Pinoy TVET

Optimizing Scholarships from Pork Barrel Funds to Address Skills and Manpower Gaps

2011-10-18T21:25:00.001+08:00

One of the most common strategies implemented by legislators in their respective constituency areas to address unemployment and underemployment is the allocation of certain amounts from their pork barrel funds (officially called Priority Development Assistance Fund or PDAF) for TVET scholarships.

This is one of the most common constituency programs of legislators for several reasons. First, scholarships are perceived by the public as "clean" programs, meaning, they are not usually associated with cases of graft and corruption; second, it has long-term and multiplier effect; and third, it has direct and personal impact on the constituents or their loved ones. However, if these scholarship funds are not directed towards employment, their implementation can have the opposite effect, and can damage the reputation of the concerned elected official or his party more than build it.

"Clean" Program

One of the difficulties for congressmen and senators in implementing projects out of their PDAF is the management of public perception of those projects. PDAF usually falls under two broad categories: "soft" and "hard". Soft PDAF is intended to address social, non-major infrastructure and relatively low-cost projects. These can include assistance to indigent patients, assistance to government hospitals in the purchase of medical equipment, distribution of PhilHealth insurance to poor constituents, livelihood programs, assistance to electrification programs, provision of fire trucks to local government units, construction or rehabilitation of irrigation facilities, and yes, provision of scholarships to poor but deserving constituents. Hard PDAF, on the other hand, usually deals with construction and similar projects.

There had been various scandals and accusations of corruption in all these projects but what seems to be mostly associated with anomalies in the mind of the public are the construction and construction-related ones. (Corollary to this, the Department of Public Works and Highways, the primary implementing agency of construction projects, has been tagged at various times as one of the most corrupt government agencies.) Thus, to avoid the complications of negative public perception, many legislators support non-construction projects with their soft PDAFs, and indeed one of these is scholarship.

Aside from the lack of negative perception in the mind of most constituents in general, the agency that implements these--the Technical Education and Skills Development Authority (TESDA)--has not been associated with major scandals involving congressional funds. (TESDA has been haunted by issues of unpaid scholarship slots implemented during the previous administration, but the damage seems to have been largely confined within TVET institutions that accepted the scholars; the scholars themselves were able to finish their courses without much trouble.)

Long-Term and Multiplier Effects

Filipinos generally put much value on education, even if the sole proof of that education is the diploma that hangs on the wall. Because of this, many families will willingly sacrifice concerns such as clothing, housing and sometimes even health so parents can send their children to school. With this mindset, most constituents will put much value to free training or schooling provided by a congressman or senator. Because training can last for months and constituents could indeed find productive work as a result of it, the scholarship assistance sticks to their minds for long. Also, because an employed person in a family can--and usually do--help the whole family sustain itself, scholarship programs have multiplier effects. They can translate into a favorable entry in the ballot not only from one voter but from several in the family, thus making the cost efficiency of the program very high.

Personal Impact

Ultimately, the decision to vote or not vote for a congressional or senatorial candidate is a personal one. Thus, for candidates that implemented programs that had personal impact on the most number of people, the decision of voters to maintain them in office is an easy one (barring election-time crimes such as vote-buying, intimidation, threats or illegal detention). Out of the premium that most Filipinos put on training and education, the personal impact of scholarship programs is high.

Connecting Scholarship with Employment

While, as mentioned, most Filipinos value training and education, more and more of them now understand that these things only become truly valuable to them when they result to employment (and income). The past administration seems to have already realized this; thus, when TESDA implemented massive government scholarship programs just before the election year, it demanded from recipient schools that the employment status of the scholars be reported as well.

The same policy continues to be implemented today. However, due to the tenuous nature of the global economic recovery, employment remains likewise tenuous and most companies still employ only for the short-term, with very little chance of renewal of employment contracts. This labor market reality needs to be considered when implementing scholarship programs from legislative allocations or pork. If most scholars of the program do not get employment or were only employed for very short period or find it hard to find work again after his initial employment, the intended positive effects of the program could easily translate to resentment or constituent frustration. And because most legislators put their names on the line in these scholarship programs through massive media exposure, the association of these programs with them becomes direct.

Several things can help put scholarship programs from pork barrel funds in their most efficient use, and thus continue to put their sponsoring legislators in best possible light as intended. However, the most important among these is the effectiveness of the program in helping the beneficiaries find employment. To attain these, it may be most helpful if concerned sponsoring public officials ensure freedom of the implementing and beneficiary agencies on the ground to determine the specific area of discipline or qualification (roughly, occupation or trade) based on labor market signals; and encourage conduct of tracer studies of the graduates.

Market-Driven Courses

Although legislators can specify the courses they want to be included in their scholarship programs, this should only be done if prior research and staff work had been done to ascertain that market demand is really along these courses. Without these, the scholarship program will probably just contribute to more skills mismatch and unemployment. A better approach--and one that is used by most legislators--is to only identify in broad terms the course areas of scholarship program based on broad market signals or government priorities. With this, the implementing agency will have the freedom to identify specific courses with real demand for graduates and avoid complications during the audit of funds.

Graduate Tracers

A good feedback mechanism for improving future scholarship programs is the conduct of tracer studies. Although the course offerings may have been based on solid labor market data, the employment rate of the graduates can still be affected by the quality of training they received, their personal intentions for taking the course and even internal decisions of key employers (especially in areas with limited industry players). To help legislators fine-tune the directions of their scholarship programs, it may be helpful if legislators are also provided with the results of these tracer studies.

Making scholarship programs from pork barrel funds facilitate jobs is of utmost importance both for improving the quality of life of constituents and preserving or enhancing the political value of any legislator. Thus, it is always necessary that they be directly connected to the requirements of the labor market and a mechanism for tracing the program outputs should be sustained and that data generated from this mechanism should be shared to the sponsoring official.

Nationalization of Middle East Labor Force: Early Signals of Future Changes in the Labor Market

2011-10-10T00:30:00.002+08:00

As countries that used to rely on expatriates for their technical manpower needs begin to nationalize their labor force, some of them are strengthening their partnerships with the Philippines along training of their trainers. Recently, the Technical Education and Skills Development Authority (TESDA) reported that the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia has trained 338 of its TVET trainers through its partnership with the government. This year, according to the report, 10 more Saudi nationals will be trained (via the MFI Foundation, Inc., formerly the Meralco Foundation) to conduct training in qualifications such as automotive servicing, electronic ignition system, electronic fuel injection, troubleshooting automotive engine systems and automatic transmission systems. Previously, trainers in qualifications such as food processing, multi-media, computer networks, video production, photography, refrigeration and air-conditioning repair were trained under the program. ("Saudi Tech-Voc Experts Undergo Training in TESDA," TESDA website; September 24, 2011)

The move of the Saudi government to even more strengthen the training of its own trainers is rooted on its intention to reduce unemployment rate (30 percent, according to some reports; official estimates report around 9.6 percent), diversify its economy (around 75 percent of its national income comes from oil) and improve its educational system. When attained, it is hoped that these will help reduce or prevent radicalism among its youth (around half of the kingdom's population is below 18 years old), make the economy more resilient and create a stronger foundation for the future through training and education.

