Conference Agenda

Changes in the European labour market, such as the number of vacant positions, new findings concerning the interdependence between social background and educational success, as well as new target groups resulting from the influx of refugees in recent years and the programmatic claim of inclusion of people with disabilities (Euler & Severin, 2020) pose societal challenges connected to diversity for European VET. International comparative VET research can make a decisive contribution here by sharing proven approaches and learning from each other (Pilz, 2017). At this point, ambiguous conceptual understandings in the context of diversity as well as a multitude of different approaches in dealing with diversity prove to be difficult.

Dealing with diversity is taken up by different concepts that either address individual diversity factors (e.g. disability, ethnic-cultural background) or diversity as a whole (e.g. broad understanding of inclusion, diversity management). The perspective on diversity, the distribution of roles in dealing with diversity as well as the associated changes in VET institutions and structures are also seen differently, depending on the concept and the understanding behind it. The authors (Kimmelmann et al, 2022; Pool Maag et al, submitted) suggest international comparative analysis focusing the wider interpretation of inclusion in dealing with diversity.

Common to all concepts is the goal of achieving equal opportunities for all learners, regardless of diversity factors. This presupposes the use of the learners' potential (potential orientation instead of deficit orientation) and requires a fundamental sensitisation and professionalisation of VET staff (Zoyke, 2016; Bach 2018) with a view to the challenges and opportunities of diversity as a cutting-cross category. However, this requires more research on diversity-oriented professionalisation of VET staff. In particular, there is a lack of analyses of competence requirements for vocational school teachers and student teachers connected to diversity in a broad sense, taking into account specific competences for dealing with individual diversity characteristics. This is where the present study comes in and investigates the following research question:

How to model competence requirements for an inclusive approach to diversity in teacher education for vocational schools?

Based on this question, the aim of the paper is to formulate recommendations/frameworks for teacher education for VET schools in the context of diversity-orientation, in order to contribute to inclusive, equitable and quality education.

For this, a discussion of competences and their modelling in teacher education must first take place. The understanding of competence is subject to various conceptualisations. Many models refer to Weinert's concept of competence (2001), which integrates cognitive abilities and motivational, volitional, and social skills. Competency models on professional action competencies have been developed since the 2000s, which structure the skills and abilities of (prospective) teachers in different competency facets and thus make them accessible to a detailed empirical investigation (Baumert & Kunter, 2011; Blömeke et al, 2010). The theoretical construct of action competence comprehensively combines those cognitive and noncognitive aspects into a complex system. Acting competent means to mobilise individual resources and orchestrate them in a complex situation (Rychen & Salganik, 2003).

Existing curricula, standards and competence models in teacher education addressing diversity can be differentiated whether they focus diversity and inclusion comprehensively or specific diversity factors only. In order to integrate the topic into teacher education and training on a most holistic level, the study incorporate broad and specific patterns at the same time.

Based on Weinert's tripartite understanding of competences as well as an analysis of general and diversity-related competence models/standards/curricula, a competence model was elaborated by four researchers from DACH countries (Germany, Austria, Switzerland) within the framework of the presented study, which anchors diversity as an integral part of a future-oriented teacher education for VET.

Even though Germany is an industrialized country, it continues to have low levels of basic literacy skills. According to the results of the Programme for the International Assessment of Adult Competencies (PIAAC) in 2012, adults in Germany have lower literacy proficiency than the OECD average (Rammstedt et al. 2013). Moreover, 6.2 million adults or 12% of the working-age population in Germany are considered "low literate" by the leo. – Level-One Study (Grotlüschen & Buddeberg 2020), which focuses on the lowest competence level of the International Adult Literacy Survey (IALS). Based on the New Literacy Studies (Barton & Hamilton 1998) and ethnographic approaches, literacy can be defined as a social practice which is integrated into people's living environment and ascribed with subjective meaning. Therefore, it is important, "to distinguish dominant literacy from vernacular" (Street 1992, p. 51). With reference to Bourdieu's theoretical concept of habitus and field (1982, 1987), the diversity of literacy practices also results from different habitus- and milieu-specific approaches to written language (Pape 2018). These practices can show up in plural forms and are also embedded in power structures. Beside "legitimate literacy" (Grotlüschen et al. 2009) proficiency various areas of life and competence, such as media, health, finance, or politics, determine opportunities for participation in society. This perspective ties in with an extended concept of basic education, which opposes a more functional understanding of basic education that is limited to written language (Duncker-Euringer 2017).

Within the German National Decade for Literacy and Basic Education various development projects are being promoted (BMBF, 2018), which also encompass 'unconventional' places of learning or learning formats. For instance, concepts of work-oriented basic education use 'outreach' strategies, whereby the place of learning is shifted towards the vocational world and work-related learning processes are initiated (Frey & Menke 2021). Moreover, young people in youth vocational assistance show low literacy levels (BAG OERT 2015) and thus can be taken into consideration as a new target group of work-oriented basic education. Since these young people do not directly enter the working world after leaving school and initially find themselves in the so-called ‘transition system’ being accompanied by teachers e.g., concerning their traineeships for orientation and job applications. The support of those participants is linked to specific labour market needs, which criteria are described in the catalogue for training maturity of the federal employment agency (Bundesagentur für Arbeit 2009) and refer to the German activation policy of 'carrot and stick'. Peoples’ self-determined career prospects are then often marginalized or 'cooled down' by the agency in favour of increasing opportunities on the labour market as well as the goal of gainful employment (Walther 2014). Coming back to Bourdieu’s field theory, one could regard people who criticize the labour market conditions and, hence, oppose the field’s “doxa” (Bourdieu), as resistant preservers of their own agency. Our presentation therefore outlines these strategies of resistance: How is resistance expressed by participants in youth vocational assistance and related to their own biography and social background? Considering plural educational settings, it is intended to focus on the diversity of participants and, subsequently, explore how their diverse resistant practices are recognised by teachers with (potentially) different biographic and social background. Finally, we will relate to what extent resistance and its assumed emancipatory potential are being supported in the terms of youth vocational assistance. Our joint research project GABO (German abbreviation for Basic Education in the Context of Work and Vocational Orientation) provides the basis for these considerations, in which the perspectives of participants and teachers in their daily practice in youth vocational assistance are captured and intertwined.

General description on research questions: Societies nowadays increasingly face the challenge of dealing with young people at risk. The reasons are multifold – unfavourable social or family environment, poverty, learning difficulties, psychological or emotional problems and other unfavourable circumstances. Educational systems are looking for effective solutions. It has been recognized that young people at risk often need additional stimulus and motivation to resist the challenging conditions, especially if their prior learning experiences and school environment has not been positive so far. Research also shows that many of these young people are more inclined to practice oriented activities and are not so keen on more academically oriented activities. For this reason there is a good justification to carry out a targeted research on the potential positive role of vocational education and training as a catalyst for improved motivation of students at risk to deal with their difficulties and to strive a more meaningful life modes. Moreover, apart from routine VET procedures, additional input might be necessary to make vocational education and training even more attractive to this target group. In this respect the research team has formulated research questions: 1. What are the most important findings world-wide in involvement of students at risk in vocational education and training, with a focus on innovative solutions requiring original approaches to motivate students and facilitate the work of the teaching and administrative staff? What are limiting and challenging factors for successful involvement of students at risk into vocational education and training to develop these students as successful future professionals?

Objectives: Propose research based approaches for innovative solutions in work with students at risk – by their involvement in vocational education and training, with additional incentivizing and support factors that motivate them to become valued professionals and socially active citizens, thus also contributing for economic development of the country.

Theoretical framework: Academic researchers have presented findings on improved solution of involvement of students at risk in vocational education and training, as there are several relevant aspects that need to be taken into consideration (Keijzer, et al, 2022) including additional attention to these students and special training for the teaching staff (Fix et al, 2017) with the students in focus and require not only attention but also innovative solutions (Sarceda-Gorgoso, Barreira-Cerqueiras, 2021). Researchers (Middleton, 2022; Mazin, et al, 2021) have pointed out that experience in vocational education and training has a high value, as part of compulsory education (López, Saurin, 2017), paying particular attention to the development of skills (Eegdeman, et al, 2018) including cognitive skills. It important to consider various aspects, including the gender of the student (Haro, et al, 2020; Jørgensen, 2015), and the role of the teaching staff is crucial, since various approaches can be developed and applied to address the various challenges.

This research, building on the approaches of Participatory Action Research and Qualitative Career Assessment (McMahon & Watson, 2015), implements a series of new tools that share the fundamental principles of a postmodern orientation to career construction (committed to equity, social justice, individual and collective activism, and sustainability). This paper has chosen to show the procedure followed with one case, although we would like to underline that this research is consolidated with a larger sample (three Second Chance Schools participate, and a total of 22 young people). Our aim is to show the methodological procedure followed and its potential. In the following, the tools designed are described and theoretically underpinned:

§ My treasure-box (Pahl & Kelly,2005)

This tool helps us to approach the personal, social and cultural context of the participants. To do so, a symbolic box is used where the participant and the researcher/professional introduce elements that are part of their daily life (e.g., objects, sayings, QR of songs, photographs, among others).

§ A day in the life (Cameron et al., 2018, 2020)

This is a mapping exercise where, in addition to identifying actions, it is of interest to know in what context each action is situated, which people accompany you, what they do, how you feel at each moment, etc. from morning to night.

§ The eat-eat jar (Thayne & West, 2019)

The participant puts into a recycled jar those situations and events that make him/her uneasy (the person is usually told: "put in everything that makes you sleepy/eats you up/eats your jar/head"). The aim is to identify what elements in your life are disturbing you and preventing you from moving forward.

§ Emotions calling (Vacheret, 2000, 2008, 2010; Baptiste & Belisle, 1991; Rascovan, 2007)

This technique (based on photolanguage) consists of presenting a series of photographs from which the participant is asked to select the one that corresponds to their needs, perceptions, or expectations in relation to a given topic (this can be done from the viewpoint of the past, present, or future depending on the purpose of the intervention).

§ Body storytelling (Prados Mejías, 2020)

Body expression (e.g., creation of body sculptures, expressive movement, dramatisations, performance, systemic movements, among others) is another artistic form that helps the person involved in the counselling process to become aware of aspects and influencing factors in relation to his/her life and professional project. Through body storytelling, the person creates/creates with his/her body (sometimes individually, sometimes in small groups) past and present situations.

§ The 'Snap' for change (Ahmed, 2017; Thayne & West, 2019)

The researcher presents the participant with a series of actions aimed at "snapping" into a wide range of issues that may affect the development of their personal, social and cultural identities. The "'Snap' for change" aims to invite debate in relation to the public and the private, the governed and the self-governed.

§ My landscape mapping systems (Rey & Granese, 2018; Romero-Rodríguez et al., 2021)

This technique consists of visually constructing the narrative of a personal experience in relation to a specific topic. Depending on the topic, we ask the participant to take a series of photographs (photographic tour) that will help in the realisation of their visual composition. This tool facilitates reflection, communication (beyond the textual-oral mode), as well as the incorporation of spatial dimensions that undoubtedly act as defining agents of our vital and professional projects.

The presented tools are used in combination with other artistic techniques such as drawing (Taylor & Savickas, 2016), collages (Burton & Lent, 2016; Chant, 2020), free visual representations (Ronkainen & Ryba, 2018), digital storytelling (Lambert, 2013, Wu & Chen, 2020), performance development based on Design Thinking (Brown, 2009), among others.

The purpose of this paper is to explore and compare the training and employment settings, opportunities, and scenarios of at-risk VET students in four countries from the perspective of the support provided to them by VET teachers individually and by VET schools institutionally, to meet their learning and training needs and to promote their employability/employment. The study is part of the large EEA research project Vocational education and workplace training enhancing social inclusion of at-risk young people (EmpowerVET), in collaboration between Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, and Norway.

The study builds on two research questions. First, what characterizes VET teachers’ possibilities to support at-risk students (national perspective)? To this end we will explore four factors: (i) availability of VET teachers, support staff, and trends; (ii) policies in VET teacher training; (iii) changing roles of VET teachers along with more diverse student populations, and; (iv) support available to VET teachers to deal with at risk students. Second, what characterizes the similarities and differences between the four countries, in the above regards, in the light of their different political-economic models of skills formation?

At-risk students/youth is not a homogenous group, nor easily definable. They often, but not always, need special support in the context of education, and duly special competence from the teaching staff to address their learning needs, against their often “uniquely complex” situations. Their risk of societal marginalization is often related to school dropout. In Norway, three background factors, sometimes intertwined, characterize youth at-risk for marginalization: migration, history of child welfare services, and psychological problems (Sletten & Hyggen, 2013, 23). In the Baltics economic hardship and geography often add to these.

Theoretically, the study builds on the concept of VET teacher competences (Antera, 2021) and institutional models of skills formation setting (Tūtlys, Vaitkutė & Bukantaitė, 2022).

