What changes in education today will help prepare professionals who will be competitive in tomorrow’s labour market? Who will not be replaced by artificial intelligence? What should IDPs do to find a job in a new place? These and other pressing questions were discussed at a press conference at Ukrinform entitled “Results and Achievements of Vocational Education Reform”.
At the helm of… a tractor
A display with dozens of indicators, viewing the process on the screen in four projections, a high-precision optical sensor, automatic calibration, histograms, instant changes in activity if necessary… No, this does not describe medical equipment or an aeroplane steering wheel. This is an ordinary modern seeding machine. And it is driven by a tractor driver, a representative of a profession that many people still stereotype as uncomplicated and unprestigious.
– If you ask the first person you meet to describe what people in vocational education and training (VET) look like, they would definitely not imagine us as we are,” says Olena Kolesnikova, Chair of the Sectoral Council of the Federation of Metallurgists of Ukraine.
She believes that vocational education and training need to change their image. This is gradually happening through EU4Skills, a joint programme of the EU and its member states – Germany, Finland, Poland and Estonia – to support the reform of Ukraine’s vocational education and training sector. In particular, it aims to adapt training to the needs of the labour market.
Over the past five years, almost 300 vocational standards have been developed. These are what employers expect from their employees, and these modern standards have been used to redesign the training of specific professions in the VET system. But all this will be in vain if students continue to believe that vocational education is for failing students, for children from marginal families, that the learning process is boring and that the equipment is outdated.
International Olympiad for Craftsmen
One of the most important steps in changing this image has been the international World Skills competition. Its history is painfully relevant: the country needed to be rebuilt after the Second World War. So, in 1946, a competition for young craftsmen was organised, a kind of Olympics for skilled workers, to get young people interested in practical careers. Ukraine joined the competition seven years ago, but after the full-scale armed attack by Russia, the importance of such an image-building event has reached a new level (although there are difficulties in participating in the international finals abroad).
In Ukraine, the contest is held as a real show with guest pop stars, music bands, craftsmen, success stories, animators, hobby trainings, quests – everything that can be interesting for teenagers. The aim is not only to find the best students, but also to meet modern international requirements, which are the basis of the contest tasks. In our country, we have also introduced nominations for high school students: in robotics, mechatronics, network administration and the Internet of Things. Over the years, 2,800 young people have taken part in the competition. Many kids who have seen the competition have started to think that being a skilled worker is cool! Interactive tours of the stations representing the professions are organised for the guests: they can hear about them, try out basic operations, and test their knowledge in this field.
The second thing that will attract students’ attention to practical professions is the introduction of dual education. This is a form of education in which students spend up to 70% of their time in on-the-job training under the supervision of mentors. And 30% of their time is for studying theory at vocational schools. During the year, almost 12.5 thousand students from colleges and schools and almost 1.5 thousand companies were involved in dual education.
Working in the age of artificial intelligence
“The needs of the labour market will continue to shift towards blue-collar occupations,” predicts Dmytro Zagorodniy, Deputy Minister of Education and Science of Ukraine for Digital Development, Digital Transformation and Digitalisation. “This is because of the country’s recovery plans, but also because of global trends. I recently read a study in The Economist about the changes that the emergence of a new level of artificial intelligence will bring to the structure of employment in the world. The service sector will suffer the least: artificial intelligence will not be doing hairstyles or cooking in restaurants. But the IT sector and the legal services will change much more”.
Of course, blue-collar and service jobs will upgrade and adapt to new technologies. In the age of artificial intelligence, blue-collar and white-collar workers will complement it, not work in the old way. Work requires completely different skills than before, and the demands are growing, as are the salaries. That is why the Ministry of Education and Science has prioritized changing professional standards, updating curricula and selecting more modern teaching materials. For example, equipment has been purchased for 121 vocational schools.
The deputy minister stressed the importance of developing an effective management system. It is the management that can influence the quality of an educational institution. Therefore, VET managers should be given all the tools, freedom and training they need to implement change.
Fewer restrictions
Of all the tasks, developing public-private partnerships has been the most successful. Almost 450 training and expertise centres have been created thanks to this partnership. These are high-quality, modern workshops in various fields where children can acquire the necessary skills, and the institution can also provide services. For example, students can learn to cook in a modern kitchen while preparing meals for a neighbouring kindergarten and earning extra money. This experience should be scaled up.
Where do the students go to study after grade 8? Not where they have an interesting job or where they want to go, but to an educational institution closer to home. Parents don’t want to let their children go to other cities or regions, and problems with hostels don’t make their life either… Finally, changes in the law have made it possible to enrol in any vocational school, regardless of where the teenager is registered, and to study at a distance, regardless of where the teenager lives. The law also provides for the free acquisition of a second working profession.
How can you avoid becoming unemployed under martial law?
Nowadays, vocational training should not only concern young people. Because of the war, we have population displacement, the closure and destruction of many businesses, and people are forced to learn new trades. There are also victims of bombings or soldiers with physical injuries who can no longer lead their usual lifestyle. According to experts, inclusiveness should not only include the accessibility of educational institutions (e.g., ramps), but also be proactive in getting people to study. Unfortunately, many wounded soldiers and civilians are depressed and see no prospects for themselves. For example, yesterday’s highly qualified surgeon who lost his arm did not even consider attending a vocational school. Again, the stereotype comes into play: they will only teach you how to glue boxes or do something uninteresting and that brings in a penny. But in reality, modern professions are chosen for different nosologies. That is why we need specialists who motivate people not to focus on physical limitations and disabilities, but to be flexible and make a career in a new way.
“Many changes have been made to the legislation to enable adults to retrain as quickly as possible”, said Olha Koval, MP and member of the Verkhovna Rada Committee on Education, Science and Innovation.
“From now on, you can work legally if you have mastered a specific profession element, but not the whole thing. For example, you are not yet a pastry chef, but you know how to make cream for cakes and pastries? You quickly get a certificate and the pastry chef hires you as his assistant. This concept of partial qualification has been introduced by Draft Law No. 4147 (to be finally approved soon). This innovation will significantly reduce the time needed for retraining, which is very important for people who do not want to be unemployed. Last year, Law No. 7293 enshrined partial qualifications in labour legislation.
More recently, the priority of professional standards over qualification characteristics has been enshrined in law. What does this mean? While the job description simply lists the job functions, the standard provides information about what you need to know and be able to do to perform these functions. In other words, it links work to education. It also makes it easier to see the results of training and retraining directly in the workplace.
In addition to educational qualifications (confirmed by a document stating that a person has studied to be a plumber, for example, so that they can work), professional qualifications will now also be recognised. This means that a person can acquire the necessary competences in any way (in a company, through courses, online courses, on their own, or from a parent) and then have them confirmed by a qualification centre (an institution checking the level of qualification). Currently, there are only 14 such centres in Ukraine. Such changes in the law mean that non-formal (trainings, workshops, studios, webinars, online courses) and informal (self-study) education will be recognised. In particular, 24 online courses in various practical fields are available on the new learning platform Vocational Education Online. And 1,002 people have already validated their non-formal qualifications.
Soon it will be possible to acquire practical skills in the most comfortable conditions, in a way that suits a teenager.