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Professor Simon Roodhouse is the Chief Executive of the University Vocational Awards Council, the UK consortium dedicated to higher level vocational education and training, research Professor at University of Bolton, senior academic adviser to The Cultural Management Applied Research Group, University of Greenwich and adjunct Professor, Queensland University of technology, Australia.
Abstract
This paper based on the work of Swailes and Roodhouse, funded by Edexcel and commissioned by the University Vocational Awards Council (UVAC) investigates the barriers to the take up of higher level National Vocational Qualifications (NVQs) in Higher Education in the context of graduate employability and workforce development. It also includes an introduction to the history of NVQs as the UK national training system and relationship to the recently introduced foundation degrees.
It exposes inconsistencies and contradictions, including the responsibility for funding workforce development in Higher education to deliver this agenda. The failure of the Qualifications and Curriculum Authority (QCA) and the Quality Assurance Agency for Higher Education (QAA) to coordinate their frameworks and respective procedures in the national interest is discussed. The engagement of employers in setting the higher education employability agenda is described and the potential role of National Occupational Standards (NoS) is described. The paper finally addresses the policy implications for engaging higher education in work force development.
Introduction
In higher education, workforce development is often described as work based learning and increasingly recognised as a field of study. Defining workforce development as workbased learning enables higher education in particular to incorporate the learning people do for, in and through work. Carol Costley, points out;
“Some universities have been involved in work based learning for a long time, for example, through placements and sandwich courses. Some universities have structured courses were continuing professional development with the knowledge gained through experience is accepted implicitly. Others use the processes of accrediting prior and experiential learning (APEL) to formally recognise such knowledge.
Learning contracts are becoming familiar instruments. These activities are variously described as work based, work related, placement activities, elective modules, independent study, APEL, reach out, CPD, work based learning among others. It is worth noting that work based learning in higher education is nearly always part of an existing university programme with its own disciplinary frameworks and approaches to higher education. Learning outcomes and criteria for assessment are therefore within the subject knowledge born of research and scholarly activities that already are embedded in the universities.” (Costley, 2001)
What is difficult to understand is the lack of engagement by higher education in workforce development that is meeting the needs of learning people do for, in and through work. Perhaps, Butcher, from the Learning and Teaching Support Network (LTSN) Generic Centre leading on employability along with ESECT in higher education has identified the problem.
“We somehow seem to be incapable of learning from experience. Succeeding generations of employers are still marooned in tedious development project steering committees whose proceedings take place in academic jargon. Frustrated academics are still struggling to secure placements and projects with the very companies who are lambasting the quality of their graduates work readiness.” (UVAC, 2002)
There is no doubt higher education has been highly successful in developing and delivering entry to work programmes , that is qualifying people for work at all levels, however, continuous professional development, retraining, part-time provision, learning diagnostics, assessment and certification all work based remain marginal. Why is this, when the case for the national economic and social demands for a highly skilled national workforce are as strident as ever?
In this context, it is noticeable, that initiatives such as NVQs and graduate apprenticeships have failed to become integral components of higher education. Similarly although considerable effort has been made to develop work based learning particularly by institutions such as Middlesex University, Anglia Polytechnic University, and other members of the University Vocational Awards Council it has been achieved through the individual, and organisational desire to respond to local and regional needs, despite the paucity of coincident policy directive from agencies with responsibility for business, skills, education and learning.
Public funding schemes persist in being unsympathetic to this activity however it is defined, and mechanisms to connect business needs with higher education are disorganised and confusing. The NVQ and national occupational standards are the only mechanism we have left to overcome these barriers.
Following several reviews of education and training, National Vocational Qualifications (NVQs) entered the UK’s education and training arena in 1986 to respond to an ad hoc vocational qualification landscape built up since 1945 with a typically British approach of adding more qualifications without the rationalisation of existing awards or reappraisal of the approvals and recognition procedures which were increasingly varied and inconsistent. As a result it was increasingly failing to deliver a highly skilled workforce in response to global competiveness and discouraging the unemployed to acquire the contemporary skills, employers required.
However, the introduction of a national scheme, NVQ, bringing education and training together led to passionate and polarised reactions. One opponent claimed that the movement ‘was perpetuating a disaster of epic proportions’ (Smithers, 1993) and Hyland (1994, p.116) considered NVQs to be behind ‘an utterly impoverished and dehumanised approach to vocational education’. Advocates of NVQs such as Hillier (1995) accused academics of running scared and argued that by concentrating on the true skills and knowledge needed to perform jobs the economy would benefit.
With over 3 million NVQs achieved since 1986 it is time to reconsider the value of NVQs particularly national occupational standards, in the light of the increased emphasis on the role of higher education in workforce development, and graduate employability, resulting from the introduction of mass higher education in the UK.
"Workforce development consists of activities which increase the capacity of individuals to participate effectively in the workforce, thereby improving their productivity and employability. Workforce development has a role to play in raising productivity; increasing social inclusion; and preparing the economy for the future. Source: In Demand: Adult skills for the 21st century, Cabinet Office, 2001
Enhancing Student Employability Co-ordination Team Role of the team (ESECT) will concentrate on the curriculum as the main route to improving employability and will seek to promote an integrated approach that can be made effective for everyone involved. The team will:
collate information about how HEIs can enhance student employability
identify ways of effectively using this knowledge in learning, teaching, assessment and curriculum practices
disseminate information to institutions, Learning and Teaching Support Network subject centres, employers, students, professional associations and other bodies
help interested parties work with higher education teachers to improve student employability across the curriculum.
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