What is the right TVET system ?

Lessons from the Region

Demand for access to postsecondary opportunities is projected to

increase further across South East AsiaDemographic trends -> growing young population in South East Asia Success in expanding access to primary and secondary education -> fueling demand for TVET and HE

ASEAN Economic Community intends to promote free flow of labor

Governments recognize the need to increase investments in human capital to further accelerate growth, increase productivity and innovation and promote competitiveness => growing investments in TVET

Growing number of private TVET providers (business/ management /admin = low cost)

Post-basic education Technical and vocational education and training Higher education

3

Broad Education Sector Development

Pre-Primary and Basic Education

Upper Secondary Education

Tertiary and Higher Education

TVET

$25515% $2

0.1%

$632 36%

$70.4%

$86449%

2012-2014(US$1,760 million)

ADB Portfolio – rebalancing towards the world of work

$180 5%

$303 8%

$885 25%

$446 13%

$1,716 49%

2015-2017(US$3,530 million)

Major concern of firms => shortage of workers with the right skill mix, particularly for jobs in technical and managerial positions

Companies need to retrain graduates from TVET institutions

While job-specific technical skills are considered most important

-> more and more companies are also looking for graduates with cognitive skills, such as problem-solving and critical thinking, and behavioral skills, such as team work and communication.

Technological Changes

Sector challenges

low level enterprise involvement => which results in poor relevance of training courses, and lack of demand-driven standards that guide program development and assessment procedures

Limited capabilities of teachers/trainers to adopt modern teaching techniques integrating theoretical content with practical skills training -> training mostly theory driven

Obsolete and inadequate equipment and workshops hamper quality teaching-learning at many TVET institutions

Inequities in access to skills training in rural areas Limited national skills development strategy to address training and

retraining needs for adults Fragmentation of TVET provision & lack of comprehensive information

on provider and financing

…. while in the past the focus was on strengthening basic education

Challenge for governments today:

Achieving the right mix of improving quality of and access to TVET -

in addition to further improving basic education and higher education => with limited resources

TVET does not create jobs

• Overall socio- economic environment and investment planning needs to be right

TVET needs to be demand-driven

• Planning should not be driven preliminarily by “educationists” and government officials

• Engagement of the business community is key

TVET for whom

• tension between aligning programs to be responsive to international standards and requirements of technology driven labor market --- and needs in the informal and local sector

Quality - not Quantity is the economic driver

TVET

Maintaining and improving TVET quality under

financial constraints

Balancing the expansion of

access to TVET with greater

attention to equity

Increasing relevance of

programs at a time of rapid change in

labor market needs

Increasing and better utilizing the

financial resources

available to TVET

Organizational Structure of the TVET-system

Getting the organizational structure right is the first step towards improving efficiency

TVET institutions need to operate as a system Efficient coordination mechanisms

Need for industry engagement at all levels Finding a balanced intervention & collaboration level for

setting up Quality Frameworks and Accreditation Systems, validation and assessment procedures, interimship opportunities …….

Governance and Management Structures => Increasing emphasis on greater autonomy of public institutions, and decentralization of the TVET system

Þ Improved management of TVET institutions, entrepreneurial focus

Building differentiated systems :

Centers of excellence striving towards international standards

Institutions with attention to locally relevant skills promotion of short courses and building pathways among training providers

Encourage private TVET provision + PPP models

Improving Instructional Quality

Wanted : teaching staff with solid technical knowledge, effective teaching and communication skills,

hands-on, practical competence

Shortage of qualified Instructors/teachers: rapid TVET expansion - the demand for qualified

teachers/instructors lectures has outstripped the supply

Need to develop strategies for continuous professional development considering efficient institutional arrangements

industry -based teaching and learning

Improving incentive systems, transparent evaluation procedures and conditions of employment

TVET needs to lead to jobs

=> challenge to link TVET programs to labor market demand

involvement of employers and business communities is key ! What is the right balance ?

growing importance of “behavioral and thinking skills” ; “analytical, business, and creative skills”

Entrepreneurial skills –> concern: lack of ‘entrepreneurial experience’ among teachers

Efficient labor market information to guide program development

Relevance of programs

TVET is expensive

Challenges to increase efficiency of available resources for public TVET systems are well understood:

due to funding constraints: reduction of operating costs, increase student/teach ratio, real value of instructional salaries fall, deferring maintenance, recruiting less qualified instructors, starving workshops, inadequate facilities

Þ Quality suffered

Efficient Spending and Financing of TVET

Choices:

Accept lower quality and continue underfunding public TVET

Shifting costs of public TVET to students and families => at the risk of allowing inequity in access

Scholarship programs for poor students , Student voucher schemes

Create income generating opportunities for TVET institutions, => concern: supplementary teaching diverts the attention of teachers away from their regular tasks

Encourage partnerships with industries/companies

promote more short courses, build modular systems

Efficient Spending and Financing of TVET

Policy areas could include:

(i) strengthening existing policy frames; developing comprehensive implementation strategies to enhance sector coordination, outlining detailed roles and responsibilities of TVET stakeholders ; (ii) developing approaches to foster autonomy of training institutions;(iii) establishing a comprehensive TVET information system, regular TVET reports; (iv) establishing procedures to develop/update skill standards in close collaboration with industry and sector associations; (v) establishing validation procedures of standards driven by industry partners; (vi) establishing assessment procedures in partnership with industry; (vii) developing a concept for practice-oriented pre-service and in-service training of teachers and trainers at all public training providers and for in-company trainers; (viii) establishing incentive schemes for teachers, providing promotion pathways between

public training providers, recognition of prior learning; (ix) establishing a framework for promoting public-private partnerships in TVET; (x) developing a concept and incentive structure to initiate cooperative training schemes jointly implemented by companies and training providers; (xi) creating a seamless educational pathways with multiple entry points that feeds graduates of TVET institutions into a higher education; (xii) establishing strategies to enhance short skills training to train and retrain adults/workers; (xiv) develop targeted strategies to increase access to TVET provision in underserved/rural areas.

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