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Re-imagining Higher Education in India 1

RE-IMAGINING HIGHER EDUCATION IN INDIA

Re-imagining Higher Education in India2


TITLE Re-imagining Higher Education in India

YEAR February, 2016

AUTHOR Sidharth Sonawat, YES Institute, YES BANK

COPYRIGHT No part of this publication may be reproduced in any form by photo, photoprint, microfilm or any other means without the written permission of YES BANK Ltd.

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Foreword

India’s education system is at the cusp of an unprecedented transformation. By 2020, India is expected to become the youngest nation in the world and this demographic dividend will demand stimuli critical for education and skill development. Rising demand for higher education, increasing globalization of educational institutions and focused sector-reforms by the Government, will provide an ideal platform for national and international businesses to invest in India’s education sector.

However, India’s higher education sector faces many challenges such as low level employability, lack of research as well as limited scope for innovation and entrepreneurship. To overcome them it is critical to align the higher education system with emerging economic realities and industry requirements as well as introduce well-structured and futuristic education frameworks.

The Government has taken progressive initiatives to increase access of education and enrollment ratios by improving quality of education. Further, an innovative approach will be crucial towards bringing qualitative reforms in Governance, teaching and financing education in India. An enabling regulatory mechanism to manage credibility of online education providers, Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs) and international accreditations, will improve access to global institutions and faculty, thereby immensely benefiting students.

Additionally, collaboration with International institutions on key aspects such as curriculum, faculty, pedagogy and global best practices will be vital in improving quality of higher education in India. To maximize this, the Government must establish robust evaluation systems to rank international players, promote competition and attract only the top education providers from across the world.

I firmly believe that the Government’s proposal to replace the 30-year old education policy with a new reformed policy will immensely help in leveraging the full potential of the sector and positioning India as a preferred talent hub, globally.

Towards the foregoing, I am pleased to present this YES BANK-ASSOCHAM Research report ‘Re-imagining Higher Education in India’, which provides an extensive review of the current India’s education system as well as suggests innovative strategies for evolving higher education for the brighter and better Future of Young India.

I am confident that the contents of the report will provide key insights and serve as an important reference for the New Policy being formulated by the Ministry of Human Resource Development through extensive stakeholder consultations.

Thank you.

Sincerely,

Rana KapoorManaging Director & CEO

Chairman


The pace of expansion of the higher education sector in the country has been remarkable. The gross enrolment ratio has increased from less than 10% in 2000 to 24.7% in 2013. Historically, such rapid growth has not been seen anywhere in the world, other than China. However, along the way we have not been able to undertake qualitative and futuristic transformation in our higher education domain. Some symptomatic indicators which highlight the structural challenges include the absence of Indian institutions in global rankings, low research output, very low employability of graduates and increasing attractiveness of a foreign degree.

This has prompted the YES Institute, the new practice think tank under the aegis of YES BANK Ltd. to develop a research report to address some of the challenges through new insights. The report has sought to present a roadmap for four key areas of reform- a) developing a future ready workforce by integration of vocational training and multi-disciplinary learning; b) global benchmarking of Indian higher education; c) revisiting higher education financing; and d) teaching reforms.

The Institute firmly believes that the education system has to be geared towards proactive policy as economic well being would have increasing correlation with education. Some of the shining examples of economic success have the common characteristics of a strong vocational education sector, robust inter linkages with industry and best of the class talent for teaching.

The report is an effort towards making a beginning towards making Indian higher education future ready and comes at a time when the government is formulating a New Education Policy. It dovetails with key themes of discussion of the policy including those on integrating skill development in higher education, financing, developing the best teachers and internationalization. We hope that it would be useful in evoking a national level policy dialogue in developing a robust education ecosystem in the country.

Preeti SinhaGlobal Convenor

Message


Acknowledgement

It gives us immense pleasure to release the YES Institute Research Report on ‘Re-imagining Higher Education in India’.

At the outset, we would like to express our sincere gratitude to Mr Dilip Chenoy, Independent Advisor and Former MD and CEO, National Skill Development Corporation for providing the guiding principles of the paper.

We would also like to thank Dr. Rajiv Kumar, Senior Fellow, Centre for Policy Research; Former Secretary General, FICCI and Mr. R Srinivasan, Director (Technical Education), Ministry of Human Resource Development, Government of India for their valuable inputs to the report.

Team YES Institute


Glossary

AICTE All India Council of Technical Education

BBA Bachelor of Business Administration

BITS Birla Institute of Technology and Science

CA Chartered Accountant

CAGR Compounded Annual Growth Rate

CBCS Choice Based Credit System

CSR Corporate Social Responsibility

GDP Gross Domestic Product

GER Gross Enrolment Ratio

GIAN Global Initiative of Academic Networks

GOI Government of India

HEI Higher Education Institution

IIIT Indian Institute of Information Technology

IIM Indian Institute of Management

IIT Indian Institute of Technology

IMF International Monetary Fund

INC Indian Nursing Council

ISB Indian School of Business

IT Information Technology

ITC Industrial Training Centers

ITE Institute of Technical Education

ITI Industrial Training Institute

MBA Master of Business Administration

MHRD Ministry of Human Resource Development

MOOC Massive Open Online Course

NITEC National ITE Certificate

NSDA National Skills Development Agency

NSDC National Skills Development Corporation


NSSO National Sample Survey Organisation

OECD Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development

PCI Pharmacy Council of India

PISA Programme for International Student Assessment

PPP Public Private Partnership

SERI State Secretariat for Education, Research, and Innovation

SEZ Special Economic Zone

SFIVET Swiss Federal Institute for Vocational Education and Training

SPU State Private University

SPV Special Purpose Vehicle

TED Technical Education Department

TVET Technical and Vocational Education and Training

UAS University of Applied Sciences

UGC University Grants Commission

UK United Kingdom

UNESCO United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization

USA United States of America

VET Vocational Education and Training

WPR Workforce Participation Rate

Glossary


1. Current Status of Higher Education in India 15

2. Evolving Higher Education Strategies for the Future 23

2.1 Changing scenario of professions in India over the years 24 2.2. Teaching as a First Choice Career 27

3. Revisiting Higher Education Financing 31

4. ‘Glocalization’ of Indian Higher Education 37

5. Integrating Vocational Education with Higher Education 43

Bibliography 53

Table of Contents


01 Current Status of Higher Education in India


01 Current Status of Higher Education in India

Structure of Higher Education

Size: India has one of the largest higher education systems in the World both in terms of number of institutions and students enrolled

Figure 1: Student Enrolled across major populous countries

Source: UNESCO

34.1

28.6

20.0

7.3

2.4

0.0 10.0 20.0 30.0 40.0

China

India

US

Brazil

UK

Student Enrolment in Higher Education in 2013 (million)

40,670

(Source: UGC)

Number of Colleges in India during the year 2014-15


Regulation: The University Grants Commission is the statutory body entrusted with regulation of higher education in the country; it enforces its standards, advises the government, and helps coordinate between the centre and the state. It is the regulatory body for Institutes of National Importance, Central Universities, State Universities, Deemed Universities, and State Private Universities in the domain of general and distance higher education in the country.

