Promoting practical learning
Policy Exchange finds that stronger links between business and education can raise the profile of vocational courses.
Greater involvement by employers in the curriculum will help to make vocational courses more attractive to students, according to a report published in January by the Policy Exchange think tank.
The ‘Technical Matters’ report focuses on how to build a high quality “technical and vocational route” through the education system. Its author, Owen Corrigan, holds a PhD in social policy from Trinity College Dublin. It focuses on England but many of its proposals are also applicable to Northern Ireland, due to the similar curriculum and set of qualifications.
Education, it notes, is “increasingly focused on the academic” but this does not meet the needs of young people whose skills are more practical. An estimated 31 per cent of A-level pupils, for example, drop out of their studies and previous research has suggested that vocational qualifications would be more suitable for them. One in five young people “churn” between low grade work and low grade education after the age of 16.
“A major shortcoming of the English approach to technical-vocational education has been the failure to recognise the unique and specific demands a high quality technical-vocational route would impose,” the report commented. There was a false assumption that that this could be delivered through the same system as that used to deliver traditional academic education.
Effective technical-vocational systems in continental Europe featured high levels of employer involvement, robust quality assurance, a core of general education, strong advice and guidance, flexible options for progressing through the system (including back into academic routes), learning that was relevant to the labour market, and the necessary institutional and regulatory support to give students clear alternatives and effective choice.
The report’s recommendations covered four themes: provision; progression; competition; and system change. On provision, all post-16 providers should be required to involve employers in the curriculum decisions that they make. Employers should also be involved in the quality assurance of facilities and providers, which would then be struck off if they failed to meet minimum standards.
Careers advisers sometimes wrongly advised pupils to take A-levels and “stronger policing” of the system was needed. Advisers needed to be reminded that their advice must be impartial and that alternatives to A-levels were “a viable and valued option.”
“Progression failures” took place when young people pursued unsuitable lines of study and then dropped out. The risks were highest when pupils moved from school to college and when they started more demanding levels of technical study.
The report calls for the re-introduction of ‘payment by results’ (i.e. to providers) for the successful completion of courses. An apprenticeship should be re-defined as an “intensive three-year training programme with significant educational and workplace learning requirements.”
Schools and colleges should be able to compete fairly for students but, too often, colleges were seen as the ‘second best’ option. Harmonising the inspection regimes for schools and colleges would allow for more accurate comparisons and help learners make better choices.
At a national level, a commissioner for technical-vocational education could ensure an “adequate mix” of different forms of education in all parts of the country. Strict standards would be needed to deliver change in the system, even if it is difficult for some providers to attain them. Colleges must also be held to the same standards as schools, to ensure “consistency, equality and roundness of education” for all young people.
