other institutions gains to the relatively poor will be diminished in competitive labour markets.
And as for the problem of the transformation of attitudes this returns to the Fosterian argument that such attitudes are not basically formed or reinforced by schools but by the economic and social realities of wider society - "the idea that children's vocational aspirations can be altered by massive changes in curriculum is no more than a piece of folklore with little justification" (Foster 1966:405). Respect for and attraction to jobs in agriculture, rural areas, the informal sector, and traditional service industries appear more related to the objective realities of income, working conditions, and prospects for betterment, than to the influence of vocational schooling on the attitudes of labour market entrants (Achola and Kaluba 1989).
Since Foster's analysis resistance to curricula that introduce agriculture into schools has widely been assumed to be inevitable (Bowman 1980). However some recent studies have questioned the extent to which this is so. Riedmiller and Mades (1991) reviewed experience in 30 countries of primary school agriculture. Studies from Tanzania, Zimbabwe, Cameroon find positive attitudes amongst parents to primary school agriculture; teachers in Zimbabwe and Botswana were less favourably disposed believing that they had not been trained for the subject. Research on curriculum reforms in Tanzania and Rwanda suggested that teachers were generally cooperative and that the reactions of local communities were positive (Riedmiller 1989). An evaluation of environmental and agricultural science in Zimbabwe (Lewin and Bajah 1991) also found generally favourable attitudes amongst teachers and students to the subject. Fieldwork suggested that the agricultural aspects of the course were amongst the most popular parts which caused the least learning difficulties. Indeed since agriculture has remained a feature of many African primary school curricula (all 30 countries covered in Riedmiller and Mades' 1991 review) it suggests that it does have a perceived value. A possible explanation is that this is the case at primary level, but at secondary, where the competition to enter modern sector jobs starts in earnest, Foster's thesis still stands.
At least four main approaches to technical and vocational education have been identified (Lillis and Hogan 1983). These include:
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Curriculum diversification at a system level which seeks to reorientate the whole school curriculum towards occupational relevant sills. Parallel systems where technical and vocational institutions exist alongside a general schools system with a conventional academic orientation. Core curriculum options that provide vocational and technical programmes within the structure of general school curricula as a minor but substantial component. Non-formal systems which provide opportunities for out of school youth to acquire vocational and technical skills which may be used either to obtain formal sector employment or promote the development of self employment and the development of the informal sector of the labour market. |
Of these the first was widely supported as a strategy throughout the 1960s and 1970s. The research consensus is disappointing. Diversification is not thought to have resulted in the achievement of many of the aims set for it in most countries. Moreover there has been a swing away from such approaches (Middleton 1988: 223) since the late 1970s as a result of increasing levels of disillusion with the impact of such reforms.
Technical and Vocational schools as separate entities are probably the most widespread form of institutionalised provision of technical and vocational education. Commonly they suffer from lower quality student intakes than normal academic schools, at least in terms of the general levels of scholastic ability represented by school examinations.
A curriculum option approach to technical and vocational education is also widespread and continues to find favour in many countries. Pre-vocational studies, living stills, and more traditional offerings like woodwork, metal work, and agricultural and domestic science, secretarial and commercial skills, principles of accounts, etc. appear widely. More recently technology and engineering studies have begun to appear. Some of these subjects are incorporated into compulsory cores in some countries and others are treated as options which are not compulsory.
Non-formal approaches are usually provided by non-government agencies with or without assistance and by companies with an interest in providing training to their workforce and the community they serve. This covers a very wide range of activities from the truly non-formal with low levels of structure and high levels of experiential learning, to arrangements which provide classroom teaching towards specific objectives outside the normal institutional frameworks.
It was always likely to be difficult to strike the right balance between academic and production related activities though some projects e.g. the Secondary School Community Education project in Papua New Guinea, have approached the problems with a considerable amount of imagination (Vulliamy 1983). Though production orientated aspects of the curriculum can, under some circumstances, make contributions to the costs of schooling though these are usually modest (Swartland and Taylor 1988, Bray 1988, Achola and Kaluba 1989). For all these reasons the emphasis in many countries has moved away from education with production models of schooling towards greater focus on developing basic learning skills in the primary and junior secondary grades.