Both the European Union (EU) and the OECD strongly relate the quality of VET provision to professional competence of VET teachers and its development (Antera, 2021, 463). Few studies have been investigating VET teachers’ competence, but both solid competence in the vocation and being a good pedagogue define a “good vocational teacher” (Mogstad Aspøy, et al., 2017). While they typically have a strong vocational identity, a large proportion of them lack formal pedagogical competence (Turmo & Aamodt 2007). Furthermore, strong focus on absence and often low school motivation are pulling teachers’ role towards being also a social worker (Lloyd & Payne, 2012; Young, 2000), as does increasing student diversity. Followingly, VET teachers often face challenges in trying to address at-risk students’ needs for learning and support. Continuous and high-quality professional development becomes a necessity to keep pace with the rapidly developing demands of their job (Psifidou & Pevec Grm, 2021).

The countries involved in this study, represent two types of strategic priorities in the development of the VET systems, with different implications to at-risk students (Cedefop, 2021). One is typical to Baltic countries, with an emphasis on fixing demand-supply skills gaps thru VET and strong focus on teachers’ vocations-related and practical skills, at the expense of broader theoretical knowledge. The other is typical to Nordic countries, emphasizing equal access and opportunities for learning skills development to all, and having a balanced view to VET teachers’ vocational and pedagogical skills and their development.

A great deal of variation exists in how VET is organised across countries, making VET more diverse than other sectors of the education system (Kis, 2020). However, despite wide variations, VET in most countries includes a significant proportion of general subjects. However, within the VET discourse and the research field of vocational education, vocational subjects and workplace issues tend to receive more attention than general subjects (Schaap et al., 2012).

This paper highlights the content and purpose of general subjects in VET. In Norway, 70–80% of the content in general subjects is common across educational programmes at upper secondary schools. There is a shared curriculum document for these general subjects. However, in VET, requirements were introduced in 2020, demanding that 20–30% of the content in these general subjects should be vocational-oriented. In Norway, teachers have the flexibility, ‘pedagogical freedom’ and ‘space’ to decide how, what, and when to integrate vocational orientation in their teaching. However, little research has been done on vocational orientation in general subjects in VET in Norway (Stene et al., 2014, p. 69). Dalby and Noyes (2022) have explored waves within the mathematics curriculum within VET over the last 30 years in England. Possibly, the vocational orientation of general subjects can be seen as yet another curriculum ‘wave’ within VET. However, using the Norwegian subject (national language subject) as a case, the following research questions are posited:

1) What are teachers’ perspectives on vocational orientation in VET programmes in the Norwegian school subject?

2) How do teachers re-contextualise vocational orientation in their teaching and practice?

This study takes a broad view of the term vocational orientation as a guiding principle, which refers to all approaches and convergences between general and vocational subjects. According to Lauglo (2005), vocational orientation is an academic concept, and the fact that the concept is possibly ‘theoretical’ makes it interesting to explore. The term vocational orientation is also often associated with the concept of relevance. However, relevance can be seen as a broader concept independent of vocational orientation. Stuckey et al. (2013), within the context of science education, refer to three dimensions of relevance: individual, vocational and societal. From this perspective, relevant content means reaching the students in ways that make general subjects useful and interesting in every part of their lives, not just at school.

In the global context, VET mainly serves two purposes: qualifying students for a work profession and contributing to social inclusiveness and equality (Hegna et al., 2012). However, according to Carstensen and Ibsen (2021), VET research has tended to view equality as a ‘potential side-effect rather than a driver for reform trajectories in VET’ (p. 1043). Furthermore, in the Norwegian context, VET also aims to provide students with general knowledge so that the student, at a later stage, can progress to higher education.

Overall, general subjects in VET are in a cross-press between different purposes. Moreover, vocational orientation has the potential to bridge the gap between academic subjects and the world of work. On the other hand, the vocational orientation of general subjects may also limit students’ access to theoretical knowledge. Therefore, to better understand the dimensions of vocational orientation, this study combines approaches from curriculum theory concerned with knowledge in school subjects (Hordern, 2014, 2022; Muller & Young, 2019; Wheelahan, 2007, 2015) with empirical research in the Norwegian context that identifies different ways of understanding vocational orientation. These include 1) lowering the level, 2) using vocational examples, 3) using the general subject as a tool and 4) pursuing joint projects (Stene et al., 2014).

The focus of the career choice process is on the students who are making the transition from lower secondary level to VET or general upper secondary level schools. Various actors (parents, peers, teachers, career counsellors, etc.) and institutions (school, vocational information center, training companies) are involved in this process. Expectations and ideas are brought to teachers by all actors involved in the process. At the institutional level, this happens through the location of career orientation in the Curriculum “Lehrplan 21”, and the goal formulations described with it. In addition to knowing the challenges in the education and career choice process, the handling of frustrations and the inclusion of one's own possible solutions (cf. Department of Education Canton Bern, 2022, p. 30) are formulated as goals. This means that students should reflect on their experiences and actions in the career choice process, re-evaluate them and, ideally, transformative learning should take place. Through the implementation of vocational orientation in schools, the career choice process is initiated and accompanied by teachers. Teachers thus come into focus, as they are supposed to impart the competences for career choice to the students through the planning and design of lessons (Driesel-Lange et al. 2020). The competence mediation model Dreer 2020) names four central dimensions here, which make the tension between the role expectations of teachers in the career choice process visible. Along the dimensions of teaching, organization, cooperation and the dimension of professional actor, the spectrum that teachers are supposed to cover ranges. What is striking here is the varying commitment of teachers (Neuenschwander, Schaffner 2011) in the career choice process and the statement that qualified teachers can make a relevant contribution to shaping quality career guidance at school (Bylinksi 2010, Deeken 2008).

The digibe project (digital support in the career choice process), funded by the State Secretariat for Education, Research and Innovation SERI, supports the career choice process by making reflection tasks on career orientation available online to schools and investigating "the effect of digitally supported reflection in career orientation at lower secondary level" (cf. SERI).

In the current project, there seems to be evidence that the role of the teacher and the understanding of the role of teachers could have an influence on the career choice process of students. So far, too little is known about teachers' understanding of their role in the career choice process in this respect. The focus will be on the design of career choice lessons by the teacher as well as on the question of which role or roles teachers assume in the career choice process. This assumes that the teacher, depending on the design of the lesson or the role taken on, is perceived as a helpful resource not only in the career choice process, but especially in the process of reflection by their students.

It is a common practice to look at different systems and other countries in search for inspiration or potential solutions in order to address problems or initiate change as part of policy learning (Li & Pilz, 2021). Still- and despite of long established practices of different types of policy transfer- it remains contested- specifically in education (Ozga, 2001). In research on policy learning in education, it is generally emphasised that a direct transfer of policies from one context to another is questionable (Phillips & Ochs, 2003). Steiner-Khamsi (2012) states context is the main factor for successful implementation. In addition, policy learning is described as a selective process, which mirrors the “‘socio-logic’ or context-specific reasons for receptiveness” (Steiner-Khamsi, 2014, p. 156). Ochs & Phillips (2002) define forces of context and their impact on cross-national attraction of externalising potentials. These may affect motives of cross-national attraction, initiate search for foreign policies and decisions to borrow, influence the determination of stages of policy development, and affect the actual development process and the capacity for a successful implementation of a policy in the home country (Phillips & Ochs, 2003). Particularly a countries´ or regions´ culture, as part of the policy context, and highly-interrelated with a variety of framing conditions, is of relevance but often neglected in transfer research (Bertram, 2020).
This paper presentation addresses the role of transnational policy learning in school improvement, based on the example of transferring practices of self-steered quality development to Indian educational institutions. It centers on an approach to measuring institutional quality, which, as a diagnostic tool, establishes a basis for quality development and thus as a change model (Li & Pilz, 2019) enables possible innovation processes for Indian (vocational) school management. This quality approach exemplifies the example of a possible "voluntary transfer" (Phillips & Ochs, 2003), or policy learning as a deliberate transfer process (Li & Pilz, 2019). It is developed in a German-Indian cooperation project and addresses, among other things, initial efforts by the Indian government to establish more holistic quality management processes in vocational education institutions (DGT, 2018). Based on a design-based research paradigm , the development of the quality framework involves several cycles of evaluation and revision, based on evaluation results (McKenney & Reeves, 2012).
In line with strong hierarchical structures and top-down steering, quality management as part of school development, in the sense of a self-directed, systematic, and diagnosis-based process (Mok et al., 2003), is currently not formally embedded in the Indian vocational education system and seldom established in the general education system. In existing quality assurance and management approaches, aspects of learning and teaching are neglected in general education (Alexander, 2001) as well as vocational education (Regel et al., 2022).
School development is primarily considered worldwide a social process at the level of the institution itself (Feldhoff et al., 2016). Factors that promote or restrain improvement build upon comprehensive systematic quality management procedures may be located within the individual institution´s “capacity” to engage in change and development processes (Stoll, 2009). These factors involve the organisational structure of schools, shared commitment and collaborative activity, knowledge and skills, leadership, feedback and accountability, teacher empowerment as well as exchange with the school environment (Ehren & Baxter 2020; Stoll, 2009). Thus, this paper centers on the following research questions: How can an approach primarily derived from international contexts be shaped to meet national and local stakeholders´ needs and capacities? How can policy learning be enabled with regard to school quality development and improvement in India? Which factors facilitate or restrain policy learning in school development in India?

Musculoskeletal disorders (MSDs) are the most widespread work-related health problems in the European Union, all professional sectors combined (de Kock & al., 2019). Faced with these risks, training has a role to play as an essential prerequisite for the implementation of sustainable prevention actions (Caroly & al., 2008). Unfortunately, most MSD prevention training struggles to produce satisfactory effects. They aim to ensure that professionals adopt safety techniques or "good gestures and good postures" developed to achieve maximum efficiency with minimum motor cost. But these safety techniques do not take into account the diversity and variability of work situations and they cannot always be respected (Denis & al., 2013; Denis & al., 2018).

One of the potential ways of improving this prevention training lies in training that would allow trainees to identify the characteristics of risky situations as well as the means of preventing them (Verdier, 2010). To this end, the video offers the possibility of observing and analyzing work situations to both identify the risks and to collectively discuss the resources to be deployed in the activity to prevent these risks, such as know-how prudence or efficient know-how that target joint prevention and performance objectives (Ouellet & Vezina, 2009).

However, this type of video training requires trainers to transform their activity. Indeed, for trainers who have not received training as trainers and who prescribe to their trainees a single operating procedure for each gesture, which must be precisely respected, integrating MSD prevention into their teaching requires them to appropriate new training content oriented towards risk prevention, being able to lead discussions based on videos about advantages and disadvantages of the different operating procedures for performance and prevention, and finally, being able to approach the variability of these operating procedures as a means of preventing MSD risks without neglecting performance.

As part of a process of designing videos for saddler-harnessers training that integrate musculoskeletal disorder risk prevention (Body & al., 2020; Body, 2022), our proposal aims to show how a collaborative and iterative process based on the articulation of a variety of interview techniques bringing together saddler-trainers with different levels of experience and expertise in the trade, enables these professionals to transform their representations of the etiology of MSDs, their relationship to pain at work and in training, and their activity as trainers.

In Norwegian teacher education a new reform was initiated in 2017 aiming at developing what is called “Teacher Education Schools” (The Ministry of Knowledge, 2017). Both previous experiences and methodological and epistemological arguments have long pointed in this direction (Darling-Hammiond, 2006; Eikeland, 2012a). The aim is to strengthen the quality of student teachers’ placement periods and teaching practice in schools, to stimulate cooperation on research and development, and to strengthen the professional relevance and quality of teacher education and the institutions.

A professionally relevant education can be defined as being characterized by a close coherence between content and tasks in the profession and the educational content. Such education is largely in accordance with the competence demands of the profession (Hiim, 2017; Sylte 2020). There’s a multitude of research indicating that insufficient professional relevance is a challenge in teacher education as well as in professional education in other areas. One of the reasons seems to be that collaboration between educational institutions and professional workplaces is not sufficiently developed (Canrinus et al., 2015; Heggen & Smedby, 2015; Hiim, 2013; Sylte, 2020; Young, 2004).

The regional education authorities in Oslo and Viken and a group of researchers in the Department of vocational teacher education at the OsloMet University developed an Action research project (LUSY), aimed at developing vocational teacher education schools with three vocational upper secondary schools (VET), funding from the Norwegian Research Council. The aim is to develop a binding and lasting cooperation between the schools and OsloMet to create the best possible vocational teacher education and VET. The intention is to form binding and lasting cooperative structures between VET and OsloMet University, on the education of vocational teachers through a symbiotic learning model. The focus in this paper is:

How can cooperations between a university, schools and companies help develop relevant quality criteria for Teacher Education Schools in VET through a symbiotic learning model?

The project is based on a holistic, multi-dimensional understanding of knowledge where professional knowledge have many forms. Much research on VET is based on a concept of competence that is frequently defined as a holistic set of knowledge, skills and attitudes applied to solve specific tasks (Koenen et al., 2015; White Paper 28, 2015-2016). However, the use of the concept of competence in VET is often unclear and varies (Lester & Religa, 2017). A main issue in the project is to show how professional knowledge is constituted, and how the organization of collaboration between educational institutions and fields of practice can strengthen by developing a symbiotic learning model (Eikeland, 2012a). The idea is to collaboratively develop a new infrastructure between VET and OsloMet that will facilitate continuous mutual learning and quality development for both parts. This infrastructure will gradually include relevant workplaces with vocational interns in placements connected with the schools and the department of vocational teacher education.

