Vocational education and training

“ This type of education is designed to train the young person to earn a good living in that branch of work for which he seems best fitted. Some of the supporters of vocational education believe that this specialized form of training ought to be commenced very early and in connection with the regular curriculum. Others think that vocational education should not be attempted until the child has been given enough generalized training to enable him properly to perform the fundamental duties of citizenship.
But whatever its relation to the curriculum, vocational education is of great significance. ”

“ In terms of this very brief and sketchy analysis of the parts of life, and of these distinctions between work, play, and leisure activities, we now can see clearly the difference between vocational training and liberal education. Vocational training is learning for the sake of earning. I hope I step on nobody's toes too hard when I say, as I must say, that therefore it is an absolute misuse of school to include any vocational training at all. School is a place of learning for the sake of learning, not for the sake of earning. ”

“ The recognition of the mechanic arts, household science and agriculture, together with the attempt to reflect the major industries of the community, have brought the vocational idea in conflict with the traditional one of culture. A middle ground seems to be the saner position to take, since it is possible, and ought to be possible, for young people to secure a blending of liberal and vocational training at the same time, and through this combination education can receive the proper emphasis upon its social significance. ”

“ The growing importance in our industrial life of efficiency and practical training should not blind us to the fact that education is cultural as well as occupational or vocational. The education of an individual is not estimated alone by the degree to which he succeeds in practical affairs, but as well by the extent to which he shows evidence of training in the appreciation of moral, artistic, and literary values. ”

“ To remedy lack of occupational skills and employment difficulties, vocational skills training programs are provided. The education and training centers regard vocational skills as an important channel to improve the trainees’ employability. ”

“ Vocational training, as one of the mightiest weapons in the general system of cultural-industrial socialist education of the working class, may attain its object on condition that, together with the vocational training of the workers along the lines of skilled labor, they will also be given a general industrial education, acquainting them with the general questions of the condition of technical and industrial development, political economy, economic geography, and also the questions of administrative and technical management of an enterprise. ”

“ And in so far as all education is a preparation for such a life, all education is vocational. But within vocational education, which, as we have seen, is the whole of education, we may distinguish "general" education from "occupational" education; and the question we have to answer becomes, Ought education in the elementary school to be general or occupational? ”

“ Those who remain in the primary schools until fourteen will be of roughly two grades; those whose ability fits them for work of some skill in trades or in the humbler ranks of business, and those of very low intelligence who are naturally destined for unskilled occupations. The former will pass from the elementary schools into some form of vocational training; the latter will go straight into industry and will receive no further teaching other than what may be given in some kind of continuation class. ”

“ The higher intellectual education should grow out of and be earned by productive vocational training.
Hence our schools should be surrounded by lands of the best quality obtainable, plots of 10, 50, 100 and more acres. These lands should be the scene of labor that would be actually productive and not mere play.... In such a school the moral elements of labor should be primary, viz.: joy to the producer, through industry and art; perfect honesty in quality of material and character of workmanship; social coöperation, mutualism, and fellowship among the workers or students ”

“ This would require that three million young people of elementary-school age be continually enrolled in schools offering some form of vocational training. This was approximately three times the number of young people then enrolled in all public and private high schools in the United States, and following any kind of a course of study. In addition, the untrained adult workers then in farming and industry also needed some form of adult or extension education to enable them to do more effective work. ”

“ Organized labor at first looked with suspicion upon the movement, but is now more favorably disposed toward it. Vocational education should be clearly distinguished from manual training, which is merely a general education in the principles of skilful hand work without regard to any particular vocation or trade. Vocational education does not turn out a fully-trained worker, but only one who has practically finished the apprentice stage. ”

“ These consider that it is not sufficient that there be a close interlocking of the technical school and class and the factory. It is equally essential that vocational education, supported by public funds, shall be an integral part of the public-school system, of which it is indeed but a normal development, and therefore that we must have a unit and not a dual system. Only thus can we insure that vocational education will remain education at all and not just provide a training-school for docile labor as an annex and a convenient entrance hall to the factory system. ”

“ Fundamentally the core of the elementary curriculum must, I believe, always be the arts that are essential to every one who lives the social life. In other words, the language arts and the number arts are, and always must be, the fundamentals of elementary education. I do not believe that specialized vocational education should ever be introduced at the expense of thorough training in the subjects that already hold their place in the curriculum. And yet we are confronted by the economic necessity of solving in some way this vocational problem. ”

“ The Growth of Industrial Training.—The movement that is perhaps most widely discussed to-day is the introduction of vocational training into the systems of education. Social reasons for industrial education. There is now an especial need for this type of training. Since the industrial revolution and the development of the factory system, the master no longer works by the side of his apprentice and instructs him, and the ambition of the youth can no longer be spurred by the hope that he may himself some day become a master. ”

