The responsiveness and proactiveness of VET – a comparative case study report of changes in VET on the occupational level

How VET interacts with a work field is a key question for both VET policy and skills policy at large. Responsiveness of VET content to skill demands in the work field needs to be balanced against a proactive approach, where learners are provided with a broad range of skills, a solid knowledge base, and/or skills believed to be in demand in the future.

There is a key distinction between countries that have feedback mechanisms to adjust VET content rapidly to employer demands and countries where VET change more slowly through state-led or social-partner led processes. While the former countries run the risk of becoming too focused on short-term needs, the latter countries may be slow to react.

This cross-country study of change in VET content on the occupational level in four occupations shows empirical evidence of the above. In general, state- or social-partner led systems change more slowly than employer-led systems. However, there are also substantial occupational differences. In the industrial mechanic occupation for instance, Germany, with a social partner-led process have shown clear ability to reform VET content, while England, with a more rapid feedback mechanism, seems to have been able to both implement new technologies and keep a degree of consistency despite the many changes in the overall VET system.

The study also shows that introducing a greater degree of flexibility for firms to specialise training within a given national standard/curriculum has been a key response to adapt to change and heterogeneity across different types of VET systems.