Search Results for
"Vocational education"

Problem-based digital learning (PBDL) has become a popular method in mathematics education. Many researchers have measured its effectiveness in mathematics. However, few studies have rigorously assessed PBDL’s effectiveness in vocational high school mathematics courses, and those that have done so have paid limited attention to its impact on students’ mathematics proficiency and creative problem solving. Moreover, the measurement approaches used in this existing research make it difficult to monitor the dynamic mastery process of students’ abilities. Hence, this study conducted a quasi-experiment on PBDL and used the Multigroup Transition Diagnostic Model (MTDCM) and the Wald test to explore the effectiveness of PBDL in vocational high school mathematics over time, especially its impact on students’ mathematics proficiency and creative problem solving. The findings indicate that: (1) PBDL greatly improves vocational high school students’ mathematics proficiency and creative problem solving; (2) While a teacher-centered classroom enhances vocational high school students’ mathematics proficiency, it is less effective in fostering their creative problem solving compared to PBDL; (3) As time lapses, mathematics proficiency can be quickly acquired and forgotten, while creative problem solving is harder to acquire and lose. This study confirms the effectiveness of the PBDL in vocational mathematics education, introduces longitudinal assessment to assess pedagogical effectiveness, and provides detailed information on students’ ability mastery, which may aid educational stakeholders in refining teaching strategies for vocational education. © The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer Science+Business Media, LLC, part of Springer Nature 2025.

The food industry plays a substantial role in the economic development of every nation. Furthermore, intention has a crucial influence on fostering the emergence of new entrepreneurs. While numerous studies have emphasised the significance of cultivating entrepreneurial intentions, there is a scarcity of research investigating the process by which culinary entrepreneurial intentions (foodpreneurial) are developed among vocational high school students. This study investigates the construction and evaluation of a framework for fostering entrepreneurial aspirations among vocational high school students specialising in culinary arts, employing the theory of planned behaviour (TPB) methodology. The participants in this sudy were vocational high school students who were asked to provide their perspectives on various aspects, including entrepreneurship education, attitudes towards the behaviour, perceived behavioural control, subjective norms, and foodpreneurial intentions. Structural equation modelling (SEM) data analysis facilitated by the SmartPLS software. This study findings indicate that vocational high school students’ intentions to engage in culinary entrepreneurship are significantly impacted by their attitudes towards the activity, their perception of behavioural control, and subjective norms. Furthermore, entrepreneurial education influences entrepreneurial intentions via the three antecedent factors of the TPB. The findings of this research carry significance for both theoretical and practical advancements concerning the process by which entrepreneurial intentions are formed among students enrolled in vocational high schools and vocational higher education. © 2025, Intelektual Pustaka Media Utama. All rights reserved.

This paper investigates the labor market returns to adult digital learning. We find that digital learning generates a 6.9% increase in labor income, with sustained positive dynamic effects. Building on a theoretical model that incorporates online training, we empirically demonstrate that digital learning both accumulates human capital and reduces learning costs through flexible, fragmented learning. Unlike traditional offline education, digital learning can overcome implicit gender and age barriers, particularly boosting earnings in nonphysical occupations. Our findings offer important policy insights for on-the-job training and human capital development in developing countries and aging societies. © 2025 International Association for Research in Income and Wealth.

The Work-Oriented Training Path (WOTP) in Quebec, Canada, is a dual vocational training program that offers students with learning difficulties supervised traineeships. Teachers play a pivotal role in managing students' occupational health and safety (OHS), yet must do so under tight time constraints, limited institutional guidance and highly diverse student profiles. Building on an activity-centered ergonomics and capabilities framework, this multiple-case study explores how gender, disabilities, and work determinants shape OHS management within the WOTP, emphasizing their implications for social sustainability. Twenty-seven semi-structured interviews were conducted with 15 WOTP teachers; 497 narrated anecdotes, which are units of speech when teachers' talk about students, were thematically analyzed to capture everyday mechanisms that expand or restrict safe participation in traineeship. The findings highlight challenges stemming from power dynamics between teachers, parents, and employers, which influence the operational leeway available for teachers to implement OHS prevention. Their work organization, conditions and tools also expand or restrict their capability to have an equitable approach. Additionally, the analysis reveals disparities in traineeship placement opportunities and OHS prevention, particularly concerning students’ gender identity and disabilities. Key factors influencing traineeship placements and OHS practices included students' communication skills, perceived autonomy, and suitability of behavior compared to social norms. Students with disabilities are frequently assigned repetitive tasks, increasing exposure to hazards that remain under-recognized. These results underscore the critical need for inclusive OHS prevention, fostering a more socially sustainable approach within vocational training programs. © 2025 The Authors

This paper examines whether pursuing Technical and vocational education and Training (TVET) in Bangladesh leads to improved labour market outcomes compared to general education. Drawing on nationally representative data from the 2016 Household Income and Expenditure Survey (HIES), it employs logit models, ordinary least squares (OLS), and propensity score matching (PSM) to analyse employment status and hourly earnings across education streams, disaggregated by gender and educational level (secondary, higher secondary, and tertiary). The findings indicate that TVET is associated with higher employment probabilities for women at the lower levels of education, while TVET-educated men at the secondary level are less likely to be employed than their general-educated peers. In terms of earnings, TVET yields significantly higher wages at the secondary and higher secondary levels, particularly for women—challenging the widespread perception of TVET as a lower-value pathway. A key contribution of this paper lies in identifying a critical gap in national survey design: the HIES dataset does not capture the education level at which TVET is pursued, complicating direct comparisons. To address this, the paper introduces an assumption-based framework and conducts robustness checks (PSM) to validate results. This is the first paper to provide gender-disaggregated empirical evidence on TVET outcomes in Bangladesh using nationally representative data, offering methodological and practical insights. It contributes to the literature by highlighting structural challenges in measuring vocational pathways and informs policy by revealing the uneven and gendered returns to TVET in a Global South context. © 2025 The Authors