“ All the employer has a right to demand is that the school give the young worker a general pre-vocational training which will introduce him to the special trade work. The graduate of the elementary school should have been through a well rounded course which not only cultivated a general intelligence, but discovered, by submitting him to many different kinds of activity, his particular flair or knack, and thus enlisted his interest in further training for a particular vocation. ”

“ Vocational education is a mighty step in advance, which offers inspiring opportunities for the extension of general education, as an accompaniment of technical training, to those who might otherwise have secured neither. Ought we not to rejoice at the retention of boys and girls in schools, where they can be under the disinterested influence of teachers, whereas they might have drifted from one shabby and depressing experience to another until they had been able, perhaps, to "pick up a trade," acquiring their views of life and their ethical principles and habits who knows how? ”

“ The demand for vocational education has come from several sources: namely, from parents who believe that education ought to be directly related to earning-power; from teachers who are convinced that there is little or no educational value in drilling pupils in studies which do not interest them; from the general public which thinks the schools would render a larger social service in training pupils to vocational efficiency; and from enterprising employers who see in this form of education a chance to get a supply of trained workers without having to break them in as apprentices. ”

“ Throughout the survey the objective held constantly in mind was the formulation of a constructive program of vocational training in the public schools. In outlining the field of inquiry a clear distinction was drawn between those kinds of general education which have a more or less indirect vocational significance, and vocational training for specific occupations in which the controlling purpose is direct preparation for wage-earning. ”

“ Vocational secondary education encompassed the largest number of schools and was reported to enroll almost 50 percent of all secondary school students. These schools provided a one- or two-year program of combined general education and vocational training in all the trades necessary for the national economy. Vocational schools were usually organized at the locations of industrial enterprises and socialist cooperatives, and students were trained as skilled workers. ”

“ Please understand that I do not mean vocational training can be totally dispensed with; I mean only that it should be done on the job. It should be done as preparatory to work; and as preparatory to work, it should be compensated. ”

“ It is comparatively easy to urge the addition of narrow vocational training for those who, so it is assumed, are to be the drawers of water and the hewers of wood in the existing economic régime, leaving intact the present bookish type of education for those fortunate enough not to have to engage in manual labor in the home, shop, or farm. ”

“ And since the workmen-teachers earn their salaries by their work, the children get their industrial training practically without cost to the community. By the Gary plan the vocational training features are only practicable if all the other liberally varied “cultural” features are put into operation at the same time. ”

“ The only adequate training for occupations is training through occupations. The principle stated early in this book (see Chapter VI) that the educative process is its own end, and that the only sufficient preparation for later responsibilities comes by making the most of immediately present life, applies in full force to the vocational phases of education. ”

“ There is some ground for identifying specialized education with vocational education, largely because specialization has some reference to the division of labor and the diversity of occupations, and for identifying general education with liberal education because the efforts of general education are directed toward the liberal training of man as man. ”

“ In certain cases the secondary schooling may be completed within the framework of vocational training or the further education of the working people. All young people have the right and the duty to learn a vocation. ”

“ No plan of vocational training is presented, because at present the mills recruit almost exclusively from foreign labor, and only a very small number of boys from the public schools are likely to seek employment in them. The technical content of the work which might conceivably be given in evening classes, except in the case of the few directive and supervisory positions, is so small that continuation instruction offers but meager hopes of success. ”

“ Vocational education has come to stay, but its various forms and alliances have yet to be completely determined. The fear that vocational training will materialize and lower education is groundless, even in theory. To train carpenters and printers in schools instead of by apprenticeship is not a threatening educational revolution; doctors, lawyers, and engineers were once trained by personal tuition under practitioners. Vocational training has long existed in the higher professions ”

“ The organization of vocational training in junior high school grades presents many difficulties which cannot be solved by a more or less abstract study of educational and industrial needs. Experimentation on an extensive scale, covering a considerable period of time, is necessary before definite conclusions can be drawn as to the limitations and possibilities of such work. ”

“ The Union shall implement a vocational training policy which shall support and supplement the action of the Member States, while fully respecting the responsibility of the Member States for the content and organisation of vocational training. ”

“ The conclusions as to vocational training were based on an analysis of educational needs in the various metal industries, together with an extended study of the social and economic factors which condition the training of all workers. ”

“ Greater attention has also been paid to vocational training, with measures to enable incremental qualifications leading to degrees and diplomas as well as basic certification. One aim of this programme was to promote soft skills too, IT and English for instance, which would enhance employability, in particular for migrant workers. ”

“ The Commission estimated that a million new young people were required annually by our industries, and that it would need three years of vocational education, beyond the elementary-school age, to prepare them for efficient service. ”

“ From vocational education, introduced to meet the differing community needs, will result greater efficiency and better appreciation of the schools, increased attendance of pupils, greater compensation for teachers, greater productiveness, higher wages, and improved society. ”