Prominent Professional Councils of UGC:

9 All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE): responsible for proper planning and coordinated development of the technical education and management education system in India

9 Medical Council of India: statutory body for establishing uniform and high standards of medical education in India including recognition and registration of medical qualifications

9 Bar Council of India: statutory body established under the section 4 of Advocates Act 1961 that regulates the legal practice and legal education in India.

9 Pharmacy Council of India: PCI regulates the pharmacy education in the Country for the purpose of registration as a pharmacist under the Pharmacy Act. They also regulate the Profession and Practice of Pharmacy.

9 Indian Nursing Council: INC is the regulatory body for nurses and nurse education in India. It is an autonomous body under the Ministry of Health & Family Welfare, Government of India.

9 Indian Council of Agricultural Research: autonomous body responsible for co-coordinating agricultural education and research in India

9 Veterinary Council of India: statutory body which regulates veterinary practice in India 9 Dental Council of India: regulates dental education and the profession throughout India 9 National Council for Technical Education: government body to oversee standards, procedures

and processes in the Indian education system

Non-University Education:

There is a large non-university sector in the country catered by the polytechnics and Industrial Training Institutes (ITIs).

9 ITIs and ITCs: Industrial Training Institutes (ITIs) are government-run training organizations while Industrial Training Centers (ITCs) are privately run equivalents. They provide post-school technical training. In the year 1980, there were 830 ITIs. This number has grown to ~13100 in 2015. 82.5% of these ITIs are operated by the private sector.

9 Polytechnics: Polytechnic colleges provide Diploma in Engineering post secondary education. There were only 332 polytechnics in the country in the year 1980 which have grown to 3139 polytechnics in 2014 with 69 per cent in the private un-aided sector.

India had 736 Universities across the Public and Private sector landscape


Figure 2: Classification of Indian Universities

Figure 3: Gross Enrollment Ratio over the years

Stateuniversities

46%

Deemed to beUniversities

17%

CentralUniversities

6%

PrivateUniversities

31%

Classification of Indian Universities

Source: UGC

Source: UNESCO

The number of Universities and Colleges has grown at a very healthy rate.

This is being driven by the incredible pace of increase in Gross Enrolment Ratio (GER)

In fact, no country other than China has seen such an improvement in enrollment at such pace any time in their history

But, there is still a lot of catching up to do with the world.

9.5 11.3

16.4

24.7

0.0

5.0

10.0

15.0

20.0

25.0

30.0

2000 2004 2009 2013

GER over the years


Figure 4: Comparison of Gross Enrollment Ratio

Figure 5: Comparison of Universities in Top 200 Rankings 2015-16

Source: UNESCO, #Figures of Indonesia and Russia pertain to 2012

Source: QS Rankings 2015-16

However, there is a perceptible lack of quality in general in the system manifested by lack of world class research universities and very poor employability metrics.

The employability of graduates remains a grave concern, the National Employability Report 2013 pegged that employability was less than 25% in almost all job functions across education streams- science, commerce arts et al.

24.729.7 31.5

59.8

76.1

89.1

0.0

10.0

20.0

30.0

40.0

50.0

60.0

70.0

80.0

90.0

100.0

India China Indonesia UK Russia USA

GER comparison (2013)#

49

30

12

11

8

8

2

0 20 40 60

USA

UK

China + Hong Kong

Germany

Japan

Australia

India

Universities in Top 200 in QS Rankings 2015/16


0

5

10

15

20

25

30

35

40

45

BusinessFunctions

Analysis& Comm.

IT & ITeS Accounting Teaching

e&

Bi

eD

.

Sals

us n

ss

evp

Operaio

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. Serv

.

tCle

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etar al

i

i

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rop. Com

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BPO

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ounting

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ig

Figure 6: Graduate Employability in Different Sectors/Roles

Figure 7: Student Faculty Ratio

This is amidst a severe shortage of faculty, poor infrastructure and static to declining per capita education spend by the government.

Source: National Employability Report 2013, Aspiring Minds

Source: MHRD Annual Reports

14.2

18.720.4 20.8

23.0

1980-81 1990-91 2000-01 2010-11 2014-15


This is combined with the estimates that going by the current projections, India would have surplus graduates by 2020. While this presents us with an opportunity to be the global hub of knowledge workers provided we have globally benchmarked quality standards, it also means that we would be at a huge disadvantage if the country’s youth is not gainfully engaged in productive activity.

This presents us with four key challenges to overcome if we were to reform the higher education space of the country.

9 Reaching world class quality standards and increasing employability 9 Creating a workforce for the future needs of the globe 9 Financing Higher Education 9 Internationalizing Indian Higher Education

We intend to delve deeper into these challenges and propose solutions to these challenges over the next four chapters.


02 Evolving Higher Education Strategies for the Future


02 Evolving Higher Education Strategies for the Future

2.1 Changing scenario of professions in India over the years

Figure 8: Evolving Professions in India over the years

Source: YES Institute Analysis

Engineering

Gen. Edu.

Medical

Teaching

Defence

C

IT

AITeS

Telecom

Healthcare

Fashion

Liberal Arts

Photography

??

1980 1990 2000 20202010


Table 1: Futuristic Skills

Urban Rural and Sub-urbanDesign Thinking Renewable Energy based skill sets including those

related to Solar PV, windmill, waste recycling, soil conservation

Social Intelligence High Value Agriculture and Allied Services

Data Science Sustainable Forestry Management

Cross Cultural Adaptabilities High value horticulture techniques

Information Filtration Capabilities Micro food processing, packaging and value addition

Application of Digitization in Social Domains

Genetic Engineering and Advanced Biotechnology Skills

The above figure indicates the changing profile of professions in the country with additional education avenues added over the years reflecting the changing profile of the global economy, exponential growth of the service sector and advancement of technology.

The available options in higher education have seen a marked change over the decades. From plain vanilla general education degrees in 1980s, there has been a gradual addition of professional avenues driven by the changes in the job market. Progressive professionalization has added qualifications like CA, BBA, MBA and IT related profiles as attractive enrolment options. More recently, avenues in Liberal Arts, Fashion and Photography are being seen as attractive qualifications by students. Data science and analytics are the latest additions to this list. However, the evolving nature of technology powered by the internet and increasing automation is leading to rapid shifts in job profiles resulting in demise of many profiles and creation of others. In fact, the world is today driven by high tech industries such as information technology, biotechnology and specialized high skill manufacturing. It is closely connected through ever faster communication channels and means of travel. The interplay of advanced communication technology, energy systems and automation is driving change in all spheres including the job market. In such a situation, even futurologists would have trouble in gauging the kind of profiles which would be in demand in 2020 and beyond!

It is imperative that a country’s education system is in sync with the emerging economic realities to prepare it for the coming opportunities and challenges. This is especially true of countries which are at a relatively lower level of economic and human development and are aspiring to move higher on the development ladder.

It is also noteworthy that the first movers who are able to capture the trend build a sustainable competitive advantage. A case in point is the concept of B-schools which was pioneered by the ivy league of the US and select British Universities and their relative competitiveness continues till day. However, it is now contended that the B-school growth and relevance may already have peaked and the world is now looking forward to a new trend.

Some of the early pointers are the futuristic skills talked about in new age job profiles. This includes skills like the following:



There are negligible structured avenues to learn such skills. This is because there is very little anticipation on the kind of job profiles which will emerge and flourish over the next decade in the wake of increasing automation and application of internet in every sphere of the economy. Nonetheless, there are increasing pointers which suggest that the future jobs would require multiple skill sets. Let’s have a deeper look to understand such pointers.