Never Meant to Be Permanent

The use of expatriates (such as overseas Filipino workers) to provide manpower for its oil and gas industry was never meant to be permanent. ("An Integrated Approach to Combat Unemployment in the Saudi Labor Market," Asian Association for Social Welfare; accessed Oct. 10, 2011) Saudi Arabia (and other similar Middle Eastern economies) were forced to get their technical and professional workers from abroad when oil boomed during the 1970s while their own nationals were yet educationally and technically ill-equipped. Today, literacy rates in oil-rich countries in the Middle East have improved (Saudi Arabia, for example, has now 86 percent total adult literacy rate, according to the United Nations International Children Education Fund) but the number of foreign nationals working there remains significant (in Saudi Arabia, 5.6 million or around 20 percent of the total population), indicating that the need for foreign expertise remains large.

But the Saudi government and others in the region are determined to reverse that. One of the strategies is to establish universities, colleges and technical training centers where the faculty members and trainers are locals.

Previously, it was thought that university professors and technical-vocational trainers schooled in Western countries will be highly beneficial for the Saudi economy. Right now, however, it has been realized that it will be best to train native Saudi trainers in countries of similar economic development. Thus, one sees programs of the Saudi government involving the training of its technical trainers in countries such as the Philippines. However, the reason for training Saudi trainers in the Philippines is not limited to the similarity of economic status; Saudi companies have long utilized Filipino technical workers, are acclimatized to the their working habits and are comfortable with their levels of expertise.

Early Signals

The building of collective technical expertise of native Saudis is an early signal for Filipino blue-collar workers that sooner or later, Saudi Arabia and other countries in the Middle East may no longer be the biggest destination for skilled OFWs. It is also an early signal that there is a need to see further down the road, and train for qualifications that will be more and more needed while reducing those that will be taken over by the locals. It will still take years for the nationalization program of the workforce of oil-rich countries of the Middle East to take effect but it is something that the Philippines' TVET sector needs to take a close look.

Harmonizing TVET with Basic and Higher Education

2011-10-01T22:10:00.003+08:00

TESDA Director General Sec. Joel Villanueva recently announced during a forum with technical-vocational institutions that his agency is now working with the Department of Education and Commission on Higher Education to "harmonize" basic education and tertiary courses with technical-vocational education and training (TVET). (Philippine Information Agency, September 20, 2011) The primary reason for this seems to be to enable graduates or even dropouts of basic education (mainly, high school) and bachelor courses to get employable skills (provided by TVET) even if they move out of the system before they finish schooling. In this arrangement, TVET is inserted in basic and higher education as a sort of parachute that the student can open in case he needs to jettison out his course for one reason or another.

Philippine education cohort estimates indicate that for every 100 pupils who enroll in elementary, only 66 graduate and of this 66, only 58 are able to enroll in high school. Of the 58, 43 finish high school. Meanwhile, of those who graduate in high school, 23 will enter college and out of that, only 14 will be able to graduate. (Philippine TVET System, pp. 3-4; produced by the TESDA)

TVET as an emergency option seems viable due to the short time one needs to finish it and the ready jobs one can find when armed with technical skills. Of course, this assumes that the technical skills inserted in the course is relevant and demanded by the market. This issue of relevance aside, there are hurdles that the three government agencies (DepEd, TESDA and CHED), working together, need to overcome for TVET to be fully integrated--and harmonized--with basic and higher education. These include: transforming TVET training content in forms that gels with basic and higher education teaching content; training the trainers and re-configuring laboratory/workshop facilities, equipment, tools and materials; and overcoming bureaucratic mindsets and cultures.

Transforming Training Content

While all components of the Philippine educational system aim to help students apply theories and concepts in real life, they vastly differ on the depth and span of theories introduced to students, and the way they are applied. Basic education introduces theories in their most basic and rudimentary forms and attempt to connect them to common experiences of mostly teen-age students. Higher education, on the other hand, usually teach theories in more complex forms, depending on the course or "major" of the students. However, no direct application to the course is attempted for most of the peripheral subjects. Thus, for example, students of engineering may be required to take some history subjects but no attempt is usually made to connect the course with those subjects, although some creative professor might take students to an intellectual excursion to, say, the engineering works of Jose Rizal in Dapitan or to the grid system adopted by the Spaniards in designing occupied towns.

These complications are not present in competency-based TVET, and it is this no-frills, drop-them-if-you-won't-use-them approach to theories and practical applications that must somehow be emulated in basic and higher education for the students to still have enough time (and energy) to develop real, employable competencies. All these must be done without sacrificing the real requirements of the educational level (secondary or higher education) at hand. In other words, in transforming the content to accommodate TVET, both basic and higher education will need to become more focused and practical. Doing so seems attractive especially if one aims to produce employable skills among students but could prove to be contradictory to the notion that both basic and higher education should awaken and broaden the mind. The existence of this contradiction is very real, and seems to have been part of the cause of many unsuccessful attempts to wed TVET with higher education in some major universities in the country through ladderized programs.

Training the Trainers; Re-Configuring/Providing the Facilities

There have been attempts and there are on-going programs for high school teachers and college professors to train them to deliver TVET. These programs usually train them in the formulation of competency-based learning materials, in the actual delivery of competency-based training and in the conduct of competency assessments. (New trainers training programs being introduced now by TESDA trains them in the use of multi-media and the Internet in the delivery of training.) Although at the surface these trainers training seem all about content and delivery, deeper analysis indicate that there is also a need to help these teachers and university faculty members think more like training center trainers whose primary concern is to train employable workers, not necessarily more knowledgeable citizens.

Aside from the trainers, there is also a need to re-configure (or more accurately in many cases, provide) the school facilities (consumables, tools and equipment) that directly correspond to the qualifications being developed. This can require significant investment, not only for the direct purchase of the facilities but also for their housing, maintenance and utilization, and also for the creation of reliable partnerships between schools, universities or colleges with private firms. (Obviously, it will not be always efficient for schools to purchase equipment and tools, and the government may not have enough funds to purchase them anyway.)

Bureaucracies and Cultures

The original intent in tri-focalizing the educational system of the Philippines is to provide enough focus on each of its components, that is, basic education, technical-vocational education and training; and higher education. However, one of the unintended consequences of this is the evolution of different (and often conflicting) bureaucracies and cultures among the Department of Education (handling basic education), TESDA (for TVET) and the Commission on Higher Education (or CHED, handling higher education) that can tend to drag down any program that requires them to work together.

Because the insertion, or rather the harmonization, of TVET with basic and higher education requires arrangements that are deep and pervasive, these differences will have to be overcome at least to some degree as well. (Some have proposed to merge again the three government agencies partly to help overcome this, and fast-track programs that require them to fully cooperate with each other.)

The on-going attempt to harmonize TVET with basic and higher education is an important step and would be well the investment although it may take some time and some false starts before the system becomes truly workable.

Letting TVET Institutions Police Their Own Ranks

2011-09-21T23:15:00.000+08:00

Technical Education and Skills Development (TESDA) Director-General Sec. Joel Villanueva recently encouraged private institutions to help improve the quality of TVET education in the Philippines by helping police their own ranks to ensure that only qualified institutions which could help in the development of technical education and skills development are in the playing field. (Philippine Information Agency, September 20, 2011)

This is a bold statement and is an indication of a bold--and needed--direction for technical education and skills development of the country.