Enhancing the links between schooling and work was widely advocated in the past in parallel with non-formal initiatives in technical and vocational education to increase the relevance of education to occupational futures. In many countries students were encouraged to take part in production activities for educational reasons and in order to make a contribution to costs. The experience highlighted several limitations. Amongst the most important were those mentioned in the box overleaf.
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students and parents adverse reactions to increased amounts of time allocated to production where this was seen to damage performance prospects in competitive examinations for selection; the limitations of school environment which precluded some kinds of activities - e.g. insufficient tools and machinery, no accessible markets; lack of suitable land (Gustafsson 1985); the need to subsidise relatively inefficient production (directly or through discounting labour costs), or provide protected markets (e.g. for furniture made by schools); the fact that scarce production skills have an economic value and skilled practitioners may be unwilling to share these with others or see their market undermined (Lewin and Little 1984); the over emphasis on production leading to the; subordination of learning to repetitive: manufacturing tasks which provide little coherent skill acquisition |
Before examining some of the evidence on the effectiveness of technical and vocational training it is important to extend discussion to consider the purposes of training. First a distinction must be made between technical and vocational provision that is direct towards training for specific jobs, and that aimed at more generalised skill up grading with a flexible range of outcomes that can be utilised across a number of occupational categories. The former is often more appropriate to employment in those parts of the labour market where specialisation is well developed and trade skills are licensed. The latter has attractions in areas where there is rapid change, such that specific skills are soon outmoded by changes in the technology of production, and where occupational opportunities are more commonly of a polyvalent rather than monovalent character. In the poorest economies specialisation is often at an early stage and the number of job opportunities are limited before particular specialised labour markets saturate. More developed economies have more opportunities for specialisation and for those with a flexible range of skills who may move from one occupation into others.
It is also important to distinguish between training as a preparation for existing jobs, training intended to lead to job creation, and training designed to improve performance on the job. Most technical and vocational training initiatives have been built on the first or third assumptions. The first may focus on pre-career qualification that can be wasteful if most graduates of courses do not enter occupations for which they have been trained. The courses provided may become training to qualify to get a job, rather than courses which actually deliver skills necessary for doing the job, unless there are close links between providing institutions and employers. Training designed to improve job performance is, of its nature, more likely to occur in or near the work place. The exceptions may be where bureaucratic employment regulations insist on qualification upgrading as a major criteria in promotion relatively independently of job performance.
Training for job creation has widely proved problematic. There are many difficulties that confront inexperienced young adults in starting a new livelihood rather than entering existing employment (e.g. the availability of capital, credit and land, attitudes of senior community members, existence of and access to markets, the problems of employing other worker). Where self employment opportunities exist and can be expanded, those who have been in the labour market for some time may take precedence, and have competitive advantages, over those emerging from training programmes. Skill exemplars to organise training may be unenthusiastic about sharing their skills with those who will compete with them and possibly lower incomes as a result. Entrepreneurship training may be especially difficult. The characteristics of entrepreneurs and how these are acquired are poorly understood. Entrepreneurs are, almost by definition, a scarce commodity in most communities. There may be strategies to assist those who display such talents; it is likely to be much more difficult to train individuals to acquire them.
Metcalf (1985) has reviewed studies that bear on the extent to which vocational and technical schools are a cost effective approach to investing in human resources. In general this review concludes that rates of return are usually sufficiently positive to justify training. However, short rather than long courses tend to be more cost effective and informal and firm based training tends to be more cost effective than separate vocational and technical schools separated from production organisations Between 1966 and 1988, 21 studies have been identified (Haddad (1991:46) several of which make comparisons between academic and technical and vocational education. The findings are generally consistent with those highlighted by Metcalf. They reinforce the view that in plant vocational training may be more cost effective than training in separate schools and that short courses may have higher rates of return than longer ones.
