Search Results for
"Vocational education"

This paper explores the interrelationships between identity and learning for adult learners participating in vocational education and training programmes situated within workplaces. Identity is understood to be integral to learning. A theoretical position for understanding identity is developed using a narrative standpoint. Adult learners are understood to bring particular dispositions to workplace learning, in particular, their previous experiences and biographies of learning. The notion of wounding learning practices is articulated to discuss the impact of adult learners' previous encounters with learning. These previous experiences may contribute to weaker identities and dispositions to learning in the workplace. Individuals' identities and relationships to learning impact upon their current and future engagement with affordances of workplace learning. Three significant pedagogical practices, from a two-year workplace training programme involving adult learners from a regional Australian town, are offered as insights into the interrelationships of identity and learning. In doing so, this paper contributes to the discussions of identity construction through workplace learning. Adult educators are invited to reflect on the potential pedagogic practices which might contribute to and foster the reconceptualisation of learners' identities and their participatory trajectories within the workplace. © 2007, © 2007 Taylor and Francis Group, LLC.

Needlestick/sharp injuries (NSIs/SIs) are a serious threat to medical/nursing students in hospital internships. education for preventing NSIs/SIs is important for healthcare workers but is rarely conducted and evaluated among vocational school nursing students. We conducted an educational intervention for such students after their internship rotations before graduation. This program consisted of a lecture to the students after the internship training and a self-study brochure for them to study before their graduation. This study used the pre-test questionnaires completed by all students and the post-test questionnaires completed by 107 graduates after work experience as licensed nurses to assess the effectiveness of the intervention. After educational intervention, the incidence of NSIs/SIs decreased significantly from 50.5% pre-test to 25.2% post-test, and the report rate increased from 37.0% to 55.6%, respectively. In conclusion, this intervention significantly reduced the incidence of NSIs/SIs and increased the report rate of such events.

The development of professional identity amongst lecturers training to teach in further education (FE) colleges in England involves processes of adaptation. These partly take place during teaching placement in FE, as trainees navigate between their own anticipated professional identity and the identities which they feel under pressure to assume as they engage in their work with students. This article explores these processes of development, focusing in particular on the identities that trainee lecturers develop in their work with disengaged 16-19 year-old students. Using case studies of two trainee lecturers, the article explores the way in which they are pushed towards adopting what they see as a 'pedagogic', 'teacherly' identity, which they had previously associated with schoolteachers, in their work with such students. The article suggests that the notion of 'schooling' identities and cultures, whilst contrasting with the vocational habitus proposed by others, is a useful way to explore how cultures and identities in general FE are created through similar processes of identity construction and reconstruction.

[No abstract available]

This paper presents the results of a study comparing student learning in an inquiry-based and a traditional course in biotransport. Collaborating learning scientists and biomedical engineers designed and implemented an inquiry-based method of instruction that followed learning principles presented in the National Research Council report "How People Learn" (HPL). In this study, the intervention group was taught a core biomedical engineering course in biotransport following the HPL method. The control group was taught by traditional didactic lecture methods. A primary objective of the study was to identify instructional methods that facilitate the early development of adaptive expertise (AE). AE requires a combination of two types of engineering skills: subject knowledge and the ability to think innovatively in new contexts. Therefore, student learning in biotransport was measured in two dimensions: A pre and posttest measured knowledge acquisition in the domain and development of innovative problem-solving abilities. HPL and traditional students' test scores were compared. Results show that HPL and traditional students made equivalent knowledge gains, but that HPL students demonstrated significantly greater improvement in innovative thinking abilities. We discuss these results in terms of their implications for improving undergraduate engineering education. © 2007 Biomedical Engineering Society.

Purpose - This paper aims to present the viewpoint of David Wright, head of External Affairs for SELECT, the Electrical Contractors' Association of Scotland. Its purpose is to highlight the adverse impact on the electrical sector of a disconnection between the Scottish Executive's education and vocational training policies. Design/methodology/approach - The paper chronicles relations between the Scottish Executive vis-à-vis its education and vocational training policies and Scotland's electrical sector regarding the funding (or otherwise) of apprenticeships. Findings - The paper points out that the Executive is simultaneously promoting a rise in the number of apprenticeships and a rise in the number of pupils staying on longer at school. The paper found that this contradiction has arisen largely as a consequence of the Westminster decision to fund apprenticeships for all 16-18 year-olds rather than provide social security payments for anyone unemployed within that age group, while the Executive is simultaneously encouraging 16-18 year-olds to stay on at school by funding them to do so. It found that an 18 year-old leaving school seeking to embark on an apprenticeship will be unlikely to receive any funding, while a 16 year-old will be guaranteed funding. Practical implications - The paper covers SELECT's support for the policy promoted by the Scottish Parliament's Enterprise and Culture Committee for lifelong learning through the creation of individual learning accounts, whereby funding for vocational training is available to individuals of any age rather than restricted to narrow age parameters. It calls for funding programmes which recognise the practical consequences of the government's policies and which will enable people in their late teens and early 20s - and older - to train or retrain as apprentices. Originality/value - This paper is of value to policymakers, employees, school pupils and apprentices. © Emerald Group Publishing Limited.