Actually, the development of self-regulating TVET bodies, including that of TVET institutions, has been one of the goals TESDA has been aiming for for sometime now but couldn't pursue fully due to structural hurdles it still need to overcome. Its charter, Republic Act 7796, seems to assume a strong presence of association of technical-vocational institutions when it provides that the TESDA Board--the highest governing body of the TVET sector--include two representatives from national association of technical-vocational institutions. Also, the charter seem to assume that these associations operate distinct and independent from any influence from TESDA or any of its created bodies.

For TVET institutions to be able to police themselves though, the following concerns may need to be addressed: nature of submission to the rules of TVET associations; commonly agreed upon standards for what is acceptable and not acceptable along TVET provision; transformation of compliance and process audits into peer reviews; and establishment of mechanisms for administering corrective actions to deficiencies of TVET institutions.

Nature of Submission to Association Rules

Right now, TESDA essentially produces the rules for TVET institutions to follow. Done in consultation with key industry players and other stakeholders, the main rule books for TVET institutions are the training regulations and the rules of the Unified TVET Program Registration and Accreditation System (UTPRAS). For TVET institutions to police themselves these regulations may need to become part of association rules. With that, the issue of whether schools submit voluntarily or mandatorily to these rules may need to be settled also. Since making submission to these rules voluntary could result in chaos and do-what-you-deem-best atmosphere within the sector, the rules may be thought of as mandatory issuance of the government that is administered by the TVET association. What complications could result from this arrangement will remain to be seen, and the issue of "who will police the police" may also be raised--and settled. (This could also result to eventually TESDA policing, not individual institutions but the TVET associations instead.)

Agreed Upon Standards

The training regulations and various UTPRAS-related issuances of TESDA, as noted, were produced using inputs from the industry and representatives of TVET institutions. However, these rules were not necessarily a product of consensus among TVET institutions. If TVET institutions shall police their own ranks, these standards will also have to be agreed upon by TVET institutions. Whether this shall be done through majority vote or complete consensus may have to be addressed, and this agreement shall need to assume that the standards they are agreeing to as associations are dictated by the employers/firms and they do not have much liberty to change them even if they are not comfortable with them. And along the way, some schools may need to be educated on the fact that their clients here the employers, and not the trainees (at least not at this point). When this is fully realized, the need for firms to sponsor training for potential employees or workers (perhaps as part of their corporate social responsibility though it has to be pointed out that this arrangement has actually direct bearing to their business operations) may also need to be addressed.

From Independent Audit to Peer Review

Today, TESDA conducts compliance and process audits to see to it that TESDA personnel and schools are complying with its UTPRAS regulations and so ensure that a common standard is being followed along administrative documents, trainer qualifications, school facilities and support facilities and the like. For schools to regulate themselves, this arrangement has to be transformed into a peer review where schools audit each other. The worst penalty may also have to be changed from recommendation to close the course to perhaps only suspend the course offering pending compliance with the agreed upon standard. The issues of who will compose the audit teams, how they will conduct the audits and when and how frequent and what schools will be audited may also need to be looked into. TESDA could remain to practice oversight on the audit process but it may only need to conform to or affirm the recommendations instead of approving them.

Corrective Actions

Finally, for TVET provider associations to regulate themselves, the issue of how violations or deficiencies will be dealt with has to be settled. Somehow, TESDA may have to maintain its function of monitoring compliance to commitments to correct deficiencies as identified during the audit, perhaps in coordination with the concerned audit teams.

Mechanisms to avoid the manipulation of the system for the benefit of only some institutions have to be installed, and this are the areas where TESDA may have to maintain an independent and authoritative presence.

Self-regulating TVET institutions that watch each other for the common good is a much-needed feature of the TVET sector in the Philippines. Complex and many issues will need to be addressed along the way but the effort is surely worth it.

Improving the Efficiency of Private Sector Investment in TVET

2011-09-20T00:12:00.004+08:00

Ever since the establishment of the Technical Education and Skills Development Authority or TESDA, private sector participation and investment in technical vocational education and training (TVET) has been encouraged. The thinking is that, since the private sector is the major provider and end-user of TVET, it should invest more in TVET.

However, it should be pointed out that private sector investment already comprises the majority of investment in TVET. In 2002, for example, about 54 percent of investment in TVET came from the private sector. It is however, interesting to note that more than half of this (around 53 percent or $58 million) came from the trainees themselves who paid for their training. Meanwhile, companies invested $32 million (around 30 percent of the private sector investment) and non-government organizations or NGOs invested $14 million (around 13 percent). ("Investment in Technical Vocational Education and Training in the Philippines," p. 66; published by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization's International Institute for Educational Planning)

When do we then say that these investments are worth it? While trainees and companies and NGOs may differ in the details on how they understand efficiency, the ultimate parameter for any investment in TVET would seem to be the ability of the investment to put manpower in jobs. The trainee pays for his training because he wants to get into a job; the company participates in on-the-job or dual training programs because it wants to help produce people that are skilled in positions that are in it (whether right now or in the future); and schools invest in TVET because they want their graduates to be qualified for jobs that exist inside the various firms.

The clarity of this parameter may vary to each of these stakeholders (some TVET institutions, for example, seemed not too concern on seeing to it that their graduates find jobs until TESDA began asking them to report where their graduates have gone after graduation) but, at least in theory, this is the reason why TVET exists. (Historically, a primitive form of TVET--apprenticeship--indeed directly linked training with work: the father taught his son his trade, and the son taught his son the same, and so on.)

There are several things that may be considered in making private sector investment in TVET more efficient. These include lessening the gap between the investment and the jobs available, training the right people for the right jobs and continuously adjusting to reflect new industry/workplace realities.

Narrowing the Gap Between the Investment and the Jobs Available

Any investment in TVET should be as efficient as buying prescription medicine: you pay for what is needed. This is not however what usually happens. Both the buyers (students, mainly) and the sellers (schools, local government units and others) of TVET are often not fully aware of what qualifications are needed in the labor market and thus their transactions often produce outputs (TVET graduates) that are not needed or only needed in small volumes by the labor market. The primary losers here are the students because they invest in something that is not the exact thing they need to land a job--something like buying a mobile phone that needs a lot of configuring and visits to the technician before you can fully use it. Not only the supply side (students who graduate and join the labor force) suffers here. Eventually,those on the demand side encounter difficulties too: companies cannot find workers that possess the exact technical competencies required by the vacancies and thus will need to train or upgrade them thus incurring productivity costs while their new workers are trying to learn the ropes. Again, the purchase of a misconfigured or broken cell phone analogy applies.

This problem can be corrected when there is a good flow of labor market information from the employers to the TVET providers and the trainees or workers, and when this information is correctly translated into training by the TVET providers. Easier said than done, but this seems to be the only way to narrow the gap between the investment in TVET and the jobs available.