This involves development of an organizational and didactic learning model for cooperation between educational institutions and fields of practice. The model is based on the concept of "symbiotic learning structure" which emphasizes learning through the collective element and closer cooperation between educational institution, school and working life as a lifelong learning perspective (Eikeland, 2012a). The purpose is quality assurance of criteria for what is needed to become a Teacher Education School through the development of such a new infrastructure.

Epistemological analyses of professional knowledge based on pragmatic approaches pose the theoretical framework of the project (Eikeland, 2008; Dreyfus & Dreyfus, 1987; Schøn, 1983; Sennett, 2008). Connections between theories of professional knowledge, organizational learning, and professional didactics will be investigated (Eikeland, 2012a; Hiim, 2017; Sylte, 2020).

In 2022, Berlin`s regional teacher training institution started a voluntary course in blended learning for vocational schools. Members of Humboldt-University joined with further education multipliers for digitalization to develop this course as an educational design research project (cf. McKenney/Reeves 2018, see "Methodology"), tailored to teacher's needs and the status quo in vocational schools in Berlin, Germany. This paper will delineate the development and evaluation of this training, with a special focus on mapping the diverse types and forms of knowledge (cf. Goldkuhl 2020; Johannesson/Perjons 2014) which informed both the design and the theoretical understanding obtained from it.
The demand for such a teacher training was based on lessons learned during the COVID19 pandemic's lockdowns and emergency remote teaching (cf. Hodges et al. 2020). Evidently, online learning environments and digital media allow for new educational settings with the potential to increase and innovate learning effects (cf. Müller/Mildenberger 2021). However, technologies and the respective legislatures are developing at a rapid pace (e.g. the European Data Protection Regulation, https://gdpr.eu/), so teachers on-the-job need further training to acquire "an increasingly broad and more sophisticated set of competences" (cf. the European DigiCompEdu framework, Redecker 2017, p. iv). Also, current generations of learners use media in very different ways and for very different objectives than their teachers do (cf. Khan/Vuopala 2019; Feierabend et al. 2017), calling for a reflection and redefinition of media competences for both groups. Focusing on vocational education, "new work" increasingly relies on digital media and specific vocational competences (cf. Rafiola et al. 2020), which cannot be expected to be covered by current curricula yet.

At the same time, a number of challenges considering online learning have been discovered. It has been evident throughout the COVID19 pandemic that on-site teaching still has substantial advantages over online teaching. Particularly, schools serve custodial and social functions: They offer students a range of possibilities to meet with and emotionally grow among peers in complex social situations. Also, schools supervise learners on behalf of parents and other custodians. This "baby sitter" function, as Wall (1978) put it cynically, is a socioeconomic prerequisite for most families to partake in work life (as experienced by many in a very stressful way during COVID19 lockdowns). Goudeau et al. (2021) summarize how school closures and remote teaching with predominantly digital resources exacerbated social class disparities in three ways: the digital divide (learners` unequal access to digital resources, tools and skills), the cultural divide (unequal familiarity with academic knowledge and skills; unequal dispositions for autonomy and self-regulation), and the structural divide (unequal support of learners from schools). In addition, concerning vocational education with its many lab and workshop settings, hands-on and on-site learning are still understood to be indispensable for the development of practical work skills, which in turn have an effect on students' employability.
In consequence, it is not "pure" online learning but deliberate "blended learning" which is of considerable importance for vocational schools, teachers and learners. "Blended learning" can be defined as "a formal education program in which a student learns at least in part through online delivery of content and instruction with some element of student control over time, place, path, and/or pace and at least in part at a supervised brick-and-mortar location away from home." (Staker/Horn 2012, p. 3) Teachers who want to develop blended learning programs then need some specific competences, which both include and exceed the respective competences for online and on-site elements of their programs. The design research project "Blending 4 Futures" aimed at identifying such competences while developing a suitable teacher training course, as shown in the "Findings" section.

Teacher education standards emphasise that teachers should be aware of cultural and gender influences and should value diversity in the classroom. Above all, teacher shall "implement teaching strategies that are responsive to the particular needs of students from diverse … backgrounds" (Australien Institute, o. D., p. 1, KMK, 2019). At the same time, qualitative studies suggest that such pedagogical norms are already rejected by preservice teachers during their first extended teaching experiences (Liegmann & Racherbäumer, 2019).

Regarding classroom management as an important basic dimension of teaching quality (Praetorius et al., 2020), ethnically diverse classes, and – in terms of gender – male-dominated classes are considered challenging or even difficult teaching contexts (Downey & Pribesh, 2004; Schönbächler et al., 2011; Sloane, 2014). This is noteworthy as students with a migrant background particularly benefit from effective classroom management (Seiz et al, 2016).

Therefore, classroom management, which is considered to include preventive, proactive and reactive practices to be effective, is increasingly examined in a context-oriented manner in research on teaching quality (Fauth et al., 2020; Göllner et al., 2020; Helmke & Helmke, 2014; Praetorius et al., 2016).

While for primary schools and lower upper secondary school education, at least some empirical results for the relevance of context- and class-composition factors for the demands of classroom management are available, classroom management at vocational schools has rarely been studied with systematic consideration of the heterogeneous contextual conditions.

This is a relevant research desideratum since it is likely that class contexts are significant sources of variation for the efficiency of classroom management in German vocational schools, which include a variety of school types and educational programs (Pahl, 2014).

Hence, this presentation highlights two main research questions:
1. How relevant are class-composition factors (gender; proportion of students from migrant families) and the divergent educational programmes within vocational schools for classroom management and its efficacy? We expect to find empirical evidence to support the hypothesis that male dominated classes, classes with high proportions of migrants, and classes of vocational education programmes which do not provide a full vocational qualification are difficult to manage.

2. How important are preventive, proactive and reactive classroom management practices – in comparison with the context and composition factors – for the effectiveness of classroom management?

It is in the responsibility of vocational education and training (VET) to prepare students with adequate competencies and skills for their professional life. One new possibility of this preparation in VET that is becoming more and more widespread is the use of learning factories. A learning factory is understood as “a learning environment specified by processes that are authentic, include multiple stations, and comprise technical as well as organizational aspects” (Abele, 2019, p. 1027). Thus, learning factories simulate real production factories within the school environment in a modular and smaller dimension. Hence vocational students gather insights in real production processes early in their education and training. This meets the important demand for a closer link and easier transition between school and work (Bonnes & Hochholdinger, 2020). As learning factories facilitate parts of workspace simulations (Jossberger et al., 2018) and digital settings (Meinokat & Wagner, 2022) many components foster successful learning. Having excellent classroom management is essential to make professional, emotional and social learning possible (Evertson & Weinstein, 2006). To not waste precious learning time (Scherzinger & Wettstein, 2019) and as the most crucial factor regarding teachers’ health issues (Gonzalez et al., 2015; Kokkinos, 2007), dealing with classroom disruptions as part of the classroom management should be looked at in detail. For the setting of learning factories, research is alarmingly lacking (Abele et al., 2015; Scheid, 2018). In order to collect useful information about teaching in learning factories and thus, improve and disseminate international VET with learning factories, the following research questions arose:

• RQ1: What types of classroom disruptions occur in learning factories?
• RQ2: What preventive and interventive measures do teachers use to deal with classroom disruptions in learning factories?
• RQ3: Which key classroom management factors influence a low level of classroom disruptions in learning factories?

Vocational education and training (VET) have been suffering from a shortage of teachers in many countries (Kalisch & Kaiser 2019; OECD 2021). The question arises how the qualification to become a VET teacher and the working conditions as well as work attractiveness of VET teachers can be improved.

A lot is known about the curricula and standards of VET teacher education and the different ways to become VET teacher in Europe (Hoppe & Kaiser 2021; Misra 2011) but we still have a lack of knowledge about the current working conditions of VET teachers and their needs for competencies.

To close this lack a reseach team form two German Universities with scientific backgrounds in work psychology and in Vocational education set up a study to analyse teachers at their workplaces in Mecklenburg-Western Pommerania in Germany in 2021 and 2022.

The aim of the analysis is to derive redesign proposals for working conditions and qualification opportunities for VET teachers. This contribution will report on the procedure, the theoretical background and the results of the work analysis.

Apprenticeships have emerged as a major European policy model. Based on the resurgence of global interest in TVET and the economic success of German-speaking countries in Europe, apprenticeships – particularly dual models of TVET (dVET) – have been positioned as a route to improved productivity, economic growth, social inclusion, and more. The European Union (EU) has become one of the most active proponents of apprenticeships and dVET (Martínez-Izquierdo and Torres Sánchez, 2022), promoting policy adoption and harmonisation across Member States, but also globally via its collaboration with international organisations such as the OECD and ILO (OECD, 2014), and via bilateral cooperation agencies such as the German Agency for International Cooperation (GIZ). GIZ has been particularly active in driving dVET adoption in the Global South, including in Mexico, which launched the Modelo Mexicano de Formación Dual (MMFD - Mexican Model of Dual Training) in 2013.

Despite this concentration of activity around dual apprenticeship policy promotion, evidence about how such programmes function outside of ‘donor’ contexts (particularly Germany, Austria, and Switzerland) is limited. Previous research has focused on the question of how/in what way to use dVET as a model for policy borrowing (Gonon, 2014) or assessing the barriers and successes of implementation from an institutional perspective (Valiente and Scandurra, 2017). By contrast, this paper explores the research question how does policy transfer of dVET impact young policy participants? Using the MMFD as a case study, the paper explores the motivations, aspirations, and goals of dual students in Mexico, as well as the strategies they employ to achieve those ends and navigate their dVET experiences. Longitudinal study supports examination of the evolution and adjustment of young people’s perspectives over time and captures the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic and ensuing economic crisis on post-dVET youth transitions.

The paper takes a particular interest in how and why different young people end up on pathways that diverge from each other and their own initial expectations. The negotiation of decision-making processes is examined as a highly contextualised phenomenon, mediated by young people’s differing identities, beliefs, agencies, and access to resources. An emphasis on TVET as a means of pursuing social justice and holistic personal and human development is used to challenge the dominance of human capital and productivist discourses in this field and instead highlight the importance of young people’s agency and life projects contextualised within diverse and overlapping structural constraints.

As a result, the study is able to shed light on how inequalities of different kinds interact with and are impacted by dVET programmes operating outside of ‘donor’ contexts. These findings have important relevance for European and TVET actors interested in the implementation and transfer of (dual) apprenticeship programmes in new contexts, particularly as they are firmly centred on the views and experiences of young people who have previously been underrepresented in dVET transfer research. Greater awareness of how dVET programmes interact with socio-cultural and economic contexts that do not share a historical path dependency with dual institutional structures can inform more effective and equitable dVET policy-making and, indeed, invite critical reflection on the suitability of dVET programmes for diverse non-donor contexts in Europe and globally.

The training and continuing education of their own employees has a long tradition in German family companies. Today, family businesses provide more than 60 percent of all jobs in Germany, 80 percent of training positions (Langenscheidt & May 2020, p. 12) and more than 70 percent of family businesses are active in the area of continuing education (Stiftung Familienunternehmen, 2022b). The interest in training and continuing education will not weaken in the future, but rather continue to strengthen: For 95 percent of next-generation family entrepreneurs (NextGens), employee training and development is a top priority (PwC, 2020).

Due to the great importance of family businesses for Germany as a business location, we will focus below on this particular form of enterprise. To distinguish between family businesses and non-family businesses, we use the definition of the European Commission (European Commission, 2009). Due to their economic importance, family businesses shape the image of the German economy abroad. By way of illustration, the five largest German family businesses are (1) Volkswagen AG, (2) Robert Bosch GmbH, (3) Schwarz Gruppe (Lidl, Kaufland), (4) Fresenius Gruppe and (5) Continental AG (Die Deutsche Wirtschaft, 2022).

The involvement of German companies abroad has already been the subject of several studies in order to capture the phenomenon of the transfer of vocational training at the meso level in the corporate context. For example, studies are available from the United States (Gessler, 2017), South Africa (Peters, 2019), and China, Mexico, and India (Pilz & Wiemann, 2021). The generally existing training engagement of German companies abroad is furthermore of interest, because although the engagement is local, it can have the potential of a systemic effect at regional and national level (Wiemann & Fuchs, 2018).

It is striking that there are no studies on the training activities of German companies in Central and Eastern Europe, even though these countries are of great economic importance for Germany (DeStatis, 2022): Poland, for example, follows directly behind the USA in terms of imports with rank 4 and exports to the Czech Republic (rank 11) are higher than exports to, for example, Korea (rank 18), Japan (rank 20), Mexico (rank 22), India (rank 23) and South Africa (rank 31).

Our research questions are: To what extent are German family companies already involved in in-company training at their branches in Central and Eastern Europe? What obstacles do these companies face on the ground and what prospects do they see for their further involvement in training?

Our study shows what contribution major German family businesses are already making to dual training and continuing vocational training in selected countries in Central and Eastern Europe (CEE) and what opportunities as well as obstacles and resulting need for action exist to improve training and continuing vocational training locally. The study focuses on countries that are of great importance to the German export industry: Poland, the Czech Republic, Hungary, Romania, Slovakia, Bulgaria and Serbia. A particular focus is on industrial-technical training occupations.