Background and Purpose: Graduates of physical therapist education programs should be expected to function as competent clinicians. Instead, the benchmark for many clinical performance assessment tools has been "as good as an entry-level graduate." The authors developed the Clinical Internship Evaluation Tool (CIET), which measures clinical performance of the student relative to a "competent clinician." The purpose of this study was to provide evidence for validity of the tool. Subjects and Methods: The CIET was used to evaluate physical therapist student clinical performance from 1999 to 2003. Data from 228 student evaluations, a survey of 26 clinical instructors (CIs), and an item review by 7 faculty members were used to collect validity evidence. The relevance of items on the CIET was examined by the survey and the item review. Coefficient alpha was calculated to estimate internal consistency among the items. A Spearman correlation was used to examine the relationship between 2 measures of clinical competence. A repeated-measures analysis of variance (ANOVA) compared the student scores at each clinical time frame to confirm expected improvements in performance longitudinally. Evidence for practicality was collected by the CI survey. Results: Based on the faculty item review and the CI survey, all items were representative of skills and behaviors considered important for a clinically competent physical therapist. The internal consistency (alpha) was .98 for the patient management items. The average correlation of the 2 measures of clinical competence was .76. The repeated-measures ANOVA was significant and demonstrated improved patient management scores as the student progressed through the program. The CI survey results indicated that 96% of respondents agreed or strongly agreed that the instrument was short and easy to use. Discussion and Conclusion: The results of the study suggest that the CIET is representative of skills and behaviors necessary for students to perform at the level of a competent therapist and that the instrument is practical to use for busy clinicians. The CIET appears to be a valid tool for measuring student clinical performance and can be a time-efficient alternative for CIs in today's demanding clinical environment. © 2007 American Physical Therapy Association.

Purpose - To provide information and insight into the potential of reforms in full-time vocational education and training (VET) (practice firms in vocational colleges) in contrast with apprenticeships against the background of training market frictions in Germany. Design/methodology/approach - Structural information on the German VET system; empirical study (2006) within a research project to illustrate the didactical and social benefits of practice firms. Findings - Underlines that vocational colleges and practice firms within them are part of a "preparatory" system which predominantly serves further education needs and the follow-up intention to undertake an apprenticeship; confirms preceding research which put them in line with the "typical" full-time VET system. Research implications/limitations - Limitations are due to the focus on one type of full-time VET and the specific conditions in the federal state of Baden-Württemberg. Practical implications - Provides useful information to understand the nature of VET in a given country; insight into the limitations of full-time VET can help teachers to rethink co-operation with companies in general. Originality/value - Useful contribution to rethinking VET policy and to understanding limitations in the wake of an implementation of new forms of vocational learning against the background of culturally-rooted tradtions. © Emerald Group Publishing Limited.

Alitex and AnTech are offering vocational training and apprenticeship in collaboration with educational organizations. Alitex, leading upmarket glasshouses manufacturer, conducts lectures, educational tour as a part of their 'relationship building' with educational organizations. These activities includes courses, apprenticeship, vocational training on quality systems. The company has begun its second knowledge transfer partnership in which university researchers work within the company on specific problems that also help towards their postgraduate studies. AnTech's version of the Robson technique employs young people on real projects to advance its technology. The Year in Industry scheme provide work experience to gap-year students. AnTech has also developed a lecture by Shini Somarathne with the help of its engineers and schools, to help teachers on giving career guidance to pupils.

The varieties of capitalism literature has put skill systems at the center of comparative politics. Yet its claims about skill specificity are driven by two large coordinated economies, Germany and Japan. This article examines political change of skills in two small coordinated economies. Switzerland has expanded its general skills orientation, whereas Austria retains a highly specific skills system. The cause of this divergence is the different interests of small and large employers: Small employers are more cost sensitive than are large employers, which leads them to oppose the introduction of more general education. The study also shows that the primary measure of skill specificity used in quantitative work-vocational training share-is unreliable. It fails to distinguish between secondary and tertiary vocational training, which have opposite effects on skill specificity. The article develops and justifies an alternative measure-tertiary vocational training-that better predicts the skills clusters observed in advanced capitalism. © 2007 Sage Publications.