The Right People for the Right Jobs

Not all TVET trainees can be trained as call center agents just because a certain area needs a lot of them; nor can all trainees be trained in welding, just because there is high demand for these in the labor market. When a person is trained in a qualification where he does not have the aptitude for, it will be very difficult for him to attain full productivity even if he passes its training requirements or passes the competency assessment. When the person cannot attain full productivity, any investment or resource consumed in training him cannot be maximized. Thus, persons who want to enroll in a training program should first see to it that they have aptitude for the qualification where the training leads and TVET institutions should administer aptitude and similar tests to prospective trainees or at least require documents that indicate their fitness for the course such as their National Career Assessment Examination (NCAE) result.

Continuous Adjustment

Because the ultimate destination of any investment in TVET is the workplace, it should be directed towards what the workplace requires. The workplace, however, is a moving target; it continuously changes as market requirements change. Because of this, investments in TVET ought to change also in terms of direction based on these new market realities. Thus, TVET graduates need to continuously acquire new training to keep them updated, schools need to adjust their curricula, equipment, facilities and trainer qualifications; and companies need to let their on-the-job trainees or dual training students use new equipment or try new technologies.

Improving the efficiency of private sector investment in TVET is a must if that investment is to be expected to grow. However, this requires narrowing the gap between the investment and the demand of the labor market, putting the right people in the right training so the right people are produced for the right jobs and continuously tweaking the direction of the investments to follow closely what is needed in the workplace.

Integrating TVET In Basic Education

2011-09-10T21:23:00.001+08:00

The Philippine government has been integrating some sort of technical-vocational skills in basic education. For many years now, parts of competencies found in the current Technical Education and Skills Development Authority (or TESDA) training regulations of courses such as crop production, horticulture, tailoring, carpentry and commercial cooking have been included in elementary and high school subjects one way or another. Recently though, the Department of Education has decided to fully insert whole qualifications for National Certificate Level I (for most qualifications) and National Certificate Level II (for a few) in the high school curriculum. (High school students will be submitted to TESDA competency assessments after finishing the qualifications.) In fact, more than half a billion pesos has been allocated for continuing the implementation of this program during the next several years. (Philippine Daily Inquirer, September 9, 2011)

Agri-Fishery Sector as Priority

Budgetary information seem to indicate that agri-fishery qualifications are being prioritized under this program (called Strengthened Technical-Vocational Education Program or STVEP), together with those related to arts and trade. There are a couple of reasons why this is a good decision on the part of the government:

One, the agri-fishery sector is dominated by independent practitioners and contractors, and thus workers are not required to fulfill the same qualifications in terms of age, work experience and educational attainment as with workers in other sectors such as manufacturing or technology-related services.

And two, the agri-fishery sector usually acts as the "shock absorber" of the economy. When employment in other sectors contract, that of the agri-fishery sector usually expands.

It must be noted though that the broad intention of the STVEP program is to prepare high school graduates to pursue bachelor's degree in college, have further technical-vocational training in TVET institutions or to put up their own businesses as entrepreneurs. It is also the intention of this program to prepare them for work after their graduation should they be unable to pursue further training.

Implications to the TVET Sector and the Labor Market

Integrating TVET into the high school curriculum has a couple of implications, both for the suppliers of TVET outside basic education and the labor market itself.

First, although not all high schools are right now offering STVEP programs, TVET institutions need to upgrade their course offerings from mostly National Certificate Level II (or NC II) programs to higher levels of qualifications such as NC III and NC IV, especially in courses that are being included in high schools with STVEP programs. This is to ensure that there will continue to have demand for their courses, and also to capture high school graduates who have acquired NC I and NC II qualifications and who want to get higher level qualifications. This should be especially true to TVET institutions that share the same service area or location as STVEP high schools.

Second, if high schools will continue to produce graduates with NC I and NC II qualifications outside the agri-fishery sector (a real possibility despite apparent efforts from the Department of Education to focus more on agri-fishery qualifications), the labor market will soon have a significant volume of workers who have qualifications equal to qualifications possessed by TVET graduates now, and who might be willing to produce the same work for lower wages.

Right now, there are already high schools that produce graduates with national certificates in automotive mechanic, computer hardware servicing, finish carpentry; and heat, ventilation and air conditioning (HVAC). (Usually, firms are willing to give higher wages for workers with higher educational attainment. Thus, right now, firms usually pay higher wages to college graduates compared to TVET graduates; TVET graduates higher than high school graduates, and so on.)

This is an uncomfortable consequence of the STVEP program, but something that should be minimized as the TVET sector re-configures itself to this new reality of the labor market. This, of course, is assuming TVET institutions will upgrade themselves, as suggested above.

Work-Ready

Integrating TVET into basic education is a good thing since this could enhance the work-readiness of high school graduates by equipping them with real, certifiable competencies thus helping them find work even if they don't pursue training beyond high school. However, the TVET sector has to adjust itself to the entrance of new suppliers (high schools with STVEP); and decision-makers in the labor market and firms have to prepare themselves for the entrance of work-ready high school graduates.

Something from Amazon.com that might be of interest:

The Role of TVET in Pacific Secondary Schools: New Visions, New Pathways (Pacific Education Series, 7)

Synchronizing Local Government TVET Programs with Its Economic Directions

2011-09-08T00:52:00.001+08:00

Local government units (LGUs) remain among the most valuable implementers of technical-vocational education and training (TVET) program in the Philippines. In 2002, around a third of public expenditures on TVET (or around PhP1.56 billion) came from local government units. ("Investment in the Technical Vocational Education and Training in the Philippines," p. 67; published by the United Nations Educational Scientific and Cultural Organization and the International Institute of Educational Planning) Most TVET training conducted by LGUs are short-term courses (ranging from a few hours to several months) and are often along well-known qualifications or occupations such as automotive mechanic, welding and electrical installation and maintenance. TVET courses funded but not directly conducted by LGUs are often along courses whose trainer, equipment and/or supplies requirement are beyond local government budgets such as advanced welding and heavy equipment operation or servicing.

While graduates of these courses are relatively easy to employ both abroad and locally, many LGUs implement these without establishing firm connection between these qualifications and the actual gaps in the local middle level manpower. Thus, LGUs often produce graduates for other areas to employ (by export processing and special economic zones, for example) while ignoring qualifications whose graduates it needs to move forward its own economy. There are several reasons for this, including the failure of the local community training and employment coordinator (or CTEC) to base his community-based training programs to the local investment plan; dogmatic reading of the figures for manpower demand in the provincial technical education and skills development (TESD) plan or absence of any local TESD plan; and the tendency of some local governments to operate their community-based training on auto-pilot.

Local Investment Plan

The local investment plan is a document that ought to be produced by all LGUs of the Philippines. This document indicates, among others, the development strategies that the local government will adopt during the next several years, together with budget allocation, the source of the budget, the timeline for implementing activities along each strategy, the expected outcomes and the legislative support that will be needed. The document also indicates (at least in broad terms) particular industries that will be promoted within certain cluster areas, and thus is a good guide for finding out what community-based trainings will be needed. This however, should be done after consulting with other local development documents such as the Comprehensive Land Use Plan, the local tax code, the executive and legislative agenda together with current employment and labor force data.