Education pays off. Many international studies show that more education also means better labour market opportunities (e.g. Psacharopoulos and Patrinos, 2004). However, some findings suggest that, given the same level of education, it also depends on which education is invested in (Birkelund et al., 2021). This is particularly relevant for Germany, where the educational system is an “archetype” (Schindler, 2017) of a strongly stratified system (as well as Austria and Czechia) and the assignment to different educational tracks is conducted at an early age. In order to correct school type decisions once they have been made, there is a wide range of ‘alternative pathways’ at upper secondary level. Catching up on school certificates, mainly higher education entrance qualifications (HEEQ), is particularly possible at vocationally oriented schools (Schuchart, 2013). On average, pupils in these school types perform worse compared to similar pupils from general schools (Trautwein, 2007). Nevertheless, alternative pathways typically provide vocational knowledge in a certain field (e.g. ‘Health’ or ‘Economy’), although they do not award vocational degrees. For instance, a lower secondary level graduate with an intermediate certificate (IC) can catch up on a HEEQ at upper secondary level and meanwhile obtain some basic knowledge in a vocational field.

Our general research question is connected to labour market opportunities that arise with these qualifications: Does the attainment of school-leaving certificates via vocational schools lead to similar opportunities as their acquisition in the general school system? Recent research has shown that general education pathways to school-leaving certificates seem to lead to higher labour market returns than alternative pathways (Heckman et al., 2006; Schuchart and Schimke, 2019). However, this research has at least two weaknesses: First, it is unclear whether these findings are due to self-selection or selection by employers. To address this point, we focus on the demand side of labour and analyse potential selection. We are interested in hiring processes at entry level positions on the labour market. Although, we focus on Germany the results are at least transferable to countries with dual vocational training systems (e.g. Austria, Denmark and Switzerland), where employers decide on who to hire for apprenticeships (Poulsen and Eberhardt, 2016).

Second, previous research has not explicitly taken into account the significance of acquiring basic professional knowledge with the attainment of a school-leaving certificate. Since a general school-leaving certificate is also acquired at vocationally oriented schools, graduates are free to apply for vocational training programs that are within the scope of the basic vocational knowledge they have already attained or not. In the former case, this could mean a great advantage also over graduates with the same school-leaving certificate but from general education schools, in the latter this would not be the case. To develop more precise assumptions, we draw on screening (Arrow, 1973; Stiglitz, 1975) and queuing theory (Thurow, 1975). According to these theories, different paths to the same educational degree could be associated with differing signalling effects. Hiring is always an uncertain investment and therefore employers are most likely to decide for applicants who are expected to have the lowest training costs. Based on these arguments, we derive the following hypotheses:

H₁: Graduates with a HEEQ from vocationally oriented schools who obtain basic knowledge in a similar vocational field to the training occupation are more likely to be invited to vocational training interviews than general school graduates with the same school-leaving certificates.

H₂: General school graduates with a HEEQ are more likely to be invited to vocational training interviews than graduates from vocationally oriented schools with the same school-leaving certificate but without specific vocational knowledge.

The presentation is based on (a selection of) the results of a doctoral research study that explored the professional development and learning of teachers working in Hungarian VET schools and the related individual and organisational factors (Bükki, 2022). The importance of teacher continuous professional development is confirmed by research that showed an important link between student achievement and the quality of teaching (Barber & Mourshed, 2007, Scheerens, 2010, Chetty et al, 2014). While there is a rich literature on this topic regarding teachers working in general education, we still know relatively little about those who work in vocational education and training (VET, Orr, 2019, Broad, 2019), and there was particularly little previous research on this topic in Hungary.

The doctoral research studied teacher professional development as participation in professional learning activities (PLAs). The theoretical framework was built on situational learning theory (Lave & Wenger, 1991, Wenger, 1998) and Billett’s (2002) “synthesising” interpretation, which defined workplace learning as participation in any activity that is work-related and potentially leads to cognitive and/or behavioural change, regardless of its form (formal, non-formal or informal). The categorisation of PLAs and the selection of individual and organisational factors to be studied were based on the literature of workplace learning in general (Tynjälä, 2008, 2013, Fuller & Unwin, 2004) and of (informal) teacher learning in particular (Kwakman, 2003; Hoekstra et al., 2007, 2009a, 2009b; Meirink et al., 2007, 2009a, 2009b; Kyndt et al., 2016, Opfer et al., 2010, 2011, Louws et al., 2017). This framework was supplemented by incorporating the special, unique features of vocational teachers’ professional development and learning identified in prior research. Most importantly, it built on the concept of dual identity and dual professionalism. In many countries, vocational teachers typically come from the industry but even after they start teaching, they often retain and value their original vocational identity as it provides them with the expertise and credibility needed to teach and socialise students into professional norms and practices (Robson, 1998), and this also shapes their understanding and practice of professional development (Orr, 2019). Furthermore, studies suggest that only continuous boundary crossing between the communities of practice of VET and of the vocation taught can guarantee vocational teachers’ up-to-date professional knowledge and the appropriate quality of vocational pedagogical practice (Broad, 2019, Andersson & Köpsén, 2015, 2019). However, it is not easy to maintain this dual identity and practice dual professionalism, and, depending on local policy measures as well as organisational conditions, maintaining industrial currency or developing pedagogical-methodological competences may be prioritised by VET teachers themselves or primarily expected and supported by their school or the state (Robson, 1998, Fejes & Köpsén, 2014, Broad, 2016, Schmidt, 2019, Tyler & Dymock, 2019).

The doctoral research study aimed to explore the practice and views of Hungarian VET teachers’ professional development and learning and the related unique, VET-specific individual and organisational factors, trying also to find the similarities and differences compared to findings of previous research conducted in other countries, in often very different national contexts. The current presentation is based on an analysis that aims to answer the following three research questions:

Q1: What types of professional learning activities (PLAs) do vocational teachers and trainers working in Hungarian VET schools participate in and which PLAs do they value most? Are participation and value-beliefs influenced by the length of vocational work and of teaching experience?

Q2: How do they understand the concept of teacher continuous professional development and does this reflect dual identities?

Q3: What do they perceive as the most significant barriers to their professional development?

In this study, we explore the topic: How can teacher specialists in Building and Construction strengthen their role as teacher specialists at their school through an experience-based master's degree?

Teacher specialist for vocational education is a position that has been tested for five years in Norwegian schools, and the scheme has drawn inspiration and knowledge from several other countries that have similar functions in their schools. In parallel with the piloting of the function, an experience-based master's degree for teacher specialists has also been offered. This education has been structured around three thematic pillars: vocational subjects, vocational didactics, and school development/organizational development. The education has been developed and carried out by an interdisciplinary team at the university.

The teacher specialists contribute to school development at their school and within their subject discipline. By being professionally updated on theory, research and new teaching methods, the intention is that they should be able to function as a local resource that builds a bridge between theory and practice, and between the management and other teachers at the school (Kringstad & Lønnum, 2021).

Research on school development often addresses questions related to knowledge, relations, and leadership/management for new teacher roles (Helstad & Mausethagen, 2019). Our analysis is based on these three dimensions as a theoretical framework.

The knowledge dimension is characterized by several factors. Lortie (1975) demonstrated that teachers continuously alternate between experience-based knowledge and theoretical and pedagogical knowledge. Traditionally, teachers have freedom to make their own choices of didactic and methodological approaches, and teachers often feel that their knowledge development is their own responsibility (Hopmann, 2015). The profession has been characterized by an egalitarian culture where all teachers have the same responsibility. However, teachers today experience an expectation of the use of evidence-based knowledge and that test results should be a basis for their teaching (Coburn & Talbert, 2006). This can lead to needs for new and more specialized roles.

The dimension of relations is mainly about how interaction develops in different contexts in the school, such as in classrooms and laboratories, amongst the teachers and in the entire school organisation. The principal has overall responsibility for the relationships at the school, but all teachers must contribute to develop the relationships with students and colleagues (Møller & Ottesen, 2011). It is important to focus on developing relationships to succeed with school development.

The dimension of leadership/management in school development includes giving directions, creating visions, and establishing relationships that support the work (Leithwood & Louis, 2012). Irgens (2013) claims that leadership is created in relations, when mutual trust characterizes the interaction between people, and we experience that others can be trusted. In this perspective, we see that power, trust and relationships are closely linked in the community. Accountability is also important in this dimension, where quality systems and indicators to promote students’ learning are developed (Helstad & Mausethagen, 2019). Traditionally, management has been linked to the principal as an individual. However, this is now regarded as a matter where more of the staff participate, with or without formal leadership positions. To succeed with school development, leaders must create conditions for professional learning communities where as many as possible contribute (Hargreaves & O’Connor, 2018; MacBeath et.al, 2018). They do not always succeed in this (Morud & Rokkones, 2020). The term distributed leadership is well established and refers to a practice where leadership is created and executed by people together (Spillane, 2006).

Based on these three dimensions, we have analysed our data material with the aim of identifying how the education has contributed to the teacher specialists' development and role performance.

The research field on Tertiary Vocational Education is limited in Norway and in Europe. This paper is part of the efforts that the Oslo Metropolitan University has set in place to accommodate the intentions of the Norwegian Ministry of Education and Research as presented in the strategy for Further and enhanced quality – strategy for tertiary vocational education. (Ministry of Education and Research, 2021).

Tertiary vocational Education (TVE) has a relatively weak position in the Norwegian education system (Høst & Tømte, 2016). As the only level in the education system, there is currently no national pedagogical competence requirements for TVE teachers by law. One assumption could be that the weak position in the education system has led to less attention to TVE teachers’ competence needs. It is up to each TVE institution to set their own qualification requirements for teachers. The only requirement thus far is that TVE must employ teachers with sufficient professional competence within their own specialty field to ensure high quality teaching.

This stands in contrast to all other levels of education which by law requires a minimum of 60 ETCS in formal pedagogical qualifications. Also Universities require by law a course in pedagogy adapted to higher education (Wittek, 2017). This study further builds on data from Statistics Norway (2019) and a report by OsloMet (Lyckander & Grande, 2018), 30% of teachers employed in TVE have no formal pedagogical qualifications.

In 2019 OsloMet developed a further education programme worth 30 + 30 ECTS: Practical Pedagogic for Teachers in TVE 1 and 2 (PPF1 and PPF2). The programme stands out in Norway as it represents a pioneering and exclusive national endeavour, with its curriculum placing significant emphasis on adult education (Knowles 2016, Illeris 2012, Wahlgren 2010), professional practice, methodologies for lifelong learning, and the recognition of prior learning (RPL) (Andersson & Fejes 2005, 2010). In line with the white paper titled "Skilled Workers for the Future — Vocational College Education" (2016–2017), the objective of PPF1 and PPF2 is to enhance the qualifications of TVE teachers. The study programme seeks to contribute to an enhanced comprehension of dual professional practice and strengthen collaboration with the industry, as mandated by the Vocational Education Act (Fagskoleloven, 2022).

The PPF study programme has been specifically designed for educators employed in both public and private TVE institutions. This inclusive approach aims to encompass all stakeholders involved in delivering professional excellence at the tertiary education level.

We aim to find out and better understand the changes that take place by attending the study PPF1, in motivation and self-perception (Ryan & Deci, 2000) (Skaalvik et al., 2021), of own competence needs as well as understanding of the dual professional role that is necessary in the TVE in Norway.

The Research questions are.

• What motivates TVE-teachers to enrol in the study PPF1 and perceived competence-needs.
• What changes take place in the participants' self-perception as TVE-teachers.
• How do they describe themselves as TVE-teachers?

The data was collected in two surveys conducted within a time space of 8 months apart and has been analysed.

The study is based on thirty-three respondents, twenty-one men and twelve women. The average age is 44 years, and no one has formal practical teaching skills from the past. Most of the respondents have been working as teachers in TVE less than 2 years.

All networks hold a meeting during ECER. All interested are welcome.

Question: Exceptionalism vs. structural typologies

If we look at comparative statistics, Luxembourg very often has an exceptional position (and might be treated as a spike, not to distort estimations), so the question of exceptionalism is very plausible. In the literature we find the discourse about American Exceptionalism, indicating a specific history and structure of education. The author was also tempted to coin the term ‘Austrian Exceptionalism’, because the Austrian educational structure shows very outstanding traits. The (temporary) Finnish PISA-Miracle has also plausibly tempted some authors to speak about exceptionalism in the Nordic region. Another line of reasoning and analysis has emphasized the differences and variability of at first sight similar ‘types’ of countries or systems, e.g., the comparison of collective skills systems, or the debates about the Nordic model, or comparisons of nations within the U.K.

The alternative to exceptionalism can be seen in types of structures. The creation of structures of course always needs a kind of balance between conceptual reduction and empirical representation; however, the impression is that this balance is often distorted by a strong focus on the conceptual reduction to the disadvantage of the empirical representations. This issue, of how to give more emphasis on the side of the empirical representations, is a main question behind this proposal.