However there is a wide variation in the findings relating to different systems. In some cases productivity gains can be identified (Fuller 1970, Min and Tsang 1987), higher rates of return than to academic schooling are evident (Chung 1987, Ziderman 1988) and graduates of technical and vocational training are more valued in the labour market (Chin-Aleong 1988). In others there seems little labour market advantage for technical and vocational graduates (Psacharopoulos and Loxley 1985, Moock and Bellew 1988) suggesting the benefits of training are not always reflected in labour market signals. There is also evidence that levels of academic achievement may suffer (Schiefelbein and Fareli 1982) and that in some circumstances graduates of training courses may be less likely to pass government trade tests than those without such training from academic schools (Godfrey 1977). Qualification levels amongst technical school graduates in work and those out of work may be quite similar suggesting other factors may be more important in determining job placement (Narman 1988). Generally, social rates of return for technical and vocational education are less than private rates. Then latter may be quite high (Grootaert 1988) where there are high levels of public subsidy and employment opportunities.
The financial aspects of providing technical and vocational education, where unit costs tend to be higher than in general academic schools have been the subject of an extensive debate. The complexities of establishing cost differentials are considerable and include difficulties with the treatment of direct and indirect costs, the rates of discount to apply to capital costs, social and private costs, and the appropriate unit of analysis. Should this be teaching periods, the completed programme or something else? (Cummings 1988). In Tanzania it appears that recurrent costs are 19% greater in agricultural schools than academic schools, 13% greater in technical schools, and 9% greater for commerce (Hinchliffe 1983). In Kenya industrial education subjects have double the staffing costs and five times the capital costs of normal subjects (Cummings et al 1985). In Thailand unit costs in agricultural and technical colleges were 98% and 54% higher respectively than in other professional training colleges (Tibi 1986). Technical education has a higher pay-off than general education in the Ivory Coast at all levels but the costs are much higher (up to two and a half times those in general schools) (Komenan 1987). In the case of Colombia and Tanzania (Psacharopoulos 1985) these costs are not justified by the demand for trainees in the labour market and the social rates of return that have been calculated illustrate this. In other cases training is considered to have been more cost effective than academic schooling (Ziderman 1988, Neuman and Ziderman 989) at least in relation to provision for those unlikely to continue to post secondary education who to work in fields related to their training.
Psacharopoulos (1988) argues that recent studies of technical and vocational education lead to a number of conclusions outlined in the box below. It should be clear that the analysis that lies behind these observations does not constitute a definitive case against further assistance for technical and vocational training. It simply draws attention to what can be learnt from the experience so far. Most of the contributors to recent reviews (International Review of Education 1988, International Journal of Educational Development 1988, Economics of Education Review 1990, World Bank 1991) offer analyses that provide general support for most of these conclusions. Collectively they focus future policy options around a number of issues.
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Vocational education is expensive The incremental social benefits may not outweigh the costs Vocational graduates may not follow the career for which they have been trained Projections of demand for specific skill training are unreliable Substitutability between vocational and non-vocational school graduates may be high Vocational and technical education provided close to or within places of employment is more likely to be successful than that provided elsewhere Vocational and technical education may be more equitable and efficient when privately financed. |
First, no single approach can capture the range of possible training purposes and delivery strategies available and indicate their relative attractiveness. It is clear that in general, vocational and technical education can have a substantial role to play both in the development of specific skills and in relation to flexible preparation of the workforce for changing labour markets. But this will only be happen where a series of conditions are met that justify the particular strategy employed.
Second, in devising appropriate strategies several considerations are important. These include those noted in the box below.
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avoiding assumptions which the weight of evidence usually, suggests are unfounded (e.g. that vocational training changes attitudes to different types of employment and that almost all trainees will necessarily follow the occupation they have trained for). improving information on current patterns of supply and effective demand for particular skills and more general technical abilities through tracer studies and occupational training maps establishing direct and indirect costs at an early stage and comparing these with other delivery strategies directed towards the same ends. identifying benefits on both conservative and optimistic assumptions about the absorption and substitutability of trainees in the labour market. examining the equity effects of different policy options - it may be that technical and vocational opportunities are disproportionately available to the relatively disadvantaged. |
Third, technical and vocational training however conducted generally takes for granted basic levels of literacy and numeracy, and often an understanding of scientific concepts, without which training inputs will be compromised. More educated trainees often benefit more from training than their less educated peers. Support for the development of basic education to achieve these antecedent conditions may take precedence where the evidence suggests this is a prior problem.
Fourth, in general training undertaken with close relationships between employers and training institutions which is in-career rather than pre-career often, but not always, seems to have greater likelihood of beneficial and cost effective outcomes.