TESD Plan

Every now and then, the Technical Education and Skills Development Authority or TESDA produces the TESD plan which indicates gaps in the manpower for specific industries for the next three years or so. The TESD plan, however, is not meant to provide the exact or actual manpower demand in a certain area; it is often regarded in practical terms only as a guide for TVET planners but never a Bible where nothing could be added or subtracted. For one thing, the firms selected for consideration in the tabulation for the plan are often selected because of their perceived dominance in the area or market under consideration. This means that smaller firms (which are often greater in number) may not be included in the data, or their aggregate estimated requirements may only be added later during the validation process. Thus, the figures in the provincial TESD plans are often best taken as benchmark indicators, and not to be taken dogmatically.

Because of the indicative nature of the provincial TESD plan, LGUs need to ascertain for themselves the figures for manpower supply and demand for for specific economic drivers or industries that are vital for their local economies. They need to replicate the process of gathering data from the field and sitting down with industry decision-makers and find out how they plan to expand (or contract) in terms of manpower during the next several years. Thus, whether LGUs realize it or not, there is a need for them to translate the Provincial TESD Plan into local TESD plans that will provide decision-makers with a snapshot of the supply and demand of skilled manpower in their community.

Auto-Pilot

Once in a while, LGUs implement community-based trainings that are very popular to the constituents. Especially when officials who implemented these get re-elected and re-elected, these programs often continue to get funded and implemented and publicized even though actual local gaps for these courses have already been filled and the training programs are now actually producing surpluses. Sometimes, the auto-piloting of training is forced, especially when the LGU has already invested heavily for the equipment and tools and workshop buildings, and not using them could cause negative publicity for the politicians who authorized their acquisition.

Local TESD Body

To fully synchronize community-based trainings with the economic directions of a certain locality, there may be a need to create a local body composed of representatives from the different stakeholders of local TVET and the local economy. The CTEC and local chief executive ought to be part of this (often with the local chief executive as the chair) together with representatives from the local industry and employers. This body can then draft the local TESD plan anchored on the locality's investment plan, the provincial TESD plan and the actual data on manpower demand for key industries.

Once the local TESD plan has been formulated, it will now be easy for the CTEC to formulate the training plan which will indicate training programs (perhaps for implementation during the whole term of the elected officials) that are consistent with the economic goals of the locality.

Related reading materials from Amazon.com:

Vocational Technical Education Skills Development Planning, Electronic Materials: Electronic components detection and identification
Planning for Technical and Vocational Skills Development: Fundamentals of Educational Planning Series No. 94
Quality Improvement in Adult Vocational Education and Training: Transforming Skills for the Global Economy

Considering Apprenticeship as a Strategy for Generating Skilled Workers

2011-09-07T00:41:00.004+08:00

The apprenticeship program is one of the means private companies use to generate skilled workers for their specific needs despite mismatches between their requirements and the skills possessed by job applicants. A training modality under what are classified as enterprise-based training (others include learnership and on-the-job training), trainees learn by observing and learning from experienced skilled workers inside the company. Technical Education and Skills Development Authority director-general Sec. Joel Villanueva recently encouraged private firms to step up their participation in the apprenticeship program as a means of getting workers because "the best place to acquire skills is in the workplace". (Manila Bulletin, September 3, 2011)

Considering apprenticeship as a generator of skilled workers involves several things for the firm. The following are some of them:

Are the competencies and skills needed by the firm not available in the present pool of unemployed who are looking for work? The pool of possible applicants remains large as around 7.4 percent or 2.91 million Filipinos remain unemployed and around 40 percent of these had some college or tertiary level education. (Philippine Star, March 16, 2011) It has to be considered that there is a significant surplus of education, nursing, business administration, information technology, and hotel and restaurant management graduates (and more in the pipeline). (Philippine Star, September 5, 2011) In addition, more than 23,000 employed skilled and professional Filipino workers have been laid off here and abroad as a result of the financial crisis. (Department of Labor and Employment [DOLE], cited in Philippine Daily Inquirer; Trabaho Philippines.Net, January 28, 2011) If the skills the company is looking for are possessed already one way or another by the unemployed, then it may be more costly to train apprentices who do not have qualifications or who do not have the work experience for the vacancies. Doing so would be like building a house from the ground up when you have the option of moving in to a finished unit at lesser cost. (It should be noted that only those do not have the skills or the experience in an occupation are qualified for the apprenticeship program.)
Is the number of workers needed more than 20 percent of the regular workforce? Department of Labor and Employment Order No. 68-04 ("Guidelines in the Implementation of the Kasanayan at Hanapbuhay Program") prohibits companies from participating in the apprenticeship program when the number of apprentices exceeds 20 percent of the regular work force. The intention behind this prohibition is to avoid abuses of the program, but this can close the chance for a fast-growing company to acquire a sizable number of its workers through the apprenticeship program especially during the times it needed the most to train and hire people.
Are the occupations pertaining to the vacancies "apprenticeable"? Not all occupations (or vacancies for that matter) can be applied under the apprenticeship program. Generally, only "employers in the highly technical industries" are permitted to apply for apprenticeship programs and "only in apprenticeable occupations" as approved by the DOLE. (Articles 60 and 61 of the Labor Code) Thus, if the vacancies the company wants to fill-up are not included among the occupations approved for the apprenticeship program, then it cannot implement it.

From these, the apprenticeship program would seem to work best in companies needing workers in highly technical or specialized aspects of their operations whose competency requirements are not present ins substantial form among their pool of applicants or from what they can get out of the unemployed; the number of workers that will be accommodated is not huge and the occupations to be filled-up are apprenticeable. Despite the limitations, the apprenticeship program can be an effective tool for creating skilled workers for the company (as mentioned by Villanueva) since:

Apprentices learn the exact technologies, processes and techniques used by the company thus making him productive even before his regular employment; and,
The company saves 25 percent in the labor cost since it can pay apprentices only 75 percent of the minimum wage or enjoy an additional deduction from taxable income of 50 percent of the value of labor training expenses, if it pays them the full minimum wage.

For companies that will do their homework, these could be enough incentives to pursue apprenticeship program. For those that won't, doing so could be highly inefficient.

Books on apprenticeship from Amazon.com worth reading:

200 Best Jobs Through Apprenticeships

Enterprise-based Technical and Vocational Education and Training: Enterprise-based Technical and Vocational Education and Training in the Developing World - Innovation, Studies and Cases

Dealing with the Complexities of Competency Assessment

2011-09-04T02:20:00.003+08:00

Competency assessment is the mechanism being used by the Technical Education and Skills Development Authority or TESDA to determine whether a certain worker meets the minimum industry standard for a particular job (or more precisely, qualification) as indicated in the training regulations. At first glance, it appears that competency assessment is nothing but the final hurdle every graduate of TVET or any practitioner of a blue-collar worker should pass in order to be regarded as a legitimate practitioner of a particular qualification. (After passing it, a TVET graduate or skilled worker can apply for a national certificate or certificate of competency depending on the the competencies he passed during the assessment. These certificates then can be used to vouch for the skills of the person.)

Competency assessment, however, has inherent complexities that TVET graduates and blue-collar workers have to deal with.