Conceptual considerations: types of systems vs. idiosyncratic patchwork-assemblage

More systematic attempts to find comprehensive structures of lifelong learning, however, have failed to find some. Structures of lifelong learning are defined as structural combinations of the different parts and stages of education institutions from early to adult learning, including general and vocational education. Education research has mostly focused on certain stages, so we can speak of mirroring institutional segmentations in research. Thus we are familiar with structural categories at the different stages (e.g., institutional vs. family early education; comprehensive or tracked secondary education; more vocational or more general post-compulsory education; different structures of higher education; institutional structures of adult education are less analysed so far), however, not much attempts have been made so far to combine these structural categories at the different stages to comprehensive patterns (despite some ideas about that are quite common, and can to some extent be misleading, e.g., the combination of tracked secondary education and broad vocational education).

Skills formation as a comprehensive process of lifelong learning is carried by individual trajectories through the overall education structure, with the different parts of the structure concurring in certain patterns as a result of complex incremental historical processes, generated by various practices of the various actors – thus the overall education structures cannot be understood as designed systems, but rather as idiosyncratic conglomerates of various elements, linked by various kinds of interfaces driven by distributed practices. Main elements are the different kinds of institutions at the different stages of the overall structure, from the elementary (pre-primary) stage to the third cycle of higher education. Each stage can take different shapes (more uniform, or more diverse) and the interrelations between these elements can also be shaped differently, with different trajectories between similar institutions as well as similar trajectories between differing institutions.

The most variety exists in VET, and the main point of our perspective is that VET must not be understood as a separate alternative, but as a de facto integral element of the overall structure of skills formation which, however, can play its role in quite different ways.

Initial Vocational Education and Training (IVET) in Portugal is constituted by several training modalities (apprenticeship courses, professional courses, education and training courses), all school-based vocational education. IVET courses are directed to young people and, except for the education and training courses (CEF) that have wide-ranging pathways, give access to an upper secondary education diploma (grade 12) and to a level 4 EQF vocational certificate.

In Portugal, as well as in other countries, IVET is considered to be a second-class education (Martins et al., 2008). The low participation of IVET graduates in Portuguese higher education (HE) contributes to the stigma of IVET and is linked to the social image that IVET curricula are very easy and that trainees are 'dummies' (Doroftei, 2020).

The main form of access to HE in Portugal is through the National Access Contest, which is open to people who have completed upper secondary education (12th grade). The application is based on national access exams, which means that the content of each access exam is the same throughout the country. The national access exams are based on the content of the general education curriculum.

There are other forms of access to HE, all of them with several constraints, like, for example, the “Access Contest for older than 23 years old”. In 2020, the Portuguese government ratified a new procedure for accessing to HE, specifically aimed at IVET graduates (PCM, 2020). However, this special contest depends on whether or not higher education institutions (HEI) are willing to open up places for it. What has happened is that the universities are refusing to take part in this special access contest, and the polytechnics are, as usual, more available to receive IVET graduates (Amorim, 2022a, 2022b; Silva, 2021). The law defines the fields of education and training of IVET courses corresponding to the fields of education and training of HE degrees for which IVET graduates can apply (CNAES, 2021). This means that an IVET graduate from another field of education and training cannot gain access to the desired degree through this special access contest. He/she will have to take the national entrance exams required for that degree (programme and IES). This situation may discourage IVET graduates from pursuing HE.

Having an HE diploma may enable upward social mobility. Access to HE is key as IVET students come mainly from families with low socioeconomic status (SES) (Alves et al., 2001; Doroftei, 2020). Furthermore, the Portuguese government aims to have at least 50% of upper secondary students attending IVET, and 60% of young people aged 20 attending HE (RP, 2019). Therefore, in order to make IVET attractive and to meet the Government’s goals, it must enable young people to pursue HE.

Access to HE is also crucial for changing the social image of IVET, for as Te Riele and Crump (2002, p. 258) state, “to bring VET in from the margins, and achieve parity of esteem with general courses, it must offer at least similar rewards, in terms of access to tertiary education (…)”.

The aim of this paper is to present the reasons that young people attending the final year of IVET evoke regarding their motivations to continue their studies, or not, in HE, and to discuss the results in the light of IVET’s social representations.

As part of the UK government’s ‘levelling up’ agenda, there is currently huge appetite amongst policy makers to give Further Education (FE) a central role in addressing the regional divides that characterise the UK. UK FE colleges tend to recruit very locally and are often best equipped to deal with local skills shortages within particular regions, whereas higher education graduates are often more geographically mobile (resulting in a ‘brain drain’ from certain regions).

Our presentation will outline research conducted in collaboration with the UK’s Social Mobility Commission focussed on exploring the outcomes of the different educational paths followed by young people aged 16, and how these further vary according to social background and geography. It sought to answer questions such as, do those from more advantaged backgrounds see high returns regardless of their post-16 educational choices? How are the higher gains of some educational pathways (like attending an elite HEI) distributed according to class, gender and ethnicity? How does geography play into monetary returns, especially given the more localised employment trajectories of FE colleges? Are high returns from certain FE courses dependent on geography (and so on the strength of local and regional economies)?

Unlike graduate returns of which there has been considerable study (e.g. Hussain et al., 2009; Tomlinson, 2012; Naylor et al., 2016) there are few studies that have considered the returns of FE study. Moreover, the limited research to date (e.g. Buscha and Urwin, 2013; Bibby et al., 2014; Urwin and Cerqua, 2017) has tended to focus on comparing outcomes for individuals that complete FE programmes with those that drop out. This research sought to take a more comprehensive, real-world approach by exploring how the choice of different educational pathways (e.g. FE vs HE) by otherwise similar individuals (in terms of attainment and individual characteristics) impacts their later earnings. Moreover, the project’s foregrounding of geography enabled important consideration of how location further influences the typical returns gained from certain pathways.

This research makes an important contribution to knowledge of the outcomes of FE study in the UK, highlighting ways in which FE could better help address the UK’s regional divides, as well as offering potentially important insights into the increased role FE could play within other countries with large regional disparities in employment opportunities like Italy and Belgium (OECD, 2016). The research further challenges the sometimes-negative preconceptions about career prospects following FE study in the UK. Indeed, unlike countries like Germany where vocational pathways often command respect (Greinert and Fraser, 2007), the UK’s highly stratified post-16 education system often privileges HE and especially elite HE study over FE. As the theme of ECER 2023 suggests however, diversity in education is key. Whilst our findings support previous research (e.g. Wakeling and Savage, 2015) that study at an elite HEI typically leads to the highest returns, we also show how a diverse range of educational pathways can bring success and highlight less commonly privileged routes to social mobility.

This double symposium explores the important role that vocational colleges and similar types of institutions play in supporting social, educational, and cultural development in their local communities and regions. We argue that the role colleges play is not as well understood or theorised as is the role of universities and schools, and that this matters because colleges are vital for the well-being of their local communities. They support their regions and communities in many ways that are not prominent beyond immediate participants. However, the ways in which they do so differs in different countries and this symposium includes diverse contributions from very different systems.

The domain of this symposium is the second vocationally oriented tier of post school education. This tier may offer other programs, but its key mission includes offering short-cycle tertiary education of about two years’ duration with a vocational / professional orientation, classified in the International Standard Classification of Education ISCED 2011 as category 55 short-cycle tertiary vocational education (UNESCO Institute for Statistics, 2012, pp. 48-50).

The roles of schools and universities are generally understood and institutionalized as broadly intellectual and cultural that are well established historically and globally. In contrast, vocational colleges are ‘mainly local organizations justified by specific economic and political functions or shaped by particular historical legacies or power struggles’ (Meyer, Ramirez, Frank, and Schofer, 2007, pp. 187, 210).

Colleges are under theorized, which leaves them vulnerable to vicissitudes of marketisation and privatization (Meier, 2013), and undermines the institutional conditions that support them. They are justified mostly by their preparation for work, and gaps in the correspondence between vocational education and work are almost always considered only a supply-side issue for colleges, rather than being co-constituted by education and work (Livingstone, 2009, p. 150). Colleges are therefore thought not to respond sufficiently to the labour market, and to need disciplining by competing with for-profit providers.

This thinking is particularly prevalent in the liberal market economies of Australia, Canada, England, the USA, and others. But it is also projected onto low and middle income countries by intergovernmental and non government organisations.

This double symposium seeks to investigate, compare and analyse colleges’ diverse social roles in different countries, explore commonalities in colleges’ social roles, and invite perspectives from participants in the symposium. Part 1 will comprise 3 presentations, and part 2 will comprise 3 presentations and a discussant.

This paper is situated within two broad theoretical traditions: new institutionalism, and the human development and capability approach. It adopts from sociological institutionalism and historical institutionalism the insight that institutions are the basic building blocks of society. It argues that institutions are modes of social organisation and resources that are shaped by rules, norms and discourses that are generally adopted by society. These social institutions both enable and constrain agency by providing parameters for action which may also build path dependencies by defining choices. The paper adopts Sen’s (1999, p. 123) position that ‘Individuals live and operate in a world of institutions, many of which operate across borders. Our opportunities and prospects depend crucially on what institutions exist and how they function. Not only do institutions contribute to our freedoms, their roles can be sensibly evaluated in the light of their contributions to our freedoms.’ Colleges have not been institutionalised in this way. The ‘mission’ of colleges is ambiguous. In Aotearoa New Zealand, Australia, Canada, South Africa and elsewhere it has been shaped by a colonial legacy. Colleges’ role is cast as residual, doing what universities and schools don’t do. Colleges’ roles are less well understood. They have less autonomy and less power. The sector is ‘acted upon’, rather than considered an actor in its own right. The paper argues for a re-imagination of college education from narrow preparation for specific jobs, tasks and roles to preparation for broad occupations. It proposes an expansive view of the purposes of college education from human capital to human capabilities (Sen, 2007, p. 99). The paper argues for colleges to develop students’ capability for education, capability for work, and capability for voice (Schröer, 2015). The paper elaborates these purposes of vocational education (Reay, 2012; McGrath & Deneulin, 2021) which it argues are shared with different emphases with universities (Moodie, Wheelahan & Lavigne, 2019). It considers the nature of colleges and of college teachers needed to fulfil an expansive mission. This leaves us with 5 key research questions: 1. What should college qualifications look like? 2. What can colleges do that universities and schools can’t do? 3. What roles do colleges play in supporting local & regional economic, social and cultural development? 4. How will the work of occupations served by colleges change in 5, 10 and 15 years time? How should qualifications change? 5. How can we support college teachers as ‘dual-professionals’ – industry experts and expert teachers?

McGrath, S., & Deneulin, S. (2021). Education for just transitions: Lifelong learning and the 30th anniversary Human Development Report. International Review of Education, 67(5), 637-658. Moodie, G., Wheelahan, L., & Lavigne, E. (2019). Technical and Vocational Education and Training as a framework for social justice: Analysis and evidence from world case studies. Retrieved from Brussels: https://issuu.com/educationinternational/docs/2019_eiresearch_tvet Reay, D. (2012). What would a socially just education system look like? Saving the minnows from the pike. Journal of Education Policy, 27(5), 587-599. doi:10.1080/02680939.2012.710015 Schröer, R. (2015). Employability versus capability: European strategies for young people. In H.-U. Otto, R. Atzmüller, T. Berthet, L. Bifulco, J.-M. Bonvin, E. Chiappero-Martinetti, V. Egdell, B. Halleröd, C. Christrup Kjeldsen, M. Kwiek, R. Schröer, J. Vero, & M. Zieleńska (Eds.), Facing trajectories from school to work: Towards a capability-friendly youth policy in Europe (pp. 361-385). Springer. Sen, A. (1999). Development as freedom. Anchor Books. Sen, A. (2007). Education and standards of living. In R. Curren (Ed.), Philosophy of education: An anthology (pp. 95-101). Blackwell Publishing. Wheelahan, L., & Moodie, G. (2016). Global trends in TVET: A framework for social justice. Education International. Retrieved from Brussels: http://download.ei-ie.org/Docs/WebDepot/GlobalTrendsinTVET.pdf

As publicly funded multipurpose post-school institutions serving local and regional populations, further education colleges in England have important, if under-recognised, educational, social and economic roles. Colleges sit between secondary schools, universities and training providers. They provide academic, vocational, general and higher education as well as workforce training. Qualifications span the basic, intermediate and higher levels. Students are diverse in age and background. They include a disproportionate share of disadvantaged and second chance students. Further education colleges do not enjoy the status generally accorded to schools and universities. In part, this is a legacy of their history as technical colleges predominantly concerned with vocational education for industrial workers and employers. A shift to more diverse missions, together with their independence from local government, brought colleges into competition with better known institutions and more prestigious establishments, but also with other colleges. Issues of organisational identity, funding and status are acute, as highlighted by a wave of mergers and closures. Monitoring of colleges is against a narrow range of performance measures. Studies of the character and wider benefits of college learning are few. In this paper, concepts of boundary marking and boundary management are used to analyse the transition of colleges in England from technical and vocational institutions to general further education establishments. A relationship between boundary conditions and organisational identities is posited. Although further education was loosely defined in legislation, the division of labour between colleges, schools and universities in the 1950s and 1960s was uncomplicated. Where technical colleges were locations for part-time education and training geared to employment, grammar schools were places of general education leading to academic qualifications, and (for the few) universities were providers of undergraduate and postgraduate education. By contrast, the open and overlapping boundaries of modern-day general further education colleges are zones of competition with schools, universities and training organisations. The features and changes making for this transition are reviewed. Their implications for the social and community roles of colleges are examined. Issues in researching and evidencing the impacts of colleges are highlighted. Recent attempts by governments to recover a vocational mission or technical route for colleges are appraised, including their potential for inclusion and diversion.

