TVET and Industry: Revamped TVET Curriculum as the Missing Link for Sustainable Economic Growth and Development in Nigeria (Published)
Technical and vocational education and training (TVET) aside from providing general education is established for training and practical skill development opportunities that attunes to national and local contexts. TVET graduates should be competent enough to apply scientific knowledge to improve and solve environmental problems. However, graduates from various TVET programmes have failed to justify this purpose. This paper explored the present curriculum using the Department of Computer Science, The Federal Polytechnic, Ilaro curriculum as a case study to identify this missing link. Descriptive and Inferential Statistical analysis carried out on some graduates of the Department explicitly working in Information Technology (IT) firms as Developers to identify whether the knowledge and skills acquired in school were sufficient for their career take off, revealed a wide gap between the present curriculum and the trends in the industry. The results obtained from the study showed that 62% passed through further skill acquisition training that created employment opportunities for them, 14% trained before admission for the TVET programme while 24% were able to learn on the job. The empirical analysis also showed that the position of the participants did not differ significantly in their mean perception of TVET programs as evidenced by the F statistic of 1.690 with an associated P-value of 0.195 > 0.05 significance level.
Keywords: Curriculum Development, Education, Industry, Skill, Technology, Vocational
Conformity of Agriculture Vocational School Curriculum: Skill Competency of Agricultural Product Processing Agribusiness with the Needs of the World of Work (Published)
Vocational school (VS) aims to prepare students to work in industries or to create their own jobs. Therefore, it is important for VS to prepare students to have better competencies needed by industries. The study aims to 1) review the suitability of the competencies of agriculture vocational school graduates, skill competency of agricultural product processing agribusiness with the competencies needed by the world of work; and 2) review the pattern of synchronization mechanism of agriculture vocational school’s curriculum in the intended competencies. Secondary data ws analyzed combined with the result of Focus Group Discussion in sample areas of study. The research results showed that 1) curriculum of agriculture vocational schools in the skill competency of agricultural product processing agribusiness is in accordance with the competencies needed by the world of work based on Level II Indonesian National Work Qualification Certification Scheme. However, there are (a) “inapplicable” core competencies (CC -3 and CC -4) in the subjects of production and processing of plantation and herbal commodities, production and processing of hardwood commodities/products (coconut, palm oil and rubber). This is due to no plantations and/or industries for processing these commodities around the locations of the sample schools, (b) core competencies and basic competencies are lack depth in the competencies needed by the industry, namely identification of tubers, fresh fruits, and vegetables for the production unit on the subject of production of processing vegetable products, and 2) legally and formally, there is no pattern of synchronization mechanism of these competencies, the existing synchronization pattern is incidental based on input from the alumni of the sample schools and/or through consultations of schools with industry as partners. this study concluded that the skill competency of agricultural product processing agribusiness refers to level II Indonesian National Work Qualification Certification Scheme, but the implementation varies depends on schools’ facilities, quality of particularly teachers of productive subjects, and the collaboration with industrial partner.
Keywords: Agriculture, Competence, Curriculum, Skill, agribusiness, the world of work, vocational school
A Relevance of the Implementation of Vocational School (VS) Towards the Needs of Industry and Workforce (Published)
This study explores the relevance of vocational school (VS) and industries to meet the needs of industries in order to get quality workers from VS. Therefore, the government of Indonesia stresses to strengthen vocational school (VS) through training both in school, company, or in technopark in order that the graduate of VS may have better competence and skill. Quantitative and qualitative of the secondary data, the in-depth interview during the focus group discussion (FGD), and survey data was collected from 536 respondents from 36 VS in eight provinces. Analysis was the combination of qualitative and quantitative from both survey and document triangulated with interview of other related resource persons. The findings reveal that the relevance of training in school and the needs of the industries is 91,67% relevant, the relevance of knowledge and the needs of industries taught in school is 93.34% relevant, skill 93.34%, and attitude 97.5%. Teachers perceptions for the three aspects is 90.83%. Most of the VS school programs are in accordance to meet the needs of industries, which have been working collabotively with schools. Training in both industries and technopark has improved VS students and teachers’ competence and skill. However, it is different with the reality that most of vocational school graduates have not been accepted by private sector or industries to work at their company due to the lack of several aspects, such as the skills which does not occur to the work of industries.
Keywords: Knowledge, Relevance, Skill, attitude, kompetence, technopark, vocational school
Return on Investment (ROI) In Business Education on Undergraduate Skills Development (Published)
This study determined the influence of ‘Return on investment in Business Education on undergraduate skills development in Federal Universities in Nigeria. The 5 specific objectives postulated were structured into 5 research questions and 5 null hypotheses. The survey design was adopted for the study. A population of 2080 was used of which 460 (22%) respondents were sampled for the study, using multi-stage sampling technique. The researcher designed two sets of questionnaires: Investment in Business Education Questionnaire (IBEQ) and; Undergraduates’ Skills Development in Business Education Questionnaire (USDBEQ) generated data for the study. The instruments were validated by five experts. The reliability coefficients using Cronbach Alpha reliability analysis were 0.86 and 0.79 for IBEQ and USDBEQ respectively. The null hypotheses were tested using Multiple Regression Analysis (MRA). The findings made were that ‘Return on Investment’ in Business Education: office accommodation; classroom space; physical facilities; equipment; library facilities; significantly influence undergraduate skills development. The null hypotheses were rejected. It is concluded among others that investment in Business Education will continue to yield proportionate returns in terms of undergraduates’ skill development. Recommendations made are that: more academic staff should be employed for Business Education Programme in order to reverse the lopsided ratio of lecturer to student; lecturers should be provided with office accommodation; the ratio of practical to theory in Business Education curriculum should be 60: 40; among others.
Keywords: Business Education, Investment, Returns, Skill