First, most companies in the Philippines at present do not really require their workers to get national certificates; it is the government that does. Many companies have their own standards and it is these standards that they actually use in evaluating job applicants and the performance of their workers. However, they may require some of their workers to have national certificates because these certifications are required by agencies such as the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) and the Department of Labor and Employment (DOLE) in relation to the application or renewal of business licenses. Thus, workers need to pass at least two skills tests: the competency assessment administered by TESDA and the skills evaluation of their company administered by the human resource office. While it appears there is a duplication (and thus, an inefficiency) here, there is actually none or only very little: the TESDA assessment is often regarded as the basic skills test while the company assessment is regarded as a validation and an assessment of skills that are specific to the company.

Second, competency assessments are not fool proof. Test questions can be outdated, they could be leaked or bought and competency assessors might turn out to be inept. These things are not supposed to happen and TESDA seems to be doing all it can to prevent these from happening but there are reports that, like any exam where something very valuable is at stake, these things are actually happening. To be sure, irregularities in the conduct of competency assessment are rare but as noted, every person submitting himself for assessment has to keep in mind that these things can and do happen.

Third, possessing a national certificate is not always equal to higher salary. Although one of the intents of competency assessment is to enable competency assessment passers to get higher salaries, this is not always what happens. As of now, there is no law requiring employers to give higher salaries to workers who passed competency assessment (and were issued national certificates or certificates of competency). Thus, certified workers often enjoy salaries that are just around equal to (if not actually less than) those earned by other workers in their company. For now, the real and effective determinants of salary are the minimum wage set by the DOLE, relevant experience, educational attainment, results of the interview; and, for workers already employed, work performance.

Minimizing these complexities require that the issues not be addressed within one or two government agencies only. Based on experiences of other countries with better worker certification systems, it is necessary that all involved government agencies continue to work together to create consistent and synchronized policies that are embeded under one system that is easy to monitor and adjust as the need arises.

Books of interest from Amazon.com:

Competency assessment methods: History and state of the art
A Practical Guide to Assessment Centres and Selection Methods: Measuring Competency for Recruitment and Development
Ahp Competencies: A Method for Effective Assessment
A Teacher's Guide to Performance-Based Learning and Assessment

Shaping the Decision to Enroll in TVET

2011-09-02T12:07:00.002+08:00

Buying training is often like buying a new house: you get something valuable but you live with the consequences for a long time. Despite this, many people enroll in TVET courses without proper perspective. Part of the blame goes to the individual trainee himself, to common perceptions of TVET, to how schools market their courses and indeed how the TVET sector sees itself in relation to the labor market.

The Person Himself

Many trainees of TVET enroll in TVET as a last recourse (perhaps because they did not pass the college entrance test or perhaps because they do not have the money to enroll in bachelor's degree courses) and thus think little about whether the course fits their aptitudes and interests; whether there is demand for the graduates of that course during the next several years (and thus ensure that they have consistent career paths); whether their physical conditions are suited for the rigors of the job that will result from the course; and whether the career path that the course will open to them is really what they like in the long haul. Often, trainees enroll simply because of some good news they heard, read or have seen in the media or some success story they heard from their friends. There is nothing wrong with considering these indicators (actually even some analysts of TVET use these signals, but they always validate them with solid market data) but in the end, one has to think with a career, not just a job, in mind.

Common Perceptions

The mind of the person doesn't exist in a vacuum. When the decision to enroll in a course is made, it is always the result of inputs that entered the mind from the outside, and this outside information is often shaped and colored by common perceptions. The media is an influential force here but so are the unwritten rules of culture ("a medical doctor should be more intelligent than an expert mechanic"; "you should enroll in welding because you are not good in class"), peers ("all my friends are into computer programming") and family ("your father provided well for you because he is an electrician in the Middle East and he wants to recommend you to his company after you graduate"). The problem with common perception is that it is highly circumstantial and often does not see much beyond the curve. It is pragmatic, and is nothing but the collective interpretation of diverse perceptions. When seen this way, the trainee might be alarmed to realize that what he has been told or what is commonly thought of is built on shaky, if not dangerous, assumptions.

Marketing

How schools market their courses can sometimes forcefully influence the decision of a person to enroll. We are not talking here about misleading advertisements or false promises. Often schools invest in their course offerings for the long-term, and often, once their systems are in place, they tend to ignore shifts in market requirements or new realities in the workplace. Thus, a school with registered courses along certain qualifications will continue to market those courses even if demand for graduates of those courses have already declined or have already shifted to something that might still bear some semblance to it but has now significant changes in the core. This could be corrected by keeping the curriculum (and the trainers, equipment and tools) updated but in many cases, this is not what happens. In a country like the Philippines (as in some other Asian countries), training institutions often utilize training inputs for as long as they can. In many cases, the only source of career information a trainee gets is the school. If the school markets this or that course, that is where the trainee will enroll complete with all the inadequacies it acquired through the years.

Collective Esteem

Each sector has its own collective esteem. Doctors see themselves as a group in relation to say, engineers or mechanics, in some way. The same is true with the TVET sector of a certain region or area in relation to the industry and to the training public. If it sees itself as a minor supplier (whether in terms of volume or quality) of the labor force, then its policies, expectations and programs will be shaped that way. If it sees itself as an important creator of production, services and goods, then its actors will reflect that view. All these, in ways that often run in the subconscious, are what the trainee will get and will shape how he decides.

With these, it is always important that the trainee get his information from multiple sources, often differentiating the claims from the facts, the short-term from the long-term, the substance from the hype. Also, it is important for the TVET sector managers and policy makers to continue to provide career information independent of interests of individual schools, to provide these in ways the reaches those who need them and to communicate them in ways that they can understand.

Some books from Amazon.com that might be helpful:

The Career Adventure: Your Guide to Personal Assessment, Career Exploration, and Decision Making (4th Edition)
Making Career Decisions that Count: A Practical Guide (3rd Edition)
Turning Points: Your Career Decision Making Guide (3rd Edition)
Drinking from the Fire Hose: Making Smarter Decisions Without Drowning in Information (Portfolio)

Re-Educating the Public About TESDA

2011-09-01T20:05:00.005+08:00

Advocacy and promotion is one of the constant programs of the Technical Education and Skills Development Authority (TESDA). Through the years, and through many directors general, it has tried to project an image to the public through purchase of media block times, information caravans, industry-government organization partnerships, distribution of literature intended for the masses and similar activities. In all these, there seems to be basic questions in the public's mind it tried and continues to try to answer. Among them:

Is TESDA training? Even before TESDA became TESDA (that is, before National Manpower and Youth Council, Department of Education's Bureau of Technical Vocational Education (BTVE), and the Department of Labor and Employment's Apprenticeship programs were fused under one authority through Republic Act 7796), the most prominent body for technical training was, well, equivalent to training in the public's mind. And rightly so. Complex NMYC's inner workings might have been, it's main thrust was that of training. When TESDA was created, the people of NMYC formed its core. Thus, although there may be big differences between the intention for TESDA from that of NMYC, corporate culture and mindset more or less remained that of NMYC. As TESDA moved on, many among its employees had NMYC mindsets--technical training. Since most of these employees are the ones people tend to have direct contact with, the public remained to associate TESDA with training. Although there are now significant changes in the way corporate TESDA thinks of its of itself, the training mindset remains one of the "baggages" from which TESDA tries to disassociate itself.