Aldrich, R. (Ed.). (2002). A Century of Education. RoutledgeFalmer. Cantor, L. M. & Roberts, I. F. (1972) Further Education in England and Wales. Routledge and Kegan Paul. Cantor, L. M. & Roberts, I. E. (1983). Further Education Today. A Critical Review. Routledge and Kegan Paul. Cotgrove, S. F. (1958). Technical Education and Social Change. George Allen & Unwin. Dent, H. C. (1961). The Educational System of England and Wales. University of London Press. Gallacher, J. & Reeve, F. (Eds.). (2019). New Frontiers for College Education. Routledge. Garrod, N. & Macfarlane, B. (2009). Challenging Boundaries. Managing the Integration of Post-Secondary Education. Routledge. Green, A. & Lucas, N. (Eds.). (1999). FE and Lifelong Learning: Realigning the Sector for the Twenty-first Century. Institute of Education University of London. Hodgson, A. (Ed.). (2015). The Coming of Age for FE? Reflections on the past and future role of further education colleges in England. Institute of Education Press. Scott, P. (1995). The Meanings of Mass Higher Education. Society for Research into Higher Education & Open University Press. Smithers, A. & Robinson, P. (Eds.). (2000). Further Education Re-formed. Falmer Press. Venables, P. F. R. (1955). Technical Education. Its Aims, Organisation and Future Development. G. Bell & Sons.

This presentation pictures how the Finnish Universities of Applied Sciences (UAS) have been institutionalized since they were established in the 1990s. The exploration is based on secondary analysis of existing data and studies concerning Finnish UAS. It aims to provide an overview of how the trends concerning student pathways via UAS to work have developed, and enhance understanding of the role of UAS in the education system. The Finnish UAS were founded when former vocational colleges were developed to form the other pillar of the higher education system beside the traditional science universities (Ahola, 1997). The UAS have developed through several phases towards enhancing regional and national collaboration between their own network and other providers of education (Rauhala et al., 2022, Rantanen & Toikko, 2012). These phases can be characterized as follows. First, the UAS were experimented in 1991-1996. The UAS study programmes were developed through piloting, and programme standards raised to the level of Bachelors´ degrees. The successful piloting of the UAS was followed by a period of their systemic induction and developing regulation for them in 1997-2003. Between 2004-2013, the UAS studies matured to become a full member of the higher education system. In 2005, they also started to provide Master's studies for those with former UAS Bachelors, or equivalent, and work experience (Rantanen & Toikko, 2012). In the next developmental phase, between 2014-2016, there has been a shift toward a more unified higher education sector, legitimized by diminishing age cohorts and demand for economic efficiency. Whereas in the 1990s much emphasis in the Finnish UAS was put on upgrading and developing curriculum and pedagogy, in the 2000s there has been an increased shift toward emphasizing research and development as well as education for adults who are at work. Since 2017 the efforts to provide studies through the national network of UAS for students all over the country by digital means have been enhanced (Koskinen et al., 2020). The common provision has been targeted to enable flexible and more efficient provision of studies for UAS students. The ways to organize work-based learning as part of UAS studies have also been developed from the original model of internships towards more varied forms of placements and work-integrated learning (Virolainen, 2007; Tynjälä et al., 2022). During their lifetime the Finnish UAS have become an important route to higher education especially for those with initial vocational qualifications.

Ahola, S. (1997). 'Different but equal': Student expectations and the Finnish dual higher education policy. European Journal of Education, 32(3), 291-302. Koskinen, M., Nakamura, R., Yli-Knuuttila, H., & Tyrväinen, P. (2020). Kohti oppimisen uutta ekosysteemiä. Jyväskylän ammattikorkeakoulu. Rantanen, T., & Toikko, T. (2012). The three phases of the research and development activities in the Finnish universities of applied sciences. In S. Ahola and D. Hoffman (Eds.), Higher education research in Finland: Emerging structures and contemporary issues (pp. 383–405). Institute for Educational Research. Rauhala, P., Kantola, M., Friman, M., Mäki, K., & Kotila, H. (2022). Ammattikorkeakoulupedagogiikan lyhyt historia. In K. Mäki & L. Vanhanen-Nuutinen (Eds.), Korkeakoulupedagogiikka – Ajat, paikat ja tulkinnat. Haaga-Helia. Tynjälä, P., Virtanen, A., Virolainen, M. H., & Heikkinen, H. L. (2022). Learning at the interface of higher education and work: Experiences of students, teachers and workplace partners. In E. Kyndt, S. Beausaert, & I. Zitter (Eds.), Developing connectivity between education and work (pp. 76–96). Routledge. Virolainen, M. (2007). Workplace learning and higher education in Finland: Reflections on current practice. Education + Training, 49(4), 290-309.

This double symposium explores the important role that vocational colleges and similar types of institutions play in supporting social, educational, and cultural development in their local communities and regions. We argue that the role colleges play is not as well understood or theorised as is the role of universities and schools, and that this matters because colleges are vital for the well-being of their local communities. They support their regions and communities in many ways that are not prominent beyond immediate participants. However, the ways in which they do so differs in different countries and this symposium includes diverse contributions from very different systems.

The domain of this symposium is the second vocationally oriented tier of post school education. This tier may offer other programs, but its key mission includes offering short-cycle tertiary education of about two years’ duration with a vocational / professional orientation, classified in the International Standard Classification of Education ISCED 2011 as category 55 short-cycle tertiary vocational education (UNESCO Institute for Statistics, 2012, pp. 48-50).

The roles of schools and universities are generally understood and institutionalized as broadly intellectual and cultural that are well established historically and globally. In contrast, vocational colleges are ‘mainly local organizations justified by specific economic and political functions or shaped by particular historical legacies or power struggles’ (Meyer, Ramirez, Frank, and Schofer, 2007, pp. 187, 210).

Colleges are under theorized, which leaves them vulnerable to vicissitudes of marketisation and privatization (Meier, 2013), and undermines the institutional conditions that support them. They are justified mostly by their preparation for work, and gaps in the correspondence between vocational education and work are almost always considered only a supply-side issue for colleges, rather than being co-constituted by education and work (Livingstone, 2009, p. 150). Colleges are therefore thought not to respond sufficiently to the labour market, and to need disciplining by competing with for-profit providers.

This thinking is particularly prevalent in the liberal market economies of Australia, Canada, England, the USA, and others. But it is also projected onto low and middle income countries by intergovernmental and non government organisations.

This double symposium seeks to investigate, compare and analyse colleges’ diverse social roles in different countries, explore commonalities in colleges’ social roles, and invite perspectives from participants in the symposium. Part 1 will comprise 3 presentations, and part 2 will comprise 3 presentations and a discussant.

One third of French young people are in the vocational track in secondary education (vocational high school or apprenticeship, RERS, 2021). The French education system relies on a strong academic convention (Verdier, 2008) embodied in a specific grammar of schooling, a “forme scolaire” (Robert, 2013). Although the vocational baccalaureate is presented as a baccalaureate "like any other", the vocational route suffers from a hierarchy of disciplines imposed by academic convention (David, 2021). Indeed, the vocational baccalaureate is thus a baccalaureate somewhat apart (Maillard, Moreau, 2019), whose identity and comparative advantage are regularly questioned. This paper discusses the structure of vocational preparation in France, and considers the different types of institutions that offer this provision. The paper explores vocational high schools, apprenticeship centres, and production schools (on-campus applied education that provides an alternative training path for young people aged between 14 and 18 years), as well as post-school institutions such as University Institutes of Technology (IUTs) that offer the diploma in technological studies (called in France a Diplôme universitaire de technologie - DUT), which are two-year diplomas leading to occupational outcomes. While IUTs have long enjoyed academic recognition because they are attached to institutions of higher education, vocational high schools have been criticized for their inability to forge links with the professional world. The latest reforms in vocational education (laws of 2009, 2018, bill of 2023) are therefore aimed at promoting apprenticeship to increase the integration rate of young people. Concerning IUT, the 2021 reform strengthens the links between IUTs and academic logic by changing their flagship diploma (DUT) from a 2-year diploma to a 3-year diploma (BUT - Bachelor Universitaire de Technologie) which corresponds to a vocational license level. How to build the articulation towards the higher education in the middle of these different conventions? Based on two monographic researches about vocational high schools (ethnographic approach of 10 schools, 50 interviews), this paper aims to analyze the intertwining of the academic and vocational conventions in the vocational path between multiple political injunctions and daily management of training needs.

David, P. (2021). Pratiques d’enseignement en formation professionnelle initiale: entre forme scolaire et socialisation professionnelle. Éducation et Sociétés, (2), 77-93. Maillard, F., & Moreau, G. (2019). Le bac pro. Un baccalauréat comme les autres?. Octarès éditions. MEN. (2021). Repères et références statistiques. DEPP. Robert, A. D. (2013). The French School system and the Universalist metanarrative (1880–2000s): Some reflections about so-called explanatory historical notions such as ‘La Forme Scolaire’. European Educational Research Journal, 12(2), 190-200. Verdier, E. (2008). L’éducation et la formation tout au long de la vie: une orientation européenne, des régimes d’action publique et des modèles nationaux en évolution. Sociologie et sociétés, 40(1), 195-225.

This paper focuses on the usability of vocational and academic qualifications in the German labour market. Our general assumption is that the competition between academic education and vocational qualifications is particularly high if there are extensive similarities or overlaps in the required skills and the activities to be performed in the workplace. In contrast, a complementary relationship between both types of qualifications is more characteristic if the companies differentiate the tasks and fields of work of vocationally and academically qualified employees. Former research shows various determining factors for the extent of competition or complementarity (e.g. industry sectors, specific personnel structures, engagement and strategy in the field of training). The usability of educational qualifications in the labour market can be estimated by various aspects (e.g. income, employment status, position). This paper presents companies’ and the individuals’ evaluation of the usability of academic and vocational qualifications. The theoretical background is formed by rational choice theory (Arrow, 1989; Esser, 1990) as well as the signaling (Spence, 1973) and screening (Stiglitz, 1975) approach. The mixed methods research concept contains curricula and vacancies analyses, case studies in selected sectors and a quantitative survey. This paper focuses on the analyses of the employment survey, which provides in depth insights on the individual perspective on labour market usability of educational qualifications. The results derive from analysing the data from the German BIBB/BAuA employment survey of 2018. We assessed employees’ educational decisions based on their returns on educational investment. To evaluate the rationality of individuals’ educational choices we calculated an OLS regression model containing variables associated with a positive effect on income (education and work experience) (Mincer, 1974). To gain more differentiated insights on the impact of career aspirations and educational choices we successively included variables into the model representing the individuals’ rationales as well as their socio-economic background and types of qualification (academic vs. occupational). Our results show that employability and income aspirations have a positive effect on individuals’ returns on educational investments, indicating that their educational decisions are rational. The presented results contribute to the debate on the relevance of vocational qualifications in the labour market, driven by the trends of academization in different occupational fields. The case studies and the company survey showed that vocationally qualified employees tend to hold more often operational management positions while academically qualified employees are more likely to hold strategic leadership positions (project management, HR management or controlling).

Arrow, K. J. (1990). Economic theory and the hypothesis of rationality. In J. Eatwell, M. Milgate, & P. Newman, (Eds.), Utility and probability. The new Palgrave (pp. 25-39). Palgrave Macmillan. Esser, H. (1990). ‘Habits’, ‘Frames’ und ‘Rational Choice’. Die Reichweite von Theorien der rationalen Wahl (am Beispiel der Erklärung des Befragtenverhaltens). Zeitschrift für Soziologie, 19(4), S. 231-247. Mincer, J. (1974). Schooling, experience, and earnings. National Bureau of Economic Research, Columbia University Press. Spence, M. (1973). Job market signaling. The Quarterly Journal of Economics, 87(3), 355-374. Stiglitz, J. E. (1975). The theory of ‘Screening’, education and the distribution of income. American Economic Review, 65(3), 283-300.