It is now widely recognized that the future of work is smart and we need a smart workforce to adapt to the emerging trends. No product today stands as a product by itself; it is being supported by aspects of service, design, experience or a mix of all of these. Multi-disciplinary learning would therefore be a significant part in tackling the issues of un-employment and under-employment of graduates. As job profiles progressively shift away from single field specialization, it stands to reason that multi-disciplinary learning is required to generate the required innovation in business models.

The education system therefore would require focus on creating multi-disciplinary and multi-skilled graduates. Latest trends indicate the emergence and recognition of multi-disciplinary and multi-skilling learning all over the world.

In India as well, this trend is reflected in the form of new private universities which have come up with philanthropic contributions from well intentioned business owners and successful investors. Probably from their own insights in education at some of the best research universities of the world, they have realized that pure professional courses in Business and Engineering would not be able to cope with the emerging challenges posed by the new age economy and society. These new age private universities have started focusing on liberal education and the multi-disciplinary approach to learning. Whether all or some of these initiatives achieve excellence in the years to come remains to be seen but the emergence and growth of multi-disciplinary learning seems irreversible in the medium term.

There are some critical aspects of this evolution:

9 First, from a pure economics point of view, pure engineering or business skills are no longer delivering outstanding value in generation of new products and solutions. An integration of the humane touch, design, aesthetics and simplicity has become as important to business as is cutting edge technology. A case in point is the product range of ‘Apple’ which has scored over competitors with its better design and appeal.

9 Secondly, with climate change, progressive urbanization, nuclear families and proliferation of social media, there is increased consciousness of the socio-environ-cultural environment where we live and the material race post World War II is giving way to preference for more sustainable, balanced and inclusive growth.

9 Next, the overall shift is also reflected by leading academicians and thinkers who have underlined the need for a new framework of learning in the Indian University system for more comprehensive and balanced learning.

“The Indian education system requires a totally new framework that facilitates the flow of knowledge across the disciplines and avoids compartmentalization of teaching and learning…” Prof M Anandkrishnan, Chairman, Board of Governors, IIT Kanpur.

Fundamentally, interdisciplinary approach enables integration of concepts, theories, techniques and perspectives from two or more disciplines to advance fundamental understanding or to solve problems whose solutions are beyond the scope of a single discipline. Many of the complex problems faced by the country in public policy are essentially due to lack of inter-disciplinary approach, for instance the health policy of the country pursued by standalone bureaucrats and clinicians leading to no common ground and


resultant below par outcomes for decades. The two factions have not come to a consensus on solving the human resource shortage in the sector especially in rural areas and in primary care even after a decade of back and forth on creating a new cadre of public health/primary care workers leaving the delivery of care in peril.

It has been empirically proven that an inter-disciplinary approach is much more suited to problem solving compared to an isolated approach. Already, progressive industries like information technology are making a shift by developing blended workforces of business analysts-domain experts-technical experts. The future probably beholds a balance of all these skills from a single source instead of collating all these skills from multiple sources. Inter disciplinary learning would also infuse flexibility in the work force to make relatively smoother career transitions mid way as the shelf life of job profiles becomes increasingly volatile and shorter. A transition to creation of such a workforce for the future requires creation of an entire ecosystem with fundamental reforms in the supply aspects of higher education- quality of higher education including the supply of quality teachers, infrastructure, global benchmarking and revisiting the financing question.

Global Benchmarking of

Indian HEIs

Revisit Higher EducationFinancing

Teaching Reforms for

Qualitative & Quantitative

Change

Integrate

Work Skills in Graduates

Enhancing Qualityof Higher

Education

2.2. Teaching as a First Choice Career

The pace of expansion of the higher education sector in the country has been remarkable. The gross enrolment ratio has increased from less than 10% in 2000 to 24.7% in 2013. This has happened at a time when the existing institutions are already struggling with huge staff shortage. While enrollment in higher education has grown six times in the last 30 years, faculty strength has only grown four times as reflected in increasing student-faculty ratio (see figure 7). This has led to an acute shortage of qualified persons to fill in the vacant teaching positions. According to the standing committee report of MHRD, the shortage of faculty at the eight newly instituted IITs is as high as 60% (Anand, 2012). Making teaching as a first choice career option therefore is probably the most ominous challenge facing the Indian higher education sector. This is because a persistent shortfall in quality and quantity of faculty may lead to decline in the academic standard of our universities which would further enhance the attractiveness of a foreign degree. There are many reasons which are responsible for such a situation:


1. Legacy Issues:

9 Structure in Public University/college: the current rigid structure of recruitment and career growth in the public higher education system poses impediments for bright people to join and continue in the system. In the absence of a robust performance appraisal system, there is a fixed tenure for attaining promotions and very limited alignment with performance. For instance, a faculty cannot attain the designation of a ‘Professor’ if he/she is working in an affiliated college instead of a University. Also, the highest grade to be attained at the University is the ‘Professor’ designation which seriously undermines the incentive to perform.

9 The teaching profession takes the maximum burden of persistent underfunding of higher education in the form of recruitment freezes especially in state run universities, over-dependence on temporary teacher positions and miniscule research funding if any.

9 Protective discrimination in recruitment for preference to certain sections of society has led to overall decline in efficiency of the system.

2. Unattractiveness of an Academic Career:

Academic salaries in India are not attractive enough for young well-educated Indians who have many more opportunities in the growing technology, service and other sunrise sectors of the economy as well as abroad. The current salary structure of public universities and colleges is pegged to the civil services which work on a decadal revision of compensation. The private sector on the other hand barring some exceptions makes gross compromises in quality for commercial considerations. In a highly aspiring society, this fortifies social and psychological barriers in attracting bright talent to the teaching profession. Predictably, a majority of IIT graduates go overseas for higher studies, and a high percentage of them do not return to India.

Way Forward: Building an efficient mechanism

9 Pay-for-performance: a robust pay-for-performance system is the first and foremost reform needed to reinstate the attractiveness of the profession.

9 Inculcating accountability: one way to build accountability in the system is to introduce student feedback as a significant criterion in annual performance review of faculty.

9 The issues of social justice should be addressed through economic assistance avenues like scholarships. Starting from its decision to scrap quotas in super specialty courses in medical institutions, the Supreme Court of India has repeatedly directed the government to do away with all forms of reservation in institutions of higher education.

9 Recruitment Reform:

o ease norms on recruiting faculty members; for instance, people with postgraduate degrees could be eligible to teach undergraduate courses instead of overemphasizing the need for doctoral degrees

o Weightage for industry experience needs to be increasedo Autonomy to best in class institutions to devise their own mechanism for recruitment of

faculty


9 Industry Collaboration: Academic institutions can enter into partnerships with highly coveted corporate recruiters. Industry professionals with rich experience from corporate can contribute as visiting faculty while academia can assist in being a regular source of high quality talent for the industry.

o industry needs to encourage professionals to accept faculty positions through sabbaticals and career enhancement opportunities

9 Faculty Development Programs: instill faculty development programs as a significant criterion in accreditation, ranking and other quality metrics.

9 Faculty Exchange Programs: encourage academic institutions to enter into exchange programs with top end global institutions.