Is TESDA the regulator of TVET? For better or worse, this perception seemed to have surfaced when TESDA began to assert itself along well, regulation of TVET courses, mainly through its Unified TVET Program Registration and Accreditation System (or UTPRAS). Especially when TESDA sought the assistance of local government units and the media in calling the attention of schools that thought they could just offer short-term or technical courses like they used to, technical school administrators began to think of TESDA as a big brother who watches their every move. This was somehow reinforced by programs originally meant to improve the quality of TVET such as compliance audits and quality awards. Right now, many schools vacillate between regarding TESDA as a hindrance and protector of their institution depending on how it is easy for them to comply with its course registration requirements. Again, this is another burden many TESDA officials and personnel have to contend with especially when directly dealing with training institutions.

Is TESDA the TVET equivalent of Professional Regulation Commission (or PRC)? The PRC regulates the issuance of licenses to professionals such as that for engineers, nurses, doctors and teachers. With TESDA's competency assessment program where skilled workers get certified as possessing the minimum skills for a particular qualification (or roughly, occupation; the two terms are not actually equal) skilled workers (and employers) began to associate TESDA with licensing. This was reinforced when other government agencies such as the Department of Trade and Industry began requiring at least some of the technical workers of shops to have competency certificates from TESDA related to their business. Because of these, problems attached to licensing began to seep through TESDA's bureaucracy also including that of bribery, stealing or selling of competency assessment questions and outright falsification of national certificates.

Is TESDA scholarship? This thinking is not as rooted as the previous ones since TESDA got associated with scholarships just recently despite years of implementation of PESFA programs. (PESFA stands for Private Education Scholarship Fund Assistance.) This is probably because the most recently government scholarship programs implemented by TESDA were done with much hype, complete with jingles, dedicated radio programs and personalities. Due to the massive funds infused to scholarships such as the Pangulong Gloria Scholarship program of the past administration, some schools hastily put up courses simply to qualify as training institutions for the courses included in the program. While what TESDA paid to the schools for conducting the training programs was actually not that much per head per course, the massive volume of students targeted under the program produced economies of scale that made the offerings attractive. Thus, for some students TESDA became the equivalent of free training and for some schools, it became synonymous with what is now subsidized training. As TESDA moves on to pursue other programs related to its primary objectives under its charter, it has to struggle with issues (such as unpaid scholarship vouchers) and mindsets associated with scholarship programs.

TESDA is also associated with things and ideas aside from those mentioned above. But these seems to be the most prominent boxes it has to get itself out when communicating itself to the public. The story is much like the blind men of Hindustan touching different parts of an elephant: there is some truth to each of these but one has to take a look at who is talking and where he stands. Each is a partial and often distorted picture of the agency and each is a reason why TESDA, like many government agencies of the government, has to constantly include promotion and advocacy in its programs.

Some books from Amazon.com that might be of interest:

Advocacy: Championing Ideas and Influencing Others
Cardinal Rules of Advocacy: Understanding and Mastering Fundamental Principles of Persuasion
Advocacy
Advocacy in the Human Services

When Disaster Strikes: How TVET Institutions Can Participate in Quick Response Efforts

2011-08-30T00:38:00.003+08:00

As another very strong typhoon leaves the Philippine area of responsibility (16 dead, PhP21.3 million damages to roads, bridges and irrigation facilities in Cagayan alone; Philippine Daily Inquirer, August 29, 2011), local government units and various government agencies are scrambling to put into place activities that are intended to help the affected provinces get back to their feet. In most cases, the immediate concerns include the restoration of road networks, electricity, water facilities and communication lines. After these however, the concerns will begin to move on to helping the local economy recover from the damages to crops, loss of properties and paralysis of business activities.

To help them do this, local government units can implement quick response programs which, in essence,are economic recovery packages that involves various government agencies and partner private and non-government organizations. For local government units that have already tried implementing these programs, the most prominent players usually include the Department of Public Works and Highways, Department of Health, the Philippine National Police, the Department of Education (mainly for the schools that also act as evacuation centers) and the Department of Social Welfare and Development. The Technical Education and Skills Development Authority, much less the public and private technical-vocational institutions, often only have minor role in these programs. However, this is often not due to the inherent lack of relevance of their services but often due to the limitations in the perception of what this government agency and the TVET sector in general can do.

In reality, TVET institutions can do much in implementing post-disaster quick response programs for local government units. A couple of them:

Restoration of damaged public buildings and similar infrastructures through training cum production schemes. After a severe disaster, people often need extra income to cope with the damages. Unemployed persons often need to work to supplement the expected family income, which in some cases, could be delayed or diminished if not totally wiped out. Meanwhile, local governments need to restore infrastructures fast. More workers will be needed in the short-run. A training program for example, in carpentry and masonry or electrical installation and maintenance for the people of the affected communities, would be very helpful in giving the unemployed (or even the employed who cannot report for work for the meanwhile) a chance to gain income (perhaps paid for by the local government or the local electric cooperative) while he helps rebuild his own community.
Restoration of farm lands through planting of fast growth, high value crops. Especially after a very bad typhoon, crops that are supposed to be harvested could not be harvested because they have been destroyed. Meanwhile, farmers who are expecting to earn from them are often left with debts from the purchase of the farm inputs. To help them attain some income, local government units can provide seeds for fast-growth, high values crops that could grow and be harvested within three to four weeks or so. The distribution of these free farm inputs should be coupled with a quick technical training especially if the concerned farmers have been planting traditional crops such as rice or corn. Many high-value, fast-growth crops thrive well in silted soil--a common condition after a flood.

What particular interventions TVET institutions can participate in the post-disaster, quick-response programs of the local governments depend much on reliable information as to the exact extent and location of the damages, the capabilities of the various TVET institutions and the resources that are available. These however, need to be identified and assured long way before disasters happen, not after, if the program is to be truly effective. Thus, it is necessary that local chief executives involve TVET institutions in formulating disaster response strategies, together with other government agencies.

Some related books from Amazon.com:

Handbook to Practical Disaster Preparedness for the Family, 2nd Edition

The Complete Idiot's Guide to Disaster Preparedness

The Disaster Preparedness Handbook: A Guide for Families (Second)

Crisis Preparedness Handbook: A Comprehensive Guide to Home Storage and Physical Survival

Taking Advantage of Returning OFWs' Need for Training

2011-08-22T23:40:00.002+08:00

Due to the present chaos in the Middle East thousands of overseas Filipino workers (OFWs) are expected to return home. While many of these workers will go back to the oil-rich region once the situation stabilizes, they may not return to the same job or company they used to work for. Others might try to apply for work in other more stable countries such as Canada or Australia, especially if they have already acquired the necessary work experience required by these countries. Many others, of course, will return home simply to wait for the situation to settle down and return to the same company. This means that, whether these workers realize it or not, they will need to have training while they are in the Philippines.

