Conference Agenda

Securing the supply of highly qualified skilled workforce is a key challenge for education and labour market policy in the context of demographic change in Germany. VET and HE are facing increasingly fierce competition for high-achieving young people, such as those with HE entrance certificate. Unlike in countries where VET is traditionally considered less prestigious (e.g., Chankseliani et al. 2016 for England), 28% of young people in Germany who choose a VET pathway have a HE entrance certificate (BiBB 2024). Young people with HE entrance certificate have thus become an important target group for image campaigns and innovative approaches in VET. The InnoVET initiative of the Federal Ministry of Education, Family, Seniors, Women, and Youth (BMBFSFJ) therefore funded 17 projects worth €74 million between 2020 and 2024 with the aim of making VET more attractive to this target group, by developing new, innovative vocational qualifications at the intersection of VET and HE (Kuhlee et al., 2022). However, what makes VET attractive to high-achieving young people has not yet been sufficiently investigated empirically (Neu, 2021). Yet, such data enable a more nuanced understanding also of how measures to increase the attractiveness of VET should look like (also Billets et al. 2022). This is particularly relevant in view of the question of whether newly designed vocational qualifications can really increase value and attractiveness. This is an aspect that is currently being discussed more intensively in the context of the introduction of T-levels in England also (Terry & Orr 2024).

The paper will therefore draw on comparative analyses of young people with HE entrance certificate who have opted for VET and those who have opted for HE. The focus will be on the possible correlations between the perceived attractiveness of VET and the choices made concerning their education pathways by the two groups under investigation. The following questions will be addressed:

(1) Why do young people with university entrance certificate choose VET? And why might they not?

(2) What are factors influencing the assessment of a potential vocational training and a corresponding career path compared to an academic one?

(3) How do respondents rate the attractiveness of newly designed vocational qualifications at the intersection of VET and HE, as developed in the InnoVET initiative?

The empirical study is based in particular on expectancy-value models (e.g., Eccles, 1983; Eccles & Wigfield, 2002) and the Thuringian Career Choice Competence Model (Driesel-Lange et al., 2020). These models assume that an educational option is preferred if it has a high subjective value and thus also a high perceived benefit for the individual. At the same time, the individual expects to be able to successfully achieve this educational option. Thereby are personal and social, and institutional factors relevant for the respective assessment of subjective value and the expectations of success (Schnitzler, 2019).

Furthermore, influencing factors that arise from the qualification program itself can be differentiated from those that arise from the future prospects associated with the qualification (Neu, 2021). The attractiveness of the program as such includes aspects of training conditions and individual design options. After completing the qualification, however, expectations regarding the job market and aspects of professional self-fulfillment and skills acquisition become relevant for participants (Heublein et al. 2018).

In Switzerland, upper-secondary education is characterised by the coexistence of initial vocational education and training (iVET), primarily organised through the dual apprenticeship system, and school-based pathways such as upper-secondary commercial schools (WMS) and specialised upper-secondary schools (FMS). Although vocational education is politically promoted as the “first choice” pathway, many students eligible for both routes prefer school-based programmes. This paper addresses the following research question: How do lower-secondary students perceive and compare learning opportunities, future prospects, and social meanings associated with school-based programmes and iVET pathways?

The study is situated within research on educational choice, vocational aspirations, and perceived learning environments. It assumes that students’ preferences are not primarily based on direct experience, but on socially shared expectations, symbolic distinctions, and stereotypical understandings of educational pathways. Since 2018, longitudinal cross-sectional data have been collected annually from lower-secondary students in one Canton through standardised written reflections and questionnaires. The present analysis draws on responses from 6,117 students aged 14–15 collected over eight school years. Using thematic analysis, 79,327 coded segments were identified and grouped into five overarching thematic areas: (1) learning formats and conceptions of knowledge, (2) future and educational orientation, (3) social roles and relationships, (4) competence and identity, and (5) evaluations and attributions.

The findings show remarkably stable patterns over time. School-based programmes are associated with theoretical and intellectual learning, openness of future pathways, social prestige, academic achievement, and continued participation in peer-oriented school environments. In contrast, iVET is primarily associated with practical learning, early labour-market entry, occupational specialisation, productivity, and adult-like work identities. While students acknowledge positive aspects of iVET, such as authenticity and practical relevance, many perceive it as narrower, less prestigious, and less compatible with academic self-identities.

The study highlights that educational choices are shaped not only by institutional structures and labour-market opportunities, but also by symbolic constructions of status, competence, and identity. Despite cantonal measures encouraging reflection on vocational pathways, students’ perceptions remained highly stable across eight years. The paper contributes to international debates on balancing vocational and academic pathways and raises questions about how young people develop informed understandings of vocational learning and occupational futures.

Across OECD countries, segmentation is deeply anchored in both – in education systems and the labour market, which tends to deepen social inequalities through life course (OECD 2025). Although trajectories and pathways to working life as well as segmentation within the education system and the labour market have been the focus of considerable research efforts in recent years (Schoon & Parsons 2002; Kleinert & Jacob 2024), the underlying mechanisms remain to be explored in greater depth. Germany is an interesting case in this regard. In addition to a strong segmentation within the general education system, Germany has a large dual vocational education and training (dual VET) sector, which is experiencing increasing segmentation – both among dual VET occupations and in the labour market. (Autor:innengruppe Bildungsberichterstattung 2024; OECD 2025). In a growing number of occupations, the shortage of skilled labour force is increasing significantly. In addition to the health, care and social sectors, the fields of mathematics, computer science, natural sciences and technology (STEM-professions) are particularly affected (BA 2023). Craft trades and industrial and technical professions, are characterised by a significant decline in demand from young people in the apprenticeship market- Despite a wide variety of dual VET occupations in Germany, young people's career aspirations are concentrated on a limited number of occupations, like in other OECD countries (Mann et al. 2020), which tends to increase the shortage as well as segmentation between occupations. On the other hand, a considerable number of young people cannot to find a training place in their preferred occupations.

Occupations differ, among other things, in the social recognition or esteem they receive. Conceptually, a distinction is usually made between a symbolic and a material dimension of occupational prestige (Honneth 2008). The perceived social recognition of an occupation and the orientation towards significant others is emphasised in various theoretical approaches as a relevant factor in occupational choice. Studies show that young people tend to exclude occupations as potential career options if they are associated with the expectation of low social approval (Matthes 2028). Increasing aspirations for a wider range of occupations is a key challenge of career guidance activities, both because young people's career aspirations are still stratified along specific social categories like gender and social status (Gottfredson 1981) and because young people in Europe have generally a limited field of professional aspirations (Mann et al 2020). This is even more important as the shortage of skilled workers has become more severe in Germany due to a number of factors, particularly in light of demographic change and especially in the VET sector (Oeynhausen et al. 2023).

In our contribution, we thus first examine the characteristics of occupations that make a job ‘attractive’ to young people in the career guidance phase, based on a survey of general education students (RQ1). Until now, little is known about how professions differ in terms of social recognition and how these differences can be explained, particularly among young people (Lynn et al 2017; Valentino 2020). Mainly, our attention focuses on the following question: Is it possible, through a career guidance approach, to raise young people's awareness of the attractiveness of professions and thus help to reduce segmentation on the demand side of training market? Is it - according to motivational role-modelling-theory - possible that vocational role models – who are themselves apprentices – can contribute to inspire and thus positively change students' perceptions of VET occupations, acting as ‘ambassadors for a profession’ and conveying not only information (knowledge and skills) about them but also a ‘taste’ for a profession by activating student’s motivation and confidence in their abilities (self-efficacy) (Morgenroth 2015)? (RQ2).