9 Leveraging Technology: the internet can be leveraged to partly address the issue of shortage of quality faculty through outreach, building economies of scale, Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs) and targeting complex topics through visualization methods.

To sum up, the teaching profession can be saved from perennial decline by building a financially efficient system reconciling the commercial, social and research ethos integral to the profession. This would require careful and sensitive handling of various issues which has led to the current state of affairs. An ad-hoc approach is unlikely to deliver the required long term results.


03 Revisiting Higher Education Financing


03 Revisiting Higher Education Financing

A strong, self-sustainable and knowledge intensive economy can only be built on the foundations of higher education. It has been reiterated in a number of policy documents that 6 percent of the GDP needs to be allocated to education with half of that amount going to higher education. However, the current fund flow to higher education remains at ~1.2 % of GDP and the ways and means of financing higher education has seen a contentious debate in the country over the years. This has become more complex today with the emergence of new variables, such as the emergence of a large ‘non-profit’ private sector education system, rapid growth in technology enabled learning and very high growth seen in enrolment, exceeding all projections.

Owing to several factors including fiscal constraint, state funding to education in general and higher education in particular has been declining in real terms. The public expenditure on higher education per student in the 2000s is nearly 30 per cent less than what it was in 1990-91. Since it is not possible to alter the salary structure of the existing staff, much of the brunt of the economy measures has been borne on

Figure 9 and 10: Public Expenditure on Tertiary Education per Student

Source: UNESCO, Figures for USA, UK pertain to 2011 and those for Indian and Brazil are from 2012.

9713.1

11497.2

4154.5

2626.9

USA UK Brazil India

Public Exp. on Tertiary Education per Student (PPP US$)

0

500

1000

1500

2000

2500

3000

2000 2004 2009 2012

Public Exp on Tertiary Education per student (PPP US$)

CAGR - 3%


Figure 11: Government Expenditure per Student on Tertiary Education

Source: World Bank Statistics

fresh recruitments, books, journals and scholarships. For example, the proportion of scholarships in the public expenditure of states on higher education declined from 0.49 per cent in 1990-91 to 0.24 per cent in 2004-05. Similarly, in the case of technical education, it declined from 0.45 per cent to 0.20 per cent during the same period1.

On a purchasing parity basis, India’s per student spend on higher education (2626.9 PPP US $) recorded in 2012 is one fifth of the UK, one-fourth that of USA and two- thirds of that spent by Brazil (Figure 9). Even though India has seen significant increase in higher education spend during the tenth and eleventh five year plans, per student spend has grown only at a CAGR of 3% (Figure 10).

Another key indicator which reflects relative government spend on higher education- Government expenditure per student on tertiary education as a % of GDP per capita shows a flat to declining trend over the period 2003-2012 (Figure 11).

Clearly, the massive expansion in enrolment and the incapacity of the government to fund such an expansion requires new and innovative ways to finance higher education in the country.

Though higher and technical education is on the concurrent list, by and large, financing remains the responsibility of states. The share of the central government has remained around 20 percent since 1990-91 with a few exceptions since then, wherein it increased to a little over 25 per cent. Much of the central government expenditure on higher education is routed through the University Grants Commission (UGC). It is interesting to note that the disbursement of funds by the UGC is uneven and the bulk of it goes to the central universities and their affiliated colleges and to a few deemed to be universities. Moreover, allocation remains to be input driven and on historical basis with very little alignment with quality and competition.

According to the estimates of the Ministry of Human Resource Development of 2012, to attain a GER of

~30%, India’s education sector needs investment worth USD 150 billion over the next 10 years. Since education is considered a ‘public’ good, government policy does not permit for-profit entities to set up higher education institutions. However, considering the current financing constraint which is only going to accentuate in the future, policy makers should look at ways to attract incremental financial resources to the sector. There are several key reasons to rethink the not-for-profit structure:

1Trends in Growth and Financing of Higher Education in India, Ved Prakash, Economics and Political Weekly

68.0

55.0

74.3

54.9

10.0

30.0

50.0

70.0

90.0

2003 2006 2009 2012

Govt. Exp. per student, tertiary (% of GDP per capita)


9 Financing Needs: educational institutions need to have access to fungible capital which is not possible under the not-for-profit structure of the sector. Credible long term institutional funding can only be attracted to education only if the not-for-profit tag is removed.

9 Commercialization and the quest for quality: while the not-for-profit structure has ostensibly

been kept to prevent commercialization of education, policy has been ineffective in preventing commercialization through trusts and societies. There are frequent media reports of dubious entities fleecing gullible students with deceptive advertisements and dubious assurances. Therefore, laying out a robust policy framework to allow legitimate regulated profits would bring in a lot of transparency and credibility in the higher education system. The quest for quality is manifested by two parallel trends:

o Closing down of institutions: In 2015 alone, various educational institutions have sought the AICTE’s permission to close down around 1,973 courses in technical subjects, citing a poor employment scenario and flagging student interest.

o Students moving Abroad: As per the “Indian Students Mobility Report 2015: Latest Trends from India and globally”, in 2014 over 300,000 Indian students headed abroad for further studies. India has also overtaken China in terms of growth rate in the number of students studying in foreign countries.

This clearly demonstrates the market dynamics and the quest for quality education leading students to relocate overseas.

9 Global movement towards private funding of education: A global education report, Tuition Fees and Student Financial Assistance: 2010 Global Year in Review prepared by Higher Education Strategy Associates, analyzed education funding patterns across 39 countries and concluded that countries around the world are increasingly turning to private sources, such as tuition fees and income from sales to fund their higher education systems. For instance, effective September 2012, UK allowed ~300% increase in undergraduate fees (the ceiling was increased from pounds 3375 to 9000 per annum). The overall impact would be lesser out-go for the bottom 25% of graduates and proportionate higher outgo for the remaining sections of graduates.

The trend points towards better targeting of economically backward sections of society, increasing scholarships and declining blanket subsidizing of all higher education witnessed even in countries with a stable GER and ageing demographics. This has great relevance for countries like India which is witnessing a great rise in enrolment and therefore there is scant chance of maintaining per student public spend, let alone increase the same in the medium term. The case for for-profit entities is also emboldened by the following allied developments in the sector:

9 The emergence and limitations of philanthropy in higher education: the rise of philanthropic institutions in the country has been a very positive development. These institutions supported by well meaning corporate sponsors have adopted the best practices of higher education across the globe. However, it would be unrealistic to think that philanthropy shall contribute a large chunk of incremental funds to higher education. In a best case scenario, if all the eligible ~15000 crore CSR funds are channeled to education, it would account for just ~2 % of incremental higher education spend. Moreover, philanthropy has not emerged as a universal phenomenon and plays an insignificant role in financing higher education in most countries except a few elite institutions based in the US and the UK.


9 Cost Sharing and Emergence of Education Loans: there is an increasing trend of cost sharing of higher education between the student and the parents as has been the trend in OECD countries. Further, the policy and market response to higher education expenditure in the form of education loans has made a significant impact in financing and is expected to grow rapidly in the foreseeable future. Total outstanding education loans falling under priority sector lending stood at Rs.70,475 crore as of end December, 2014. Outstanding loans have grown at a CAGR of 29.9% since 2005. On a similar time frame, education loan accounts have grown from 0.25 mn to 3 mn registering a CAGR growth of ~32%.