The training that returning OFWs will need could be one or a combination of two or more of the following:

Training in qualifications related to what they already have. For example, a welder who had extensive experience in oil and gas might want to get some training in welding that is more focused on construction-related projects.
Training in qualifications not related to what they already possess. For workers who plan to work in countries outside the Middle East (especially in countries whose economies are more diversified), there will be a need to train in qualifications that are entirely new to them. Thus a pipe fitter in the Middle East now might decide to train as a butcher to take advantage of job opportunities in Canada.
Upgrading training in qualifications they already possess. As the Middle East deal with the effects of the world financial crisis and the challenges of new economic directions brought about by possible political reforms, there may be an increased need for foreign workers with higher skills especially if national governments attempt to create more jobs for their local populations. Or workers might try to take advantage of new positions vacated by highly skilled workers who decide to work elsewhere. In both of these cases, there will a need for skilled workers to train in higher certification levels along the qualifications that they already have.
Training in common competencies such as use of computers or occupational safety. While most skilled workers focus on what is regarded as the core competencies of their qualifications, the many directions occupations in the Middle East could take in the short-term might demand that workers become better skilled in competencies expected of all workers in a particular industry such as oil and gas. The emphasis on these might increase as companies attempt to retain the best of their workers amidst the political and economic problems affecting many countries in the region.

For technical-vocational institutions to respond properly to these training needs, they will need to understand precisely why a certain OFW is seeking training. A good pre-training interview coupled with some career planning session conducted by a competent guidance counselor or trainer would be highly advantageous. Likewise the use of recognition of prior learning or RPL will make whatever training the OFW want to undertake highly efficient. And of course, the training itself should be modular or competency-based.

Unfortunately, not many TVET institutions in the Philippines are truly implementing these supposedly built-in features of competency-based training delivery in their programs. Thus, many OFWs might not get the most from their training.

For the returning OFW, it is always best to take a look at how a particular training institution delivers its training program before enrolling. If a TVET institution's training delivery doesn't look that much different from the way he was taught in high school or in traditional colleges or universities, then it is highly possible that that institution is not implementing a competency-based mode of training delivery. The following are the some features of competency-based training delivery:

Modular;
Individualized or self-paced;
Based on work that must be performed;
Training materials are directly related to competency standards;
Assessment of trainee is based on collection of evidence related to performance of work vis-a-vis industry standards;
Recognition of prior learning;
Allows trainees to enter and exit at various points of the training program;
The trainer is not the sole source of knowledge.

Books from Amazon.com you might want to read:

Developing Technical Training: A Structured Approach for Developing Classroom and Computer-based Instructional Materials
Building Effective Technical Training: How to Develop Hard Skills Within Organizations
Developing Training Courses : A Technical Writer's Guide to Instructional Design and Development
Demystifying Technical Training: Partnership, Strategy, and Execution

Responding to the Opportunities of Internet-Based Businesses

2011-08-21T18:08:00.005+08:00

With the effects of the financial crisis taking its toll among businesses not only in international economic centers but also here in the Philippines, more and more would be entrepreneurs and existing business people are thinking of putting up businesses that are mainly based on the Internet.

Internet-based business is cheaper to put up (mainly, you only spend for a domain name and server space, in contrast to spending for rental of a physical space or constructing your own building), doesn't need to be closed and opened everyday (it is always open once you upload your website on a server); and doesn't need to have sales assistants, store clerks and similar personnel.

A major gap in TVET courses now in the Philippines, especially those dealing with entrepreneurship, is the minimal attention given to competencies that one needs to put up an online business. Partly because of this, most Philippine companies that thrive online are also big mortar-and-glass companies that have the command of IT, marketing, accounting and legal personnel to do the website design and maintenance, online promotion, manage credit card transactions and taxes and do the contracts for large-volume and/or international orders.

The Technical Education and Skills Development Authority, in cooperation with Mindanao Technical Vocational Education and Training (MinTVET) recently identified Mindanao as "the future hub of technopreneurs" (Manila Bulletin, August 21, 2011) and has outlined strategies for pursuing this goal through 2015. This seems to be a good start. However, for the country to be really competitive vis-a-vis its neighbors that are literally flying in pursuit of capitalizing on the low cost of doing business on the Internet, more obviously needs to be done within its TVET sector.

First, competencies needed to put up internet-based business should become part of the competencies included in the curricula, at least of qualifications (or courses) whose graduates can earn their living online. Concerns such as those mentioned earlier should be addressed and, second, exposure to real online businesses should become part of the training. TVET graduates who want to pursue online businesses don't actually need to be highly skilled in IT. They only need to know where to outsource the technical, marketing and legal aspects of their online business so they can focus on product or service design, quality control and other things that are vital to the business and which only they can provide.

Including online business management as part of the curriculum requires that trainers have at least exposure, if not actually expertise, on this. As with other aspects of TVET delivery, it is ridiculous for trainers to advice their students about doing business online, say, as a fruit tree farmer selling high value fruits online, if they haven't done so one way or another themselves.

Likewise, to cement these competencies in the mindset of the graduates, it is best to include these in the competency assessment. It is a practice among competency assessors to sometimes narrowly focus on the technical competencies and ignore competencies (usually those classified as "basic" or "common" competencies) that strengthen or support the core technical ones.

Lastly, there is a need to include how technopreneur graduates of TVET did fare later after their graduation and start of their online businesses. The Impact Evaluation Study conducted by TESDA periodically can integrate this concern and could also gather ways for improving current technopreneurship interventions.

You might want to read these books from Amazon.com:

Internet Riches: The Simple Money-Making Secrets of Online Millionaires
The Six-Figure Second Income: How To Start and Grow A Successful Online Business Without Quitting Your Day Job
The Complete Idiot's Guide to Starting a Web-Based Business
Starting an Online Business For Dummies (For Dummies (Computer/Tech))

Pinoy TVET

2011-03-01T21:19:00.001+08:00

The technical-vocational education and training sector plays a key role in developing the economy of the Philippines. Prior to the creation of the Technical Education and Skills Development Authority (TESDA), concerns for middle-level skills were handled by the Department of Education through its Bureau of Technical Vocational Education. However, studies commissioned by the government recommended the tri-focalization of education to enable the government to address skills mismatch in the labor market. The result is the concentration of the Department of Education in basic education, TESDA in technical-vocational education and training or TVET and the Commission on Higher Education in well, higher education (that is, degree courses and post-graduate studies).

The primary role of TESDA is to manage the TVET sector (that is, the aggregate of suppliers and stakeholders of TVET) and make it relevant, effective and efficient. As manager of TVET, TESDA likes to describe itself as a leading partner. This says a lot about how it ought to operate: leading without domineering, or even participating in areas of technical education and skills development where the private sector has already sufficient presence.

There's a lot happening in the TVET sector right now. And this is not only because TESDA, the manager of TVET, is under a new leadership--that of Sec. Joel Villanueva. Aside from new policies and programs that will probably be implemented under his administration, the TVET sector is under pressure from the forces of the economy, demographic shifts, regional geopolitics, technological developments, and cultural and ideological changes among other things. The TVET sector is the primary producer of the bulk of overseas Filipino workers (OFWs), as well as that of most local workers. Even short-term developments, such as the present chaos in Libya and other countries in the Middle East can create pressures in the TVET sector as well as the more subtle, yet more important developments, such as the graying of populations of Europe, Canada and other countries and the greater integration of regional economies.

Thus, the TVET sector is worth watching.

I hope this blog will contribute something to the conversation on TVET, and I hope both the buyers and sellers of TVET will find something useful in what I post here.