Technical and Vocational Education and Training Colleges in South Africa have been shaped by economic inequalities, shifting curriculum and qualification policy, and insecure work conditions aggravated by some aspects of neoliberal models of educational delivery, combined with bureaucratic control, leading to schizophrenic institutions. They are part of a vocational education system that has been the subject of many reforms, and is regarded as a relatively weak part of the overall education and training system (Allais, 2013; DHET, 2013; Taylor and Shindler, 2016). TVET colleges have been reinvented in numerous ways—renamed, restructured, given new governance models. The current 50 Technical and Vocational Education and Training colleges, previously Further Education and Training Colleges (FET), were created by merging 152 Technical Colleges. The shift from Technical Colleges to FET colleges gave them substantially increased autonomy, through the FET Colleges Act of 2006 which gave councils wide-ranging powers, including hiring lecturers directly. This was supposed to enable colleges to function as ‘responsive providers’. The shift from FET to TVET was supposed to signal a stronger focus on the vocational side of their work, after political shifts and a location under a new Ministry of Higher Education and Training. Policy makers and industry continue to argue that the TVET system remains weak and that the TVET colleges do not meet their needs (Kraak, 2010; DHET, 2019; Allais and Marock, 2020). Reforms since the transition to democracy have led to an institutional environment that is complex and expensive, without much visible improvement in the system (Kraak, 2010; DHET, 2012; Allais, 2013; Ngcwangu, 2014). The qualifications system is enormously complex: layers of new qualifications and ways of designing qualifications have been added, without removing the previous ones. Recent changes to post-school funding led to a dramatic change, whereby college students were eligible for funding that was previously allocated to university students. This has affected the nature of the student body. TVET policy is developed nationally, focused on colleges and formal provision separately from sectoral industrial strategy. While in theory colleges should play a role in local economic development, and industry representatives are therefore included in governance structures, there is often tension between local, sectoral, and national economic needs. In short: these institutions, which serve students with weak educational achievement and generally from poor families, have enormous expectations put on them in a context of muddled governance and constant policy reform.

Allais, S. (2013). Understanding the persistence of low skills in South Africa. In J. Daniels et al. (Eds.), New South African Review 3 (pp. 201-220). Wits University Press. Allais, S., & Marock, C. (2020). Education for work in the time of COVID 19: Moving beyond simplistic ideas of supply and demand, Southern African Review of Education, 26(1), 62-79. DHET. (2012). Ministerial Task Team on Seta Performance. Report for the Minister of Higher Education and Training. Department of Higher Education and Training. DHET. (2013). White Paper for Post-School Education and Training. Building an expanded, effective and integrated post-school system. Department of Higher Education and Training, Republic of South Africa. DHET. (2019). National plan for post-school education and training. South African Department of Higher Education and Training. Kraak, A. (2010). A critique of South Africa’s national human resource development strategies, Southern African Review of Education, 16(1), 59-82. Ngcwangu, S. (2014). Skills development in post-apartheid South Africa: Issues, arguments and contestations. In S. Vally, & E. Motala (Eds.), Education, economy, and society (pp. 244-264). Pretoria: Unisa. Taylor, N., & Shindler, J. (2016). Education sector landscape mapping South Africa. Johannesburg: Joint Education Services.

The skills needed for work in the 21^st century have been debated since this century began. The Partnership for 21^st century skills, established by leading multi-national companies including Microsoft, Cisco, Adobe, Ford, Dell and Pearson, set out to establish a framework for the 21^st century skills needed in the modern workplace. These, naturally, included the use of ICT and digital technologies, as well as those better known as 21^st century skills today such as critical thinking, creativity, and team working. The OECD adopted the concept in 2010 with Andreas Schleicher stating “educational success is no longer about reproducing content knowledge, but about extrapolating from what we know and applying that knowledge to novel situations” (https://www.oecd.org/general/thecasefor21st-centurylearning.htm).

Not all countries have adopted the language of 21^st century skills. However, many have adopted what we refer to here as ‘generic’ skills as part of their curriculums and values for education (OECD 2022). Apart from the OECD, other frameworks have been developed. For example, Skills Builder (https://www.skillsbuilder.org/) is used by employers, educators, and impact organisations across 10 countries including England, as it provides a useful framework to define skills. Eight essential skills are identified – listening; speaking; problem solving; creativity; staying positive; aiming high; leadership; and teamwork. Voogt and Roblin (2012) highlighted the key common skills as being ICT literacy, collaboration, communication, social and cultural skills, with a majority also including creativity, critical thinking and problem solving.

Although 21^st century skills are often related to children in compulsory schooling through curricula, the academic literature focuses on them in the context of those skills required by graduates transitioning into the modern workplace. Similarly, large scale quantitative research on the changing skills needed in job roles is driven by the availability of the comprehensive US-based O*NET taxonomy. To enable this more locally, England has been reviewing skills taxonomies (Popov et al, 2022) in preparation for developing its own version. 21^st century skills therefore, despite mostly being delivered to children and young people during compulsory education, are mainly researched in the context of being skills for work.

Our research focuses instead on the generic skills taught to young people aged 14-19. We review how generic skills are delivered to 14–19-year-olds across a range of jurisdictions focusing particularly here on England, the Netherlands, Singapore, and Scotland. We structure our analysis around four key factors: the systems and structures; the formation and enactment of policy; the educational and vocational cultures and traditions; and the education and status of teachers. We find that policy coherence and the professional status of teachers is crucial for the effective and consistent teaching and learning of generic skills to 14-19 year olds.

Across the four countries there is significant variation in the extent that generic skills are incorporated into the curriculum and how far this is a central curriculum design consideration and how far it is secondary. Policy coherence includes incorporating generic skills into the 14-19 curriculum at the same time as making sure they are part of a more general shift to adopt generic skills in other parts of the curriculum. For example, in Scotland, the Curriculum for Excellence was initially devised in 2004 and has been refreshed in 2019. The most recent version retains the explicit reference to skills, stating that young people are entitled to experience ‘opportunities for developing skills for learning, skills for life and skills for work’ (Scottish Government, 2019).

Changes in the workplace, technological evolution and political aims for labour mobility challenge initial vocational education and training (IVET) systems to prepare students for life-long learning (Billett, 2014; Nägele & Stalder, 2017). Basically, IVET provides students with a formal qualification which can be referred as domain-specific competencies (Gekara & Snell, 2018). However, due to their inevitable lack of versatile job experience young IVET graduates cannot stand out in recruitment situations with their domain-specific competencies; instead, students profit from domain-general competencies (Löfgren et al., 2022; Nägele & Stalder, 2017). These refer to integrated sets of knowledge, skills and attitudes that broadly assist an individual to adapt and act in unknown situations (Gekara & Snell, 2018; Nägele & Stalder, 2017).

In this study, Finnish IVET students’ domain-general competencies are investigated from the student perspective. In fact, Finnish technical-trade employers and IVET teachers have considered that IVET students graduate with varying or even unsatisfactory levels of competencies (Löfgren et al., 2020, 2022). However, students themselves have been seldom consulted (Billett, 2014). Also, Panadero et al. (2019) note that there are not many validated self-report instruments for IVET student domain-general competencies except for the one of Kyndt et al. (2014). They measured the following domain-general competencies that are not sufficiently addressed in the formal curricula but are greatly beneficial in the workplace: work organisation, cooperation ability, professional attitude, problem solving, active listening, empathy and assertiveness (Kyndt et al., 2014). This instrument covers very well the competencies we have found to be important for the Finnish IVET graduates (see Löfgren et al., 2020, 2022).

Despite its rarity, the instrument of Kyndt and colleagues (2014) and all other competency questionnaires alone may give a too simple, acquisition-driven impression of the student development of competencies. This is problematic because technical-trade educators, for example in Finland (Virtanen et al., 2014) and Sweden (Nylund & Gudmundson, 2017) tend to prefer a craftsperson habitus to their pedagogical task; thus, educators seem to stress students’ responsibility for their studies.

In fact, the learning environment alone can help the IVET students to overcome their difficulties and to continue with their studies, provided that the educators especially concentrate on their interaction with the students (Virtanen et al., 2014). In an advanced learning environment, educators at school and in the workplace provide the students with social support, recognition, equal treatment and a positive climate for learning so that the students may overcome individual adversities and develop more positive self-efficacy beliefs and a motivation for learning (Lüthi et al., 2021; Virtanen et al., 2014).

This study aims to discover how IVET students consider their learning of domain-general competencies and learning environment. We also want to find out how the experienced vocational learning environment contributes to student learning of domain-general competencies. The research questions are as follows:

RQ1) How do technical-trade IVET students perceive the domain-general competencies they have learned during their studies?

• H1. Students’ domain-general competencies consist of the categories of Work organisation, Cooperation ability, Professional attitude, Problem solving, Willingness to learn, Active listening, Empathy and Assertiveness.

RQ2) How do technical-trade IVET students experience their learning environment established by vocational educators?

• H2. Students’ experienced learning environment in IVET consists of receiving Social support from teachers and workplace mentors; encountering Equality and relatedness; having a constructive Climate for learning; and receiving Recognition for one’s opinions and efforts in learning.

RQ3) How does the experienced learning environment relate to technical-trade IVET student learning of domain-general competencies?

• H3. A supportive, equal, constructive and encouraging learning environment contributes to student learning of domain-general competencies.

In Germany, teachers traditionally study two subjects, for regular schools for example physics and English. In vocational education and training (VET), for example metalworking and English. This is in line with teaching at regular schools: Students have lessons in ~10 subjects each week and each teacher is responsible for two subjects. In VET-schools, this classical structure of teaching was replaced successively since the late 1990s by the so-called “learning field” approach (Lernfeldansatz, cp. for example KMK 2007). In this teaching approach, apprentices only have lessons in their vocation, subdivided into 10-15 (depending on the vocation) consecutive learning fields distributed over three years. General subjects like “[m]athematical and scientific content, technical contents, safety information and economics, business administration and ecological aspects should be imparted in an integrative manner within the learning fields” and “40 hours of English language objectives and contents are integrated into the learning fields” (BIBB 2015). In the first ten years after this re-structuring, many generic papers on learning fields have been published (cp. for example Fischer 2004, Straka 2005, Deitmer 2007).In the last years, nonetheless, the scientific and pedagogical discussions became rather quiet. Now, more than 25 years after this paradigmatic shift, it is time to explore its introduction, success, possible weaknesses and development potentials – and to work on the latter. Our research questions, exemplarily for the general subjects of physics and English, are:

* How advanced is the implementation of the learning fields on meso-level in the technical VET-schools in the German federal state of Bremen?

* Are there any concrete concepts or collections of examples of apparent good practice that could support VET-teachers in teaching accordingly?

* How does the implementation on micro (teaching)-level take place?

* From the perspective of the teachers, where are the deficits and how could they be overcome?

Although the empirical part of the study focusses on one country, only, we expect that the paper could help improving VET-teaching and VET teacher education in other countries, as well – and vice-versa, so that we could learn from the experiences made in other countries represented by delegates in the audience.

This article aims to contribute to the debates on the explanatory role that a political economy approach can have in the field of youth policies in Mexico and Latin America, specifically by explaining the recent adoption of an unprecedented workplace-based social policy for young people in Mexico. Several Latin American countries share similarities that go back to their similar industrialisation trajectories between the post-war period and the 1970s and the subsequent privatisation of strategic development sectors during the neoliberal period beginning in the 1980s. A political economy approach offers an account of the various institutional arrangements and educational, labour and youth policies in the region. The article draws on various existing approaches that together can constitute a proposal to bolster the study of these policies.

'Youth policy' is a developing and multidisciplinary theme of study whose central academic debates revolve around a diversity of scholarly work, ranging from the analysis of the political determinants of active labour market policies (ALMPs) in Europe (Bonoli, 2010) to the divergent configuration of national education and skills training systems (Busemeyer and Trampusch, 2012), to the recent emergence of a myriad of 'policy devices' or 'policy innovations' focused on supporting young people amidst increasingly uncertain social and economic prospects worldwide (Jacinto, 2010).

Compared to studies focused on European countries and the global north, the Latin America region is still understudied, and its local institutional, political, and economic arrangements are still enveloped with homogenising and generalising conceptions, such as the notion of the ‘hierarchical market economy’ proposed by Schneider and Soskice (2009). At the same time, there is a recent resurgence of political economy approaches in the region that aims at inquiring into intraregional differences (Hernández López, 2017; Madariaga, 2019). In this sense, this article also seeks to contribute to this debate.

In December 2018, a newly elected left-wing government in Mexico announced the launch of a massive national workplace-based social policy for 2.3 million people between 18 and 29: 'Youth Building the Future' (JCF). In addition to paid work-based learning in all types of participating companies for up to 12 months, the policy grants beneficiaries social security. The main research question of this article is: What were the main material and ideational factors that led the Mexican government to adopt the JCF policy? To answer the question, the article draws on first-hand empirical evidence consisting of interviews with numerous policy stakeholders and an analysis of policy documents.

Theoretically, this article is informed by several currents of political economy studies, particularly the analytical framework of 'Cultural Political Economy (CPE), as developed by Jessop (2010). CPE continues in the critical tradition of social analysis that, since Marx, has understood social reality as 'conceptually mediated' (Fairclough, 2013). Its main claim is that policy adoption processes are explained by 'material' (economic, institutional, and political) and 'ideatic' or 'semiotic' (discourses and ideas) factors.

Jessop (2010) operationalised this analytical framework through the three ‘evolutionary mechanisms’ of variation, selection, and retention, where variation refers to the initial moment in which a subject area or domain is problematized in such a way that policy change is instigated; selection refers to the interpretative struggles, both of the causes and of the possible solutions that should be adopted to solve the problematized situation, and finally, retention refers to the moment of formal and legal institutionalization of a specific political solution. Not much research has applied CPE to the field of education and training, so it is still a budding field to which this article seeks to contribute.