Timely availability of education loans have not only given a boost to the sector but has also enhanced affordability given the periodic revision in fees by both the government and private colleges. As an aggregate percentage, education loan account for ~ 11% of total enrolment up from just 2% in 2002-03. The government has also recently launched a single window electronic platform –www.vidyalakshmi.co.in to further streamline access to education loans and scholarships. The portal allows a candidate to apply to multiple banks by filling just one form. Funding students instead of institutions should be the way forward to create an efficient system and healthy competition among higher education institutions.

Some other measures which could contribute to creation of a financially sustainable and efficient higher education system are:

9 Corporations should be encouraged to contribute to industry and project specific research, incubation centers and specially designed curriculums through tax benefits

9 Allow 100% FDI in construction of higher education infrastructure and development of education infrastructure should be at par with hotels/hospitals/SEZ. The current FDI norms like minimum developed area of 50000 sq. metres are stringent and in certain cases unrealistic in the context of education sector

9 Allow leading universities and institutions (based on accreditation and indigenous ranking) to access foreign debt capital. This would lead to inflow of funds from multilateral development financing bodies

In conclusion, there is an urgent need to derive a new equilibrium of financing higher education in India. The under lying principles of cost sharing should be the basis of reaching this new balance. This would entail allowing flow of fungible capital into qualified (read ‘quality accredited’) higher education institutes and redoubling the efforts towards access and equity through increase in coverage of scholarships and grants for meritorious and economically weaker sections of society. In this regard, a Social Impact Fund with dedicated resources for funding higher education corpus could be established to ensure fair access of higher education to students from poor background.

Figure 12 and 13: Education Loan Statistics

Source: Department of Financial Services, Ministry of Finance, GoI

6674

27909

48416

70475

2005 2009 2012 2014

249

1627

24813000

2005 2009 2012 2014

Loan Accounts ('000)O/s Education Loans (Rs. Crore)


04 ‘Glocalization’ of Indian Higher Education


04 ‘Glocalization’ of Indian Higher Education

The U.S. Council of Graduate Schools’ new statistics show that offers of admission to Indian post-graduate students are up 25 per cent for 2013-14 from the previous year, compared to a 9 per cent increase for all countries. A similar pattern can be seen for other popular destinations of higher education including Germany, Canada and the U.K. This is despite the fact that India is the least expensive destination for higher education among 15 leading countries and a foreign degree in the US, for instance, is likely to cost about seven times more on average when compared to India. Further, a survey conducted by HSBC noted that 85 per cent of Indian parents were in favor of sending their children abroad for a better university education. This also means that given cost parity, 85 out of 100 students in India would prefer a foreign degree compared to a domestic one!

This empirical data brings us to two critical gaps in Indian higher education; first, the perceptible lack of access to quality higher education in India and second, the need for greater internationalization of Indian higher education landscape to retain talent.

Internationalization of higher education in the context of Globalization:

‘Internationalization’ has been defined in a number of ways in different contexts. According to Prof. Philip G. Altbach, “Internationalization includes the policies and practices undertaken by academic systems and institutions—and even individuals—to cope with the global academic environment.” It is therefore a response of education stakeholders to globalization characterized by increasing interaction of all forms enabled by new information and communication technologies. Internationalization of higher education facilitates the osmosis of educational ideology, pedagogy and outlook. There is growing realization across the world that collaborative research is more valuable in tackling global economic, social and environmental problems. At the same time, deeper collaboration can encourage institutions to put their goals in a broader national and international context. What was largely considered a domain of image building, collaboration and partnerships between universities have now become a necessity. If the relevant gains from global collaboration are not realized, students would move to greener pastures overseas and research activities would move either to foreign soil or beyond universities into the domain of market forces.


Figure 14: Comparison of India and Australia’s collaboration with US and UK institutions (2013)

In the Indian context, internationalization would entail creating globally-reputed institutions; connecting with the best institutes in the world; attracting international students and faculty; building a culture of research, innovation, and entrepreneurship to enable qualitative economic growth; and becoming a hub for talent globally.

Let’s understand the key drivers of internationalization in the Indian context:

9 Lack of Partnerships: Indian higher education institutions (HEIs) partnerships are characterized by student and faculty exchanges and remain few and far between. For instance, Indian institutions have only 44 collaborations with US universities compared to 955 by Australia. (Exhibit 1)

9 Student Mobility - Our top talent goes to developed countries for studying, research and contributing intellectual capital as well as economic value to other countries. An estimated 300,000 Indian students are studying abroad, spending over USD 10 billion annually2.

9 No Indian university in the top 200 in global rankings: In the QS World University Rankings 2014, only 2 institutions (the IITs and University of Delhi) figured in the top 500 compared to 97 from the USA and 18 from China. There is no Indian institution in the top 200. It therefore becomes imperative for the country to learn from global best practices.

9 Employability: Only a small portion of Indian graduates are considered employable. The National Employability Report 2013 pegged that employability was less than 25% in almost all job functions across education streams- science, commerce, arts et al.

India has the opportunity to be a global hub of talent by 2030 due to its demographic advantage. It will be amongst the youngest nations in the world by that time; with nearly 140 million people in the college-going age group, one in every four graduates in the world will be a product of the Indian higher education system. The estimated increase in demand for medium and high skilled jobs both nationally and globally bodes well for India which could be in a sweet spot to cater to the emerging opportunities in the job market. To realize the vision of India emerging as a global talent hub, assimilating the global best practices or ‘Glocalization’ is a crucial piece of the overall strategy.

Source: Sannam S4; Universities Australia

2Source: Indian Students Mobility Report 2015, ‘Latest Trends from India and globally’

44

158

955

482

US UK

India Australia


Ways to enable ‘Glocalization’:

9 Foreign Partnerships: Allowing foreign universities to set base in India could be a key catalyst in enabling internalization. The Foreign Education Institution Bill, 2010 which lapsed in 2014 was expected to facilitate entry of foreign institutions and lay down a policy framework for their operation while ensuring that only reputed institutes operate in the country. Foreign education institutions involvement can have a positive structural change in India’s curriculum which will become globally acknowledged and could rationalize the higher education sector apolitically. It is very important that the Government of India draw up clear regulations and procedures for foreign universities interested in establishing linkages in India with Indian institutions and ensure transparent and quick implementation.

Some Indian institutions like the Indian School of Business (ISB) for instance have emerged as the best known ‘glocal’ education brands by providing co-certified programs with the best Universities in the World. Stringent regulatory norms and limited autonomy however, has meant that such globally reputed institutions are not recognized by the Indian system.

9 Building Indian Higher Education Brands- Indian institutions should increasingly look outwards to set up campuses in foreign countries to establish the credibility of Indian higher education. The Government can play its part by offering easier financing options to enable such initiatives by the HEIs. Some of the early adopters of this model have been the Manipal Group, the Amity Group and BITS Pilani among others.

9 Student Mobility: we have been averse to foreign students coming to India reflected by the cap on admitting foreign students in Indian institutions. As of 2012, there were only 33,156 foreign students in the country3. Attracting international students is essential to create a ‘Brand India’ and improve the cultural composition of our institutions. Accredited Indian institutions should be allowed to intake international students without any restrictions. Easier visa norms for students would also be helpful.

