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Contributions from
the Column
InWEnt News
Social services fail the poor in many countries
Training labour skills in South-Eastern Europe
06/2005 |
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[ Balkans ]
Training prepares for new challenges
Practical vocational training is a precious commodity in the eyes of companies and labour in South East Europe. The rapid pace of economic development and the Balkan states' aspirations for joining the European Union (EU) calls for swift adjustment to modern standards. InWEnt supports that process by developing flexible training options for jobs in particularly high demand.
[ By Jochen Hönow ]
From the small town of Baia Mare in Romania to Zenica Canton in Bosnia-Herzegovina, to the city of Plovdiv in Bulgaria, the situation is similar: weak institutions, antiquated infrastructures and technologies, environmental damage and high unemployment impair the quality of life for many people. Hence the efforts of the international community – and especially the EU – in recent years to help the countries of South East Europe tackle the difficult task of structural change. Through political initiatives like the Stability Pact, the EU supports the potential accession candidates' endeavours to secure peace and democracy, economic development and regional cooperation. This support and the countries' own efforts have created a reform-oriented political landscape geared to Europe.
Now, those positive changes in underlying conditions are to be reflected in vocational education and training, too. With an eye on EU integration, the countries of the region are reforming their general and vocational education systems. Bulgaria, for example, has long been noted for the high standard of training it gives its workforce. However, more and more job-seekers find that the qualifications they possess are not what the private sector wants. Practical skills and modern expertise are at a premium there. Building restoration, building materials consultancy, gas installation and plumbing, information technology, mechatronics and accountancy are areas where private-sector demand for specialists is particularly high at present. At the latest get-together of the “Regional Balkan Network”, teams of InWEnt-trained specialists from Albania, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Macedonia and Romania presented the first finished concepts and teaching materials for training programmes designed to make job-seekers fit for today’s labour market.
Drawing on years of experience of cooperation, InWEnt helped create a transnational knowledge network in 2003. Called the “Regional Balkan Network”, its aim is to improve vocational qualifications in the participating countries by intensifying exchange between experts, spreading awareness of exemplary projects, defining common goals and quality standards and developing vocational further training programmes. What prompted the partners to engage in this venture was the realisation that many training channels at present largely fail to meet the requirements of business and industry. Needs analyses at a number of vocational education centres, job agencies and companies have shown that training is often not just poor but also poorly suited to local needs.
In need of updating
The kind of vocational training available to job-seekers and youngsters in the region today is in need of updating; it is heavy on theory, divorced from practice and based on outdated textbooks and traditional “chalk and talk” teaching methods. In Romania, for example, youngsters are mostly trained at dedicated vocational schools. Tuition is supplemented by work experience. The length of a vocational education is between two and four years. Youngsters who fail to meet the conditions for enrolment (higher school-leaving certificate, entrance exam) can acquire a basic qualification in one-to three-year courses. This all sounds good but it not always fits the companies needs: experts complain of poor equipment standards, the length of education and outdated curricula of off-the-job training.
With InWEnt's support, the teams of specialists are working on the development of flexible further training and re-training concepts capable of adapting rapidly to changes in demand. The offers based on them convey the requisite skills and knowledge succinctly and with a practical bias. The idea is to enable course participants to put what they have learnt straight into practice in a work environment. Each national team has now created a training package for a variety of thematically related jobs. The individual modules and course contents were developed on a uniform methodological and didactic basis in the relevant national language and English. This makes it possible for those in the network to exchange concepts and profit from the expertise of other group members. The teams structured the new content so the relevant occupational skills can be learnt or upgraded in a three- to six-month course.
Flexible further training options like this are important. Dynamically developing branches of the economy such as the construction sector or the IT industry need readily available specialist personnel. They cannot wait till someone completes a three-year training programme. What is more, many of the region’s women, youngsters and refugees have never received vocational training. For those entering the job market for the first time, the new concepts open up a real opportunity to get started. For those who already have vocational qualifications, the further training programmes improve their chances of getting a job in their chosen occupation.
For the Balkan Network teams to be able to accomplish this assignment, it was first necessary for the members – experts from ministries, education departments and educational establishments – to undergo further training themselves. In a multi-stage process, with InWEnt’s support, they learned how to determine the kind of vocational qualifications required in their region (“Training Needs Assessments”) and how to develop their own occupational training and education concepts on that basis. Depending on the needs of the participating institutions and target groups, the methodological emphasis was on modern teaching methods, learning strategies or exam standards.
The specialist teams from the five countries involved developed the content of their basic and further vocational training programmes not only at regular seminars but also via an Internet portal. Here, the persons participating in the scheme – who number around 60 at present – compared notes with one another as well as with experts from Germany. By next year, they want to offer further training programmes for tourism, web design, e-commerce, mechanical engineering and machine servicing and to integrate further specialist teams.
The growing network's most important partners include labour and education ministries, business organisations, job agencies, private and public vocational training establishments and international organisations such as the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) and the International Labour Organisation (ILO). Flanking workshops and study tours encourage even more supraregional exchange of experience and expertise. Here, decision-makers from politics, business and education are able to discuss current vocational training issues and engage in an international dialogue.
In the longer term, vital steps will include revamping the teacher training system, restructuring the process by which occupational qualifications are acquired and integrating modern communication technologies into timetables. Only open, flexible vocational education systems, says Romania's education ministry state secretary Paloma Petrescu, can meet the requirements of a globalised world and European market. And an experienced school principal from Albania sums up perfectly the idea of the Regional Balkan Network: “Supraregional exchange has brought us new knowledge and initiated new approaches to vocational education practice. In my view, InWEnt has opened a window to Europe.” And that is an important step forward – because Bulgaria and Romania are set to join the EU on January 1, 2007, and the other Balkan states will follow suit later.
Dr. Jochen Hönow
is a senior project manager with InWEnt's “Modern Media and Development of Professional Training Curricula” division. He is responsible for programmes in South East Europe. jochen.hoenow@inwent.org
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