All of us, until after the year 2019, have gone through the old normal education system to matriculation; that is grade 12.
The year 2020, however, has seen a new normal – the removal of grade 12, albeit a small percentage going to grade 12.
A pool of learners will thus exit at grade 11 and enter the adult world of education and training because grade 12 and Unam are reserved for nerdy learners.
Meanwhile, considering we do not have a forest of nerds in Namibia, you can imagine the dichotomy of a community into two classes – nerdy and normal learners.
This change in the education system has brought mixed feelings.
Feelings on whether or not it is widely beneficial in our country with eminent history of inequality even in education to have such a division, you ask. Well, it could be.
After all, since time immemorial, we have always been given two choices as a nation.
That is between Polytechnic, currently known as Nust and Unam.
The two with their stringent requirement and hefty prices have been leaving the mass of us consequently stranded when in actual fact, other options exist – VTCs. My take with the new change, is that, in other parts of the world, the 12th grade does not officially exist, but its equivalent is the second grade of secondary school.
This is not compulsory, as education is only compulsory until the 10th grade. Where grade 9 will get the students ready for work, and prepare the students for more advanced studies.
Vocational programmes with all things considered, including; media, soft skills, and agriculture, feature prominently in the school curriculum to prepare the learners for specific careers or trades.
In my country, on the other hand, that is not the case and the perception of VTCs is that it is for the poor academic performers, otherwise not qualified to be absorbed into the seeming main stream – Poly and Unam.
Now, and only now government is visibly and eloquently advocating on more career choices and opportunities.
This means – out with Poly and Unam and in with Technical Vocational Education and Training (TVET).
Today, after over 20 years of shallow believes, all public discourses are on VTCs to take over and help build our ever failing economy and to improve livelihoods, vocational schools to apply training based competency approach and bridge the skills gap between work and education.
Vocational schools to help small businesses and these small businesses in return to help create the much needed employment and similarly for small businesses to absorb apprenticeship in support of vocational training otherwise misunderstood in the formal sector to mean a personal assistant who makes copies, tea, and send around the office building.
All hail to our informal sector. Our potential employer and saviour after government was enabled owing to economy crash.
There, jobs are in abundance yet competent employees are scarce to occupy them. Instead, owners of these businesses wear a hundred hats simultaneously in order to effectively and efficiently run their businesses.
This is the situation in a small country with a very high unemployment rate. A very much unparalleled situation and a contradiction in terms of – there are jobs yet there are no jobs! It is a sorry state, especially when the writings are on the wall as to what needs to be done. It is no paradox either. Just think – the informal sector we have and it makes up more than half of our real economy. Vocational schools we have them too and these are 100% locally owned.
With firm support, the two sectors; training and business are a gold mine. It is, therefore, up to the leadership to decide just how robust they are willing to go in changing the status quo and the imaginary economy to build a solid economy through TVET.
Equally important is for government to protect the VTCs from the country’s big universities who since the advocacy of TVET have been on the sides redefining their characteristics to encroach on what is for TVET, thereby competing with VTCs to out beat and secure formal internship agreements with employers, particularly State Owned Enterprises, and in the process making it difficult for VTC especially private owned to secure such formal agreements for their trainees.
This state of affairs is unfair and outright corrupt. If left to continue, it will confuse the order.
With the prevailing curriculum changed and a pool of learners forced to make ways to higher learning, there should be a distinction and a striking study path between VTCs and university graduates.
University students looking to attain the skills required for the job market must enrol at a VTP. It is only fair to balance out the impact and the system.
After all, one over the other is trained to assess competence while the other is for a show. Government as the enabler must also simply invest and fund more without fear and with guided faith in TVET and also in the informal sector.
Government must in addition change its implementation machinery.
It is its weakest link in the entire system.