Another key initiative could be opening representative offshore offices, equivalent to British Council, Education New Zealand, Education USA, etc to facilitate education exchanges.

9 Faculty Exchange: Only a handful of Indian HEIs have faculty exchange programs with global universities. The problem is compounded by the fact that there is around 35 percent and 40 per cent faculty vacancies in state and central universities respectively. Faculty mobility is expected to not only help in filling critical gaps but also address the issues of limited industry and global exposure.

An excellent initiative launched by the Government of India in this regard is GIAN (Global Initiative of Academic Networks). GIAN is expected to create a channel for U.S. professors in science, technology, and engineering to teach in Indian academic and research institutions on short term exchanges. This would be a mutually beneficial collaboration if it were to allow faculty members from U.S. universities to spend six months of their sabbatical year in India. Some of India’s leading academic institutions like IITs and IIMs could have foreign faculty members this year under the national GIAN) program.

3 All India Survey on Higher Education, Government of India


9 Education SEZs: With an aim to encourage development of education infrastructure, the government could also draw upon international precedent on development of Special Education Zones or Knowledge and Research Hubs, which are basically delineated geographical areas similar to Special Economic Zones (SEZ), but dedicated to education infrastructure (e.g. Dubai International Academic City). Entities engaging in development of such infrastructure need to be fiscally rewarded through measures like an income-tax holiday benefit and other indirect tax benefits (similar to those available for developers of SEZs). There is a huge debate in the academic circles regarding the necessity and applicability of such zones in the country. However, a balanced and transparent policy framework enabling a level playing field for both domestic and incumbent foreign institutions is expected to draw positive feedback from the academia.

The Gujarat government is mulling to set up of a Special Purpose Vehicle (SPV) at the state’s largest education hub spread over 1000 acres of land at Chokari village for development of various civic amenities at the site. As per the state government’s proposal, the Chokari village backyard will host a central university, a teacher’s university, a sports university and IIIT, to be known as a “special education-cum-sports zone”.

The elements listed above are some of the ways to reform and bring the global best practices to India. The overall aim of ‘glocalization’, harnessing the best of the world in India can be realized when regulation also moves in tandem with new realities. Regulation has to move towards outcome based from an input based approach. The premise of academic, operational and financial autonomy needs greater focus especially at the state level. Even the State Private Universities (SPUs) do not enjoy any meaningful autonomy, for instance, SPUs are not allowed to hire foreign faculty in permanent positions and fees is not decided by the University but a state level committee. The long term vision and finer details to shape the education system are therefore missed due to over regulation and mistrust between the government and non-government sector.

There are a number of instances of well intentioned quality foreign institutions backing off from setting up campuses in India due to stringent conditions and ambiguous regulation. The best of global higher education needs to be tapped through various forms of partnerships including twining, joint degree programs and faculty exchange initiatives.

Overall, Internationalization to ‘glocalize’ Indian higher education is the need of hour and would have benefits for all stakeholders- students, universities, governments and society at large. It is in our interest to align with global accreditation systems and best practices. The policy framework and regulation should allow flexibility in approach to allow development of globally connected education networks. With an enabling regulatory framework and collaborative efforts of all stakeholders, India has the potential to place itself on the higher education map as a hub that nurtures global talent and a country with a strong cultural base of research, innovation and entrepreneurship.


05 Integrating Vocational Education with Higher Education


05 Integrating Vocational Education with Higher Education

India started a vocational education scheme through the central government in 1988 which had the target of enrolling 25% of all students by year 2000. The National Education Policy 1986 recognized that, “introduction of systematic, well-planned and rigorously implemented programme of vocational education is crucial in the educational re-organization.” After however, 25 years of its launch, the earlier schemes just managed to scratch the surface in terms of impact. Only 2% of persons under the age 15 years have a vocational education qualification to their credit.

Vocational education suffers from a serious image issue and students take up vocational education mostly as a last resort. The boundaries between general and vocational education has further dented the prospect of take off of the vocational education stream. The public, private, formal and informal segment of education have grown independent of each other and there are no set pathways for student mobility. This has resulted in twin issues - unemployable graduates mostly due to lack of practical job skills on the one hand and acute skill shortages faced by industry on the other.

The lack of experience in a work place setting leads major knowledge intensive companies of the country like the IT sector to spend money and time on training newly hired graduates for work related skills. On the global horizon, a knowledge intensive economy like Switzerland with zero labour arbitrage is able to seamlessly integrate fresh graduates into high end technology profiles due to the strong vocational education background.

Enrollment into higher education has grown at a phenomenal CAGR of 8% over the last decade. The government has set a target of achieving 30% GER by 2020. Just as growth in GDP for the economy, GER has captured the attention of policymakers so much so that it has been understood as the single most significant parameter of achievement and failure for the education policy and implementation.

However, the strategy of chasing GERs without commensurate vocational skills has created a severe workforce employment scenario in the country. As per the National Employability report quoted elsewhere in the report, employability of graduates was less than 25% in almost all job functions across education streams- science, commerce, arts et al. There are other significant visible as well as subtle challenges due to the underlying focus on attaining GER:


Share of India and other younger nations in total surplus of low skilled labour in 2020E

9 Even going by the current projections, India would have surplus graduates by 2020. As per the Mckinsey Global Institute ‘The World at Work: Jobs, pay, and skills for 3.5 billion people’, the demand for highly skilled labor is projected to outpace that for low-skilled workers. India and other younger developing countries could have ~58 million surplus low skill workers by 2020. It also estimates that the lack of vocational training could lead to a shortage of 13 million medium skilled workers needed for jobs in industries. This implies that a large section of the population would be stuck with subsistence agriculture and menial urban jobs.

9 India’s female labour force participation rate fell nearly seven percentage points to 22.5% between 2004-05 and 2011-12, according to NSSO data. This trend has been partly attributed to the

Source: ‘The World at Work: Jobs, pay, and skills for 3.5 billion people’, Mckinsey Global Institute


61.7%

increase in gross enrolment ratio of women in higher education plus a combination of factors including patriarchy. This trend is surely going to turn with time and workforce participation Rate (WPR) for women are bound to go up in the future in line with the overall trend towards nuclear families, urbanization and gradual improvement in the social status of women in the society. As per the World Bank, at 53 percentage points, India has one of the worst gender gaps (disproportionate difference between the sexes) in the world when it comes to labour force participation. If the workforce participation rate for women in India was to be the same as for men, roughly 217 million women would join the labour force. While IMF has estimated that this will boost India’s economic output by 27%, it also presents with a challenge of securing productive employment for the women coming out with higher education qualifications.

Underlying principles of vocational training

9 Economic Security 9 Employment 9 Global competitiveness

Figure 15: Vocational Education Pyramid

Employment

GlobalCompetitiveness

Economic Security


The intense desire to pursue an academic education generates unrealistic expectations amongst parents and undue pressure on students in schools. The consequence is a prejudice against and less-than-positive image of TVET and all its negative associations with those who are less academically inclined. In reality, the greatest gaps in human resource development are in technical and vocational skills and by that the greatest challenge is to change this image!