The role of vocational education and training (VET) has been shifting in recent decades with the influence of globalisation and social-economic events such as the downturn in the economy and financial crises. In this regard, the role of international organisations like UNESCO, the European Union (EU), the World Bank, and the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) in shaping VET policies in developing countries have been debated in the scholarship. On the one hand, neo-institutionalist scholars who endorse the World Culture Theory argue that politicians at the national level are subjected to and subsequently borrow or transfer policies backed by international players such as the World Bank or the EU in order to be perceived as legitimate (Ramirez, Meyer, and Lerch 2016). For these scholars, multinational organisations articulate universal norms, values and virtues and these common values influence the education policy decisions and preferences of decision-makers operating in different countries which leads to convergence. However, the opposite string of scholars, without ignoring the influence of globalisation on the national police arena, indicate that convergence cannot be reduced to the formal adoption of specific policies and policy instruments (Verger and Fontdevila 2022). Thus, there are factors of a different nature (global, local, material and ideational) that drive national policymakers towards borrowing these policies but similarly, these factors influence the recontextualization of the borrowed mechanism.

In the case of EU members, various directives featuring mechanisms (like metrics and indicators) were adopted at the macro-institutional level, and states were expected to enact policies that would meet certain models and standards in national VET strategies (Lawn and Lingard 2002; Witt 2018). However, the situation differs in the case of non-member European neighbourhood nations, particularly when countries that do not aspire to EU membership follow policies and processes devised and endorsed by the European Union. The research looks at the experience of Azerbaijan, an EU neighbour country that reformed its VET system based on EU-encouraged policy models and procedures.

The study's purpose is to identify the primary factors and elements influencing the Azerbaijani government's decisions to accept EU-supported VET mechanisms within the reform initiative. It also seeks to clarify the mechanisms by which European policy models appear on Azerbaijan's national policy agenda, as well as the contextual (political, economic, and cultural) factors that influence national policymakers in their adoption or rejection of those ideas. The main purpose is to better understand the EU-Azerbaijan policy borrowing and try to identify elements that impact decisions on policy borrowing that go beyond past studies on international political and economic aspects (Langbein and Börzel 2013). Nonetheless, to uncover these factors, the study employs the Cultural Political Economy (CPE) concept developed by Jessop (2010) and further enhanced by Verger et al. (2016), which would help to understand reasons and methods of policy dissemination, adoption, and change with the content and the ideological drivers in the national context.

The study concentrates on change agencies, i.e. stakeholders, the institutions and policymakers that decide on policy adoption, by examining their motivations as well as the environment surrounding them during the decision-making process. For this purpose, the research primarily seeks and answers the following question: To what extent has the EU influenced the reform of the VET system in Azerbaijan? The study also aims to answer the following supportive questions: which VET policy concepts are appealing to Azerbaijani policymakers, and why? Why did certain EU-encouraged VET mechanisms make it to the policy agenda and be adopted as a policy while others did not? what are the primary elements (motivations/incentives) that influence Azerbaijan's policymakers' decision to embrace EU-encouraged VET policy models in the VET system reform?

The French system relies on a state-regulated model of vocational training regimes (Greinert, 2005). It thus distinguishes itself from the dual corporatist model or the liberal market economy model that can be found in the german and anglo-saxon worlds respectively.

The French education system is based on a strong academic convention (Verdier, 2018) embodied by a specific grammar of schooling, a "school form" (Robert, 2013). The vocational training system has a strong tradition of schooling (Brucy, Troger, 2000). Although the vocational baccalaureate is presented as a baccalaureate "like any other", the vocational route suffers from a hierarchy of disciplines imposed by academic convention (David, 2021). In fact, the vocational baccalaureate is therefore a baccalaureate somewhat apart (Maillard, Moreau, 2019), whose identity and comparative advantages are regularly questioned. The problems of the vocational track are now attributed by the political and economic world to the academic convention.

Since 2007, the French vocational track has undergone two important reforms: the renovation of its flagship diploma and the inclusion of apprenticeship in vocational high schools (until then, apprenticeship was reserved to the training centers of apprentices). A third reform is in preparation. This multiplicity of reforms raises questions about the real effects of these political decisions on the education system.

At the end of the Second World War, France gradually set up vocational high schools. Created in 1985, the lycée professionnel (LP - vocational high schools) actually welcomes more than two-thirds of the young people in the vocational track for upper secondary education (RERS, 2021), with the remaining third turning to apprenticeship in apprenticeship centers. The LP was instituted at the same time as a new vocational diploma: the vocational baccalaureate, which was prepared in four years (compared to three years for the general and technological baccalaureates).

The creation of this diploma competes with the CAP diploma (created in 1919) in order to respond both to a political will (to revalorize the vocational pathway, to reduce the number of graduates without diplomas, to improve the link between training and employment) and to a demand from the metallurgy sector. This sector, represented by the employers' federation (very powerful in France) asked for the creation of an intermediary diploma between the CAP diploma and the technician's diploma (for higher education). This diploma was to prepare young people capable of mastering numerically controlled machines and looking for a quick integration (Bernard, Troger, 2012). The LP has helped to absorb the massification of access to education. The growth of students has been accompanied by the abolition of entrance tests (Pelpel, Troger, 1993): these two elements have contributed to the downgrading of the vocational track's image.

The last reforms of the vocational path are presented by politicians as a desire to revalorize the vocational pathway in terms of the vocational convention by attenuating the school-based form that links it to the academic convention.

Based on the sociology of conventions (Boltyanski, Thevenot, 2006), this paper proposes to reflect on the evolution of the French vocational training system. To what extent does the implementation of these reforms, and the necessary translations by the actors in the field that they imply, allow for this renovation of the vocational track ?

Developing countries in Global South host 83% of the world’s refugee populations (UNHCR, 2022) and are struggling to create education, livelihoods, and social inclusion opportunities for these marginalised groups (Buscher, 2011; Jacobsen, 2006; Jacobsen & Fratzke, 2016). Skills development and vocational training are an intrinsic part of the education and livelihood strategies of the international actors and organisations in refugee crises (UNHCR 2019a; 2019b; 2014). UNESCO’s Global Monitory Report (2019) and UNHCR’s Global Strategies for Livelihoods (2014-2018) stress strengthening entrepreneurship skills for employment generations, empowerment, and decent work. These strategies are linked to SDG 4, particularly target 4.4, which addresses entrepreneurship through the expansion of technical and vocational skills.

The growing narrative of the ‘enterprising self’ in education (Brunila & Siivonen, 2016; Down, 2009) and the world of work (Ainsworth & Hardy, 2008) has been translated to enterprising refugees in migration contexts. The increased focus on entrepreneur skills for refugees is directed towards the self-reliance of these marginalised subjects (UNHCR, 2005). However, the idea of self-reliance has been critiqued for its grounding in neoliberal ideology and usage as an exit strategy by donor organisations (Easton-Calabria & Omata, 2018; Skran & Easton-Calabria, 2020). In line with the international organisations’ focus on entrepreneurship, the National Policy on Skills Development and Entrepreneurship (2015) in India aims to harness the potential of its demographic dividend through enterprising individuals. Despite being a non-signatory of global refugee conventions, India receives a large number of refugees from all around the globe. However, the complex legal-political landscape of India creates numerous challenges related to the success, sustainability, and utilisation of entrepreneurship skills for refugees in the country.

This paper examines the entrepreneurship discourse within the skills development agenda of international organisations and how that interacts with the multidimensional identities of refugees and their social, political, and economic needs and aspirations in their host country, India.

Theoretically, going beyond the orthodox approaches to VET (McGrath et al., 2020), the paper combines capabilities and intersectional lenses to examine the effects of race, gender, class, ethnic, and religious identities of refugees on the entrepreneurial skills development and utilisation. In particular, the paper employs the concept of the capability to aspire and conversion factor from the capabilities canon and converges it with the intersectional inequality perspective. By bridging these two frameworks, it strengthens the capabilities account of VET that considers the multidimensional identities of VET attendees along with their socio-political, economic and migration contexts.

Many young people with a migration background experience equal opportunities in Germany as insufficient (El-Mafaalani, 2018, pp. 102-103). Vocational education research has so far focused particularly on statistical discrimination, while there is a lack of empirical studies in the educational context with regard to subjective experiences of discrimination (Horr et al., 2020, p. 5). Subjective experiences do not necessarily coincide with objectively measurable inequalities, but can deviate greatly from them (Ette et al., 2021, p. 28; Straub et al., 2021, p. 143). For those affected, the experienced situation is usually more important than the actual discrimination (Ette et al., 2021, p. 28).

This study therefore asks how adolescents' perceptions of personal ethnic discrimination differ according to origin group membership. Several studies have already confirmed origin group differences in perceptions of ethnic discrimination (Diehl et al., 2021; Flores, 2015; Salentin, 2007; Steinmann & Strietholt, 2019). The distinctive feature of this work is that the focus is on the transition to vocational education and training (VET). Accordingly, the dependent variable is perceived ethnic discrimination in the search for an apprenticeship position.

Gender, along with migration status, is considered a relevant social category in research on transitions to VET (Enggruber, 2011). In order to investigate the interplay of group of origin with gender, an intersectional perspective is adopted. Particularly in the quantitative field, intersectional studies are lacking (Else-Quest & Hyde, 2016; Strand, 2014, p. 133). While Skrobanek (2007, p. 32) shows that women perceive ethnic discrimination more than men, other studies conclude that women report less ethnic discrimination (e.g., Salentin, 2008, p. 521; Schaafsma, 2011, p. 789; Te Lindert et al., 2008; Venema & Grimm, 2002, p. 72) and expect ethnic discrimination in the labor market less likely than men (McWirther, 1997, pp. 133-135). Because of the contradictory results, the question arises as to how perceived ethnic discrimination differs by gender. In which group of origin is the difference between young men and women most pronounced?

Productivity theory assumptions (Beicht & Walden, 2017, p. 429; Ette et al., 2021, p. 27; Hunkler, 2016, p. 604) suggest that young people of Turkish origin perceive more discrimination than young people of other origin groups, since their names and/or phenotypic characteristics indicate a migration background more visibly. Regarding the interaction of origin group and gender, intersectional theories yield opposing expectations: The Subordinate Male Target Hypothesis suggests that migrant men perceive ethnic discrimination more strongly than migrant women (Purdie-Vaughns & Eibach, 2008, p. 379; Veenstra, 2012, p. 684). The Additive Approach and the Intersectional-Inspired Approach, however, justify the assumption that female migrants perceive more personal ethnic discrimination than male migrants (Purdie-Vaughns & Eibach, 2008, p. 377; Veenstra, 2012, pp. 647-648).

This theoretical paper seeks to problematise conceptualisations of VET and its relationship to social justice.

Four key issues are addressed:

1. The secular and ongoing reproduction of inequalities amongst disadvantaged groups in VET.

2. The limits and possibilities of conceptualisations of VET

3. Patterns of inequality surrounding VET

4. Conceptualisations of equity, equality and meritocracy

VET occupies a liminal space lying between post-secondary and higher education (Moodie, 2002). The paper explores debates that engage with understandings of equity, social justice, VET as well as the constituencies VET addresses. There is a current in discussions of work based learning that associate it with equal opportunity and access to VET credentials, aiming to dignify such labour. This applies particularly to occupational practices that are frequently low paid and filled by disadvantaged groups (Billett, 2005). How far can such a strategy take us? Is it compromised by VET’s construction? How does it sit with the social relations in which VET is placed and to what extent does it go beyond these? The paper explores the suggestions that despite a secular interest in VET and disadvantage those groups designated as such have remained largely the same over time (see ONS 2021; SMC 2020; 2022; 2023; Zoellner 2022). The paper seeks to identify some of the issues behind this status quo. This leads to an analysis of the manner in which VET is constructed and its relationship to waged labour. How broadly or expansively can we conceive VET? Wolf (2022) points to a paradox, arguing that in the university sector vocationalism has become increasingly important but that in the liminal space of VET it has become marginalised, engaged in by disadvantaged groups having little occupational purchase. VET incorporates what Esmond and Atkins (2022) refer to as courses orientated towards ‘welfare vocationalism’ and a ‘technical elite’, but also those qualification lying between these polarities. In the case of the technical elite following T-levels and apprenticeships this is very much a minority route. However, the paradox Wolf raises is well made. How within such a context can VET contribute to social justice? Rhetorically, ideologically and hegemonically VET can be conceptualised in a manner that emphasises its closeness to the needs of employers. If that association is undermined can we conceive of a reconceptualised VET that could make a contribution to societal, community and individual well-being, and thus social justice? Is such a conceptualisation feasible and yet remain VET? It is important to avoid reifying VET by failing to acknowledge it as a site of contestation that is nevertheless framed by employer interests. Can it be otherwise? It is also necessary to consider the contours of inequality within which VET is located, which place a limit on its radical potential and contribution to social justice? The objective here is to locate VET within a contextualisation that touches on the patterns of inequality present within the English social formation. The aim is to provide, a glimpse of patterns of inequality as applicable to VET. This discussion raises questions about the on-going re-composition of class relations and in particular the manner in which we conceive the insecure working/middle class. In addition, it talks back to the introduction of the paper which refers to iterative processes that define and re-define the disadvantaged groups that VET allegedly serves. This leads into an examination of conceptualisations of equity, equality and meritocracy.

The paper is set within an Anglophone context, implicitly considering the applicability of the paper’s argument to other social formations.