Preliminary-Blueprint-Eng

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education PathWays
The Ministry will ensure that the education system includes
distinct pathways to cater for different student interests and
abilities. These pathways will be viable and attractive, providing
development in the required skills and knowledge to provide
a clear route to chosen professions. The Ministry will primarily
focus on strengthening existing pathways to make them more
attractive options to students.
Measures undertaken will include:
▪ Increasing student awareness of the education pathways and
career options available;
▪ Enhancing the Vocational Transformation Plan to include
greater collaboration with the private sector;
▪ Raising the quality and availability of places in religious
schools; and
▪ Ensuring the continued attractiveness of post-secondary
options.
The Ministry recognises students’ diverse interests and abilities, and
intends to help them develop these talents. This requires access to
alternative, attractive, and viable pathways for individual student
progression. The secondary education system already allows students
to choose a pathway at various points in secondary school. Among the
pathways offered are academic, technical, vocational, religious, sports,
or arts school.
education pathways and career options
Students and parents have expressed concern over their ability to access
up-to-date information about the different education pathways available,
and the resulting career opportunities available to those pathways. In
many cases, they also lack clarity about the types of skills, competencies,
and training required to succeed in the various professions. Combined,
this makes is harder for them to make informed choices about the
students’ education pathway.
Vocational education pathway
Vocational education prepares students for careers requiring expertise
in a specific set of techniques. These careers range from technical or
vocational skills like carpentry to positions in engineering and other
occupations. In contrast to the technical stream which prepares
students for further education, the vocational stream is more careeroriented.
At present, the number of students enrolled in vocational
secondary schools has been slowly declining due to supply constraints,
from 62,200 in 2008 to 51,500 in 2011, a fall from 2.7% to 2.2% of all
secondary enrolments.
However, industry demand for vocational graduates is high and
will continue to grow. In 2008, the Ministry of Human Resources
reported a labour shortage of over 700,000 skilled workers in the
manufacturing, agriculture, and construction industries. Future
demand will rise even higher. Out of the 3.3 million jobs created under
the NKEA by 2020, at least 46% will require vocational certificates or
diplomas, compared to 22% requiring university degrees (Exhibit 7-5).
Closing this demand gap will require the creation of 50,000 additional
places in vocational education per year.
EXHIBIT 7-5
Job creation under Economic Transformation Programme,
based on qualifications required
Projected
number of
new jobs
created in
2020 by
qualification
required
0.8
0.7
0.6
0.5
0.4
0.3
0.2
0.1
0.7
0.8
0
Unskilled Vocational/ Diploma Degree Masters/ PhD
Percentage
Certificate
Professional
of total
additional jobs
22 24 22 22 7 3
SOURCE: Economic Transformation Programme, 2010
In addition to the challenge of meeting this demand, there is an
associated challenge of ensuring levels of quality. A lack of qualified
instructors and an industry-recognised curriculum, weak collaboration
with industry, and limited on-the-job (OTJ) training leads to graduates
who are not equipped to meet industry needs. Interviews with parents
and students also highlighted a lack of awareness of the vocational
pathway, and subsequent career opportunities.
In order to address these concerns, the Ministry developed the
Vocational Transformation Plan to strengthen the training of skilled
graduates. As part of this plan, the Ministry has expanded vocational
education to begin in lower secondary through the Basic Vocational
Education or Pendidikan Asas Vokasional (PAV) programme and
strengthened the existing pathway in upper secondary through the
Vocational College or Kolej Vokasional (KV) programme. By 2015,
the KV programme is expected to capture 10% of all upper secondary
enrolment. Initial feedback from students, parents, and industry is
positive as the plan is being rolled out.
technical education pathway
Technical education is similar to vocational education in that it
prepares students for specialised careers, ranging from accountants to
dieticians. However, it is recognised as part of the academic pathway,
often requiring a strong academic foundation with many students going
on to gain a tertiary qualification. In addition to studying many of the
same academic subjects as students in mainstream schools, technical
students can choose from a set of technical electives ranging from civil
engineering to agricultural sciences to the principles of accounting.
Recently, the Ministry has also begun to work with private-sector
0.7
0.7
0.2
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