Challenges to be overcome:

9 Reconciling the needs of various socio-economic-cultural groups 9 Mapping demand and supply of jobs in the evolving economic scenario 9 Meeting needs of academically less inclined students 9 Acceptance of the system by parents, teachers and society 9 Measuring Outcomes

Recognizing the importance of TVET alone is not sufficient to address these unique challenges. It takes much greater concerted efforts in terms of policies, governance, leadership, expertise, capabilities and a government, willing and ready to invest in TVET, to make a real difference

While there is no ‘universal’ system which every country can adopt, there are significant learning’s emerging out of countries which have excelled in making their TVET responsive to change.

Case Studies:

Countries with a strong commitment to vocational education and training (VET) tend to experience lower rates of youth unemployment. The World Economic Forum placed Switzerland top of their global competitiveness rankings for the sixth consecutive year.

Case Study 1: Switzerland:

Systemic Innovation in the Swiss Vet System

Switzerland is one of several European countries with a so-called “dual” vocational education and training (VET) system in which students combine learning in school with learning in workplace settings. VET is the mainstream upper secondary program, serving 70 percent of Swiss young people. It prepares a broad cross-section of students including high achievers for careers in a range of occupations—high-tech, human service, health, as well as traditional trades and crafts, white-collar as well as blue-collar. It enjoys very strong support from Swiss employers, who credit it with being a major contributor to the continuing vitality and strength of the Swiss economy. One measure of the strength of that economy is that Switzerland enjoys virtually full employment, with a youth unemployment rate that is the lowest among developed countries.

It has been argued that the Swiss dual VET system is one of the key factors explaining the country’s economic success. Young people are in the labor force at about the same rates as the 25 to 64 year old population, likely due to the seamless transition of almost all youth from apprenticeship to a full time job. The most enviable quality of the Swiss system is not just the engagement of a wide range of employers in the system, but the value these employers attach to their role in helping young people grow up and become part of the talent pipeline employers need in order to keep their enterprises productive and competitive. Switzerland has over the past 20 years modernized its vocational education and training system in ways that have made it an international leader in educating youth and in maintaining its position as a world economic leader.


About 30 percent of Swiss companies, participants in the Swiss vocational education system, host this sort of “educational” employee. They rotate among three learning sites—workplace, intercompany courses, and school—in different proportions over the three- or four-year period of their apprenticeship. Their learning is highly personalized; their interests and talents are at the core of their training, and their options for further study and changes of course are encouraged and open. According to the studies of Stefan Wolter, Managing Director of the Swiss Coordination Centre for Research in Education and a Professor of Economics at the University of Bern (Dionisius 2009), the productive work undertaken by the trainees more than cover the cost of training to their employer. Each occupation has a qualification certificate that is attained through a final assessment, and is standardized across the country.

The Student Perspective: each industry sector in partnership with the State Secretariat for Education, Research, and Innovation (SERI), develops qualifications and assessments for the industry, establishes curriculum, and provides through their affiliated training companies varying amounts of course work during the three- or four-year upper secondary vocational education. The commercial sector includes 21 areas of specialization including banking, retail, public administration, and some areas of IT. Students feel that they have made a much better choice than spending more time sitting in classrooms at an academic high school. Most students prefer to earn the vocational baccalaureate, and, after working for a while, earn an advanced degree at a university of applied sciences (UAS). Students entering the social care sector—very popular among young people—also work as apprentices.

Education Structure: compulsory education in Switzerland ends at grade 9, compulsory education in Switzerland gets strong results, as evidenced by performance on the most recent PISA4 assessments, where Swiss scores in literacy and science are well above the OECD average, and math scores are among the highest in the world. The University system on the other hand is much more specialized focused on preparing young people for a relatively narrow band of professions. However, the entry to the university system is controlled through various ways, for instance at the end of the first year there is a rigorous exam, enabling only about half of the entrants to continue and many students therefore opt for the vocational education route.

4Programme for International Student Assessment


Image: The Swiss Education SystemSource: Centre on International Education Benchmarking

While parents and teachers obviously play an essential role in guiding young people, each canton in Switzerland operates a network of community-based career centers specially organized and staffed to help young people in the transition from grade 9 to whatever comes next. The career counselors support students through this process, helping them persevere until they have found the right match.

System of transfer between the University and VET system: there are a number of crosswalks and points of transfer between the two systems. A growing number of students who start a three- or four-year apprenticeship decide to pursue either simultaneously or with an additional year of study a more applied version of the academic baccalaureate. This diploma entitles students to admission to a University of Applied Sciences (UAS), where students can earn Bachelor’s and Master’s degrees in such fields as information technology, health care, social work, business, arts, music and engineering. But students with the vocational qualification can also sit for an additional exam—University Aptitude Test that qualifies them to enroll in the more traditional university system if they choose.

Role Definitions:

Federal Government: The role of the federal government is to regulate and steer the system carried out through two governmental units: the State Secretariat for Education, Research, and Innovation (SERI) akin the ministry of Education and the Swiss Federal Institute for Vocational Education and Training (SFIVET).

Employer Organizations and Associations: they are the real drivers of the system, decide the training content of VET and PET programs, and also take the lead in determining when new occupational programs

Compulsory Education

Vocational Education and training

Selective Schools

Federal AcademicBaccalaureate

Universities and Federal Institutes

of Technology

Universities of Applied Sciences

Professional Colleges

Federal PET Diploma And Advanced Federal

PET Diploma Exams

Federal VET Certificate (2 Years)

Federal VET Diploma(3 or 4 Years)

Federal VocationalBaccalaureate

Tertiary Level Type B Tertiary Level Type A

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Bridge-year Courses

Direct Access Additional qualifications necessary


need to be developed to take account of projected changes in the economy. Consequently, the VET system enjoys enormous support from the employer community. The employer community – the associations and the member companies that employ apprentices – contribute about 60 percent of the total cost of the VET system.

Canton: The cantons and within them the municipalities are the decision-makers: taxes are set locally, not by the Federal government, and cantons have the primary responsibility for most services including education. Each canton has a VET office that has broad responsibility for overseeing the implementation of VET programs. The cantons are also responsible for funding and operating the PET colleges, and for funding and operating the network of Careers Centers that play such an important role in providing advice and assistance to young people and their families as they navigate the transition from the end of compulsory schooling to the VET system, including the choice of an appropriate apprenticeship placement. The cantons also play an important role in marketing apprenticeship to the employer community and ensuring that firms that offer apprenticeships meet a national set of quality standards.

Swiss leaders across the sectors have decided that the only way for Switzerland to maintain this standard of living is to compete with other countries not on the basis of costs, but on the basis of skills. At all levels of the system the focus is on investing in the skills of its current and future workforce.

Case Study Source: Gold Standard: The Swiss Vocational Education and Training System; Centre on International Education Benchmarking

Case Study 2: Singapore

Singapore has a long history of initiatives in the areas of skills for employment or entrepreneurship. The Technical Education Department (TED) was established within the Ministry of Education in 1968 to spearhead the development of secondary vocational education, industrial training and technical teacher training. Since then, the structure and policy focus under TVET has seen changes necessitated by the transformation seen in the economy from a pre-dominant labour intensive economy in 1960s to capital intensive in 1980s and finally evolving as knowledge in the 2000s.

To meet the skilled manpower needs of Singapore’s future economic development, a primary school education was no longer sufficient. Employers need vocational graduates who have had a secondary education and higher-level national trade certificate skills in response to the dynamic changes in an increasingly global economy. This review was a turning point for the establishment of the Institute of Technical Education (ITE) as a postsecondary educational institution in 1992.