This study investigates the influence of lecturer behavior on student self-motivation, soft skill development, and the integration of these factors into learning quality and hard skill competency within the context of vocational education. Drawing on Self-Determination Theory (SDT) and Social Learning Theory (SLT), the research emphasizes the importance of motivation-driven instruction in preparing students for Industry 4.0. Data were collected from 229 final-year students at four Indonesian aviation polytechnic institutions. Using Structural Equation Modeling (SEM), the findings reveal that lecturer behavior significantly enhances student self-motivation (β = 0.911, p = 0.000) and soft skill competency (β = 0.124, p = 0.044). Student self-motivation also positively affects the quality of learning (β = 0.925, p = 0.000), which in turn contributes to hard skill competency (β = 0.449, p = 0.000). However, soft skill competency does not significantly influence learning quality (β = 0.004, p = 0.464), suggesting its greater impact lies in workplace adaptability rather than academic performance. These findings accentuate the need for vocational curricula that integrate motivational teaching practices with industry-relevant skill development to optimize student readiness for professional challenges. © 2025 The Authors

The purpose of this study is to assess how well the 6C Skills activities are implemented in the Industrial Design (RBI) course at the Faculty of Technical and vocational education (FPTV), Universiti Tun Hussein Onn Malaysia (UTHM), regarding the soft skills mastery and project results of the students. Participants included 92 Bachelor of vocational education (SMPV) students, 50 of whom were in the treatment group (TG) and 42 of whom were in the control group (CG). 49 TG lecturers and 44 CG lecturers made up the total of 93 lecturers that participated. Project assessments and questionnaires were utilised to gather data for the study, which had a quasi-experimental design. Since the normality test revealed an anomalous distribution of the data, non-parametric statistical tests such the Mann-Whitney U and Wilcoxon Signed-Rank were used to analyse the data. The findings indicated that TG and CG significantly differed in their attainment of student project outcomes (U = 566.500, p < .001), with TG performing better. A significant increase in TG for all subcomponents was also seen in the post score of 6C Skills competence (Z varied from -5.533 to -5.996, p < .001), but the increase in CG was less pronounced. These results demonstrate how well the 6C Skills-based teaching strategy works to enhance 21st-century abilities. This research has significant ramifications for the advancement of TVET pedagogy that is more dynamic, comprehensive, and pertinent to the demands of the future industry. © Copyright for this article is retained by the author(s), with first publication rights granted to the journal. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).

vocational interests are often seen as trait-like preferences for work-related activities, with individuals trying to develop a congruence between their interests and workplace characteristics. A profile of the vocational interests at the beginning of the vocational educational training (7th and 8th grade) and its predictors should be valuable for research and social and educational policies. The main objective of this research was to examine whether certain groups of demographic characteristics predict the six personality types described by Holland. Two samples of 7th- and 8th-grade students were employed for the analyses (N=237; N=110). It was found that Realistic personality is predicted by masculine gender, while females tend to exhibit more Social personality features. The number of family members was a significant positive predictor of Realistic personality. The number of foreign languages spoken negatively predicted Realistic and Social personalities. The father’s income negatively predicted the Enterprising personality features. The present findings argue in favor of integrating and emphasizing the demographic characteristics of adolescents in the evaluation of their vocational interest profiles. Future studies should consider objective measures of the social-demographic characteristics (instead of self-reported), as well as different analysis methods (such as latent modeling) to support larger sets of predictors. © 2025 Universitatea din Oradea. All rights reserved.

Access to education is crucial for young people in particular in terms of their life paths and career prospects. Higher educational qualifications are generally associated with better labour market opportunities. Sustainable employability and future-oriented social development require close integration of school and vocational education and training, as well as equal opportunities in the education system. © 2025 Silke Anger, published by ZBW – Leibniz-Informationszentrum Wirtschaft.

vocational training can lead to higher employment rates and improved incomes, particularly for young women in low-resource settings like Kampala’s slums. Despite these benefits, further research is needed to understand the full impact and mechanisms of vocational training on youth in low-resource environments. In 2022, a focus group project, part of a larger study, involved 60 women aged 18 to 24, recruited from three Youth Support Centers operated by the Uganda Youth Development Link (UYDEL) in Kampala. Six focus groups (about 10 women in each group) were held to explore urban stress and how vocational training might mitigate social and environmental stressors and improve mental health. Data analysis conducted using NVivo software identified five key themes: economic benefits, skill development, building confidence and self-esteem, improved social and behavioral well-being, and enhanced lifestyle and quality of life. This formative research underscores that vocational training benefits young women, highlighting outcomes such as job acquisition, financial empowerment, and skill development. Additionally, self-esteem and confidence development emphasize the training’s role in fostering mental health and agency and addressing gender inequality. These findings underscore the value of vocational training in enhancing the mental health and overall well-being of young women and suggest areas for future research for how to best optimize and scale these programs in low-resource settings. © 2025 by the authors.