Thinking about where to go and what next to do in the reform of vocational qualifications

Funding text 1: The articles in this special edition of the Journal of Education and Work are the fruits of a symposium on the future of vocational qualifications which was organised in 2013 by the then-Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) Centre on Skills, Knowledge and Organisational Performance as part of its third five-year programme of ESRC funded activity. Our aim in organising the event was to provide an opportunity for participants from the worlds of policy and research to compare notes on the reform of vocational assessment and qualifications across the UK nations and with other countries, and to reflect on some of the fundamental issues and questions that underlie the reform process. We deliberately chose to make it a relatively small gathering rather than a vast conference, and the symposium was undertaken at Pembroke College, Oxford, under Chatham House rules, with a note circulated afterwards covering issues raised and some of the key points made. We asked contributors to see the paper we were commissioning from them as a chance to reflect on the fundamentals and also to indulge in some ‘blue skies’ thinking. We wanted to address the big issues that surround vocational certification rather than simply focus on the sometimes rather arid and narrow technicalities that can dominate discussions in this area of policy and practice. The ultimate objective was to try to help set an agenda around reform that could help influence both the process and substance thereof. Our contributors rose to this challenge most impressively, and all of the papers given at the symposium have been converted into the articles that follow in this special edition.; Funding text 2: A second issues concerns the ability of employers to organise themselves collectively to design VQs towards which the broad mass of organisations in a sector or sub-sector feel some genuine sense of ownership and commitment. Unfortunately, the institutional mechanisms to deliver this desirable outcome are often in doubt. For example, the Sector Skills Councils (SSCs) that are meant to represent the employer interest within the skills system no longer receive a core grant from government, and now subsist on project funding. Some have already collapsed. In September 2012, the retail SSC (Skillsmart) was effectively wound up by its backers (the British Retail Consortium), and most of its responsibilities handed on to People 1st – the SSC for hospitality and tourism. We now have industries into which large numbers of young people go covered by one huge, weakly resourced SSC, whose contact with its employer base is, at best, open to some question. How well some of the SSCs will cope with fresh VQ reform is an open question.

Funding text 1: The articles in this special edition of the Journal of Education and Work are the fruits of a symposium on the future of vocational qualifications which was organised in 2013 by the then-Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) Centre on Skills, Knowledge and Organisational Performance as part of its third five-year programme of ESRC funded activity. Our aim in organising the event was to provide an opportunity for participants from the worlds of policy and research to compare notes on the reform of vocational assessment and qualifications across the UK nations and with other countries, and to reflect on some of the fundamental issues and questions that underlie the reform process. We deliberately chose to make it a relatively small gathering rather than a vast conference, and the symposium was undertaken at Pembroke College, Oxford, under Chatham House rules, with a note circulated afterwards covering issues raised and some of the key points made. We asked contributors to see the paper we were commissioning from them as a chance to reflect on the fundamentals and also to indulge in some ‘blue skies’ thinking. We wanted to address the big issues that surround vocational certification rather than simply focus on the sometimes rather arid and narrow technicalities that can dominate discussions in this area of policy and practice. The ultimate objective was to try to help set an agenda around reform that could help influence both the process and substance thereof. Our contributors rose to this challenge most impressively, and all of the papers given at the symposium have been converted into the articles that follow in this special edition.; Funding text 2: A second issues concerns the ability of employers to organise themselves collectively to design VQs towards which the broad mass of organisations in a sector or sub-sector feel some genuine sense of ownership and commitment. Unfortunately, the institutional mechanisms to deliver this desirable outcome are often in doubt. For example, the Sector Skills Councils (SSCs) that are meant to represent the employer interest within the skills system no longer receive a core grant from government, and now subsist on project funding. Some have already collapsed. In September 2012, the retail SSC (Skillsmart) was effectively wound up by its backers (the British Retail Consortium), and most of its responsibilities handed on to People 1st – the SSC for hospitality and tourism. We now have industries into which large numbers of young people go covered by one huge, weakly resourced SSC, whose contact with its employer base is, at best, open to some question. How well some of the SSCs will cope with fresh VQ reform is an open question.

Funding text 1: The articles in this special edition of the Journal of Education and Work are the fruits of a symposium on the future of vocational qualifications which was organised in 2013 by the then-Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) Centre on Skills, Knowledge and Organisational Performance as part of its third five-year programme of ESRC funded activity. Our aim in organising the event was to provide an opportunity for participants from the worlds of policy and research to compare notes on the reform of vocational assessment and qualifications across the UK nations and with other countries, and to reflect on some of the fundamental issues and questions that underlie the reform process. We deliberately chose to make it a relatively small gathering rather than a vast conference, and the symposium was undertaken at Pembroke College, Oxford, under Chatham House rules, with a note circulated afterwards covering issues raised and some of the key points made. We asked contributors to see the paper we were commissioning from them as a chance to reflect on the fundamentals and also to indulge in some ‘blue skies’ thinking. We wanted to address the big issues that surround vocational certification rather than simply focus on the sometimes rather arid and narrow technicalities that can dominate discussions in this area of policy and practice. The ultimate objective was to try to help set an agenda around reform that could help influence both the process and substance thereof. Our contributors rose to this challenge most impressively, and all of the papers given at the symposium have been converted into the articles that follow in this special edition.; Funding text 2: A second issues concerns the ability of employers to organise themselves collectively to design VQs towards which the broad mass of organisations in a sector or sub-sector feel some genuine sense of ownership and commitment. Unfortunately, the institutional mechanisms to deliver this desirable outcome are often in doubt. For example, the Sector Skills Councils (SSCs) that are meant to represent the employer interest within the skills system no longer receive a core grant from government, and now subsist on project funding. Some have already collapsed. In September 2012, the retail SSC (Skillsmart) was effectively wound up by its backers (the British Retail Consortium), and most of its responsibilities handed on to People 1st – the SSC for hospitality and tourism. We now have industries into which large numbers of young people go covered by one huge, weakly resourced SSC, whose contact with its employer base is, at best, open to some question. How well some of the SSCs will cope with fresh VQ reform is an open question.