ITE is a government-funded post-secondary institution focusing on vocational and technical education. Without being structured as a University or Polytechnic, the institute focuses on career-based vocational and technical education. As an integral part of the national education system, its goal is to train technicians and skilled personnel for jobs and careers in the major sectors of the economy. Catering to the needs of the lower 25% of a school cohort who are less academically inclined, ITE provides full-time institutional-based courses under its “One ITE, Three Colleges” system of governance.

There are two basic levels of qualifications under the National ITE Certificate (Nitec) system of certification. Depending on their achievements in schools, aptitudes and interests, students may enroll at the Nitec or Higher Nitec mainly two-year courses in Schools of Engineering, Business & Services, Electronics & Info-Communications Technology, Applied & Health Sciences, Hospitality and Design & Media.


Image: Singapore Education System Source: UNESCO

Key Learning’s:

Vocational Education structure needs to be responsive to the ever-changing socio-economic landscape: Singapore’s policymakers pursued a policy of relentless and systematic development of education and training in keeping with the needs of economic development. Manpower planning and skills development at the national level was a strategic tool in attracting foreign investments. With each phase of economic restructuring and development, the educational and training institutions were called upon to response to the manpower needs of new emerging industries. The industrial training board was given statutory status with high autonomy and flexibility in operations. Another crucial policy change was the decision by the Ministry of Education to upgrade and reposition VTE as a post-secondary educational institution. This led to the establishment of ITE in 1992 and its transformation as a world-class educational institution.

Changing Public Perception and Image: As an Asian country, there was culturally a steep preference for an academic education. Parents harbour the aspiration that their children will make it to a university. To overcome this barrier and change people’s mindset, public campaigns on “using the hand” were initiated and basic workshop subjects such as metal work, woodwork, technical drawing and basic electricity were made compulsory for all secondary students. “Top of the Trade” television competitions and “Apprenticeship of the Year” awards were used to create interest and promote the importance of technical skills among the young in the early years of Singapore’s industrialization. The repositioning of ITE as a post-secondary institution and its journey of transformation and achievements in organizational excellence is another critical milestone in effecting public perception.

Leveraging Industry Partners: The VTE Model in Singapore is based on a system of pre-employment full-time institutional training for school leavers. Some instances of industry level partnerships include industry based training centers like Traineeship, Approved Training Centers and Certified on-the-job

Secondary Express(4 years)

Primary (6 years)

Secondary Normal(4/5 years)

Secondary NormalTechnical (4 years)

OtherTraining

Institutesand

LabourMarket

Universities

Degree

Institute of Technical Education

Higher Nitec

Master NitecDiploma

Junior Colleges Polytechnics

GCE ‘A’Level

(25%) (40%) (25%) (10%)

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Training centers. Another form of partnerships is the joint establishment of Centers of Excellence in various technologies to facilitate exchange of technology, expertise and training resources.

Operational Excellence: ITE has achieved international recognition for its achievements and innovations in vocational and technical education. It has created a unique brand of an ITE College Education for those who are less academically-inclined. It has also built a strong team of leaders and staff who are professionally qualified and dedicated to the cause of vocational and technical education. There is an open willingness to learn from and adopt the best relevant practices from other educational systems.

Case Study 3: Austria

While most nations are struggling to raise the status of TVET and improve its parity of esteem with general education in order to make it more attractive, Austria emerged as the world exemplar among countries having high regard for TVET. There seems to be little need for enhancing the status of TVET in Austria. Approximately 80% of young Austrians in the upper secondary education are in post-compulsory vocational education.

Following are some key measures and policy initiatives that contribute to the high status of TVET:

9 The education system is qualification-oriented; 9 TVET is provided through a highly developed apprenticeship system and comprehensive

scholastic vocational training system. Slightly more than half of the students choose the school based option, while the other half opt for the dual-system of TVET;

9 There are constant efforts to develop educational opportunities with future oriented content; 9 Occupational standards and TVET curricula are regularly updated and revised; 9 New programs are introduced to meet labour market skills needs and changing workplace

requirements.

Source: Schmid, K. (undated). Country Report: Austria, Achieving the Lisbon goal: The contribution of vocational education and training systems. European country reports, Institute for Research on Qualification and Training of the Austrian Economy.

Policy Focus

Redefining the policy focus on skilling: Creating multi-skilled people

9 Multi- disciplinary learning: design a mechanism which allows ‘odd’ subject combinations from the post secondary system. The Choice Based Credit System (CBCS) facilitates student mobility across institutions within and across the globe as a global best practice. However, a number of additional measures are required to truly facilitate inter-disciplinary learning:

o Student advisory system to guide students on choosing a combination of subjects. o Addressing systemic issues of teacher vacancies and inadequate infrastructureo Harmony in the relative quality of institution participating in the credit system.

9 Creation of a robust functional vocational education structure at secondary school level: No industry participation, little practical training, and poorly qualified instructors ensured that for decades only 3 per cent of students from the senior secondary level were in vocational education. There is a need for developing a PPP based ecosystem at the secondary school level. As of 2009, there were just 5% of the senior secondary schools offered vocational education streams.


The Government has for the first time introduced vocational education at the level of class 9 through revision of ‘vocationalisation of higher secondary education’ in 2014. Against this backdrop, countries like China have managed to develop systems to ensure that nearly ~50% of students completing nine years of compulsory schooling enter vocational education at the senior secondary school level. Of the three years of vocational learning, one third is spent on industrial training, an area where we have a lot of ground to cover.

9 Industry participation: only 16 per cent of Indian firms carry out any in-firm training themselves, as against 80 per cent of Chinese firms. Therefore, industry has to offer internships, participate in developing curriculum and assist in developing competencies for the work life.

Redefining the Skills Ecosystem: From employment to empowerment

9 Standardization: there is an acute need to instill standardization in the various skilling initiatives of the government. While the NSDA and NSDC are the nodal skilling bodies under the Skills ministry, various entities like the ITIs, state skill boards and entities under MHRD follow their own standards and there is no streamlined pathway to connect it with normal education.

9 Re-establish Outcomes: the measurement of outcomes from skilling initiatives have to move beyond just numbers. The current national training models focus too much on short term outcome metrics like targeting minimum two months employment post training. Retention beyond 2-3 months shows marked low employability of trained people.

The solution lies in building a mechanism for long term support and guidance in order to improve employability outcomes. The impact analysis should include socio-economic factors like social status, economic gain, soft skills and adjustment to formal working environment. This is necessary to improve retention rates and long term productivity gains. The underlying focus of skilling initiatives should transform from employment to empowerment.

9 Overcoming execution challenges: Finally, it is extremely crucial that the policies identified for vocational education are executed well at the ground for real change and benefits. The job at hand to train ~500 mn people over the next decade is humungous and requires a great coordination effort with meticulous planning, implementation, monitoring and impact analysis.

The skills challenges require the best brains as well as the best hands to plan and execute the mission. Moreover, the plan would most certainly require constant course correction in a dynamic economic environment. This is especially true when all the three variables- the skill sets, pedagogy and the job market are constantly evolving and policies have to be pre-emptive rather than reactive to maintain and grow the competitive edge of the economy.


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