Meeting in the Middle: TVET Programs’ Education–Employment Linkage at Different Stages of Development

Katherine M Caves,Ursula Renold,Johanna Mirka Kemper,Patrick Mcdonald,Andrea Ghisletta

doi:10.3390/socsci10060220

Katherine M Caves, Ursula Renold + Show 3 more

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https://doi.org/10.3390/socsci10060220

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Journal: Social Sciences	Publication Date: Jun 9, 2021
Citations: 7	License type: CC BY 4.0

Affiliation: ETH Zurich, University of Basel

Abstract

Technical and vocational education and training (TVET) programs are most successful at supporting youth labor markets when they combine education and employment. Education–employment linkage theory describes this combination in terms of power-sharing between actors from the education system and their counterparts in the employment system over key processes in the curriculum value chain of curriculum design, curriculum application (program delivery), and curriculum updating. The Education–Employment Linkage Index measures linkage for every function in a TVET program where actors from the two systems interact, aggregating those into processes and phases and eventually an index score. We apply this index to the largest upper-secondary TVET programs in Benin, Chile, Costa Rica, and Nepal. We find that Benin has relatively high education–employment linkage, while the other three countries score very low. Benin’s situation is unique because its TVET program is moving from employer-led to linked, rather than the typical employer integration into an education-based program. Other countries with large informal economies, low formal education and training rates, and existing non-formal employer-led training may be able to implement similar approaches.

Highlights

We investigate how large upper-secondary Technical and vocational education and training (TVET) programs in these four countries compare to international scores and look for similarities and differences in the drivers of linkage where they exist
We explore the dynamics around levels of informality in the labor market, interaction with formal education programs, and differences by stages of development in the four case study countries
The Certificat de Qualification Professionnelle (CQP) remains in development and while it scores well in linkage it still has some way to go before becoming an established mainstream TVET program. These results confirm our expectation that education–employment linkage is weaker overall in our sample of countries with relatively weak TVET systems than it is in the sample of top performers (H1)

Summary

Introduction

Publisher’s Note: MDPI stays neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations. Young people’s successful transition onto the labor market is one of the main criteria for assessing the success of technical and vocational education and training (TVET). Programs (e.g., Ludwig-Mayerhofer et al 2019; Deitmer et al 2013; Eichhorst et al 2015). Linking education and employment within TVET programs appears to contribute to better youth labor market outcomes (Bolli et al 2018, 2021). Common approaches to connecting education and employment include apprenticeship models 2011), industry–school partnerships (Flynn et al 2016), and more systemic public–private partnerships in developed (e.g., Pillay et al 2017; Remington 2018) and developing (e.g., Dundar et al 2017; Kohli et al 2015) contexts

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