This thesis examines the extent to which the private Technical and Vocational Education and Training (TVET) Sector in South Africa is responsive to national development. National development is understood as associated with a range of socio-economic imperatives which include challenges of poverty, unemployment, inequality, the ravages of the HIV/AIDS pandemic and its associated impacts. In addition to these, the educational component of national development is to ensure access, redress and equity, which are necessary to undo the impacts of an apartheid-related skills regime. Skills development is considered a crucial means to respond to these challenges. Without skills for formal and informal labour markets, as well as productive self-employment, South Africa’s capacity to respond to the new globalised era is likely to be considerably stunted and will negatively affect its developmental trajectory. The methodology used in this study included a mix of quantitative and qualitative strategies to obtain the size, shape and nature of provision. The quantitative component, undertaken in the course of 2002, was supplemented by randomly chosen qualitative case studies. Together, they provided the basis for unravelling a sector distinct in nature, form and content. Developing a comprehensive typology provides important insight into responsiveness of a sector characterised by wide-ranging provision forms. The typology of provider type based on profitability and form, i.e. ‘for-profit’, ‘non-profit’ and ‘in-house’ providers, was replaced with a multi-dimensional model. Learner type, as a primary typological category, includes the ‘pre-employed’, ‘unemployed’, the employed ‘self-funded employee’ and the ‘corporate client’. Provider types responding to these learner types are distinguished on the basis of location, delivery patterns and programming. The various provider forms include ‘multi-providers’, ‘specialist providers’, ‘consultants’, ‘in-house’ and ‘non-profit’ providers. Provider purposes include those responding to employment, either formal labour market or self-employment, and self-development, including leisure-related skilling and lifelong learning. Learner types and training purpose determine the manner, form and characteristics of provision. This understanding of a widely divergent and heterogeneous sector provides the context for assessing its contribution to national development in South Africa. The notions of responsiveness and receptiveness are used as conceptual devices to assess the role of the sector. Responsiveness describes specific labour market purpose, while receptiveness refers to the social development and educational imperatives of access, redress and equity. The sheer size of the sector suggests an important demand-led element of provision and represents an important measure of receptiveness to national development prerogatives. The conservative estimate of 706 884 learners, located at 4178 sites for 864 providers that pre-registered with the Department of Education in 2001, provide the basis for serious consideration of the sector. The sector adequately responds to the immediate short-term needs of employers. Programmes offered for corporate providers respond more deliberately to their immediate short-term skill requirements and which has made it possible for them to outsource a considerable proportion of their training. In addition, there is no other education and training form flexible enough to provide for the training needs of employees, and sometimes the customers of corporate concerns, as in product upgrading and support, at times and locations suitable to their requirements. Private providers did not necessarily have more linkages with the formal labour market than do public providers and are not necessarily able to secure more effectively employment opportunities for their pre- and unemployed learners With respect to receptiveness, the sector comprises learner patterns consistent with national demographics. The sector is associated with an older, employed learner type, typically enrolled in shorter-term courses. This demonstrates the sector’s accessibility. In comparison with their public counterparts, costs were not prohibitive and programme structure allowed adequate flexibility to enable learners to weave in and out of the system. Variable admission requirements also allowed learners to slot into appropriate levels. The absence of data makes comparative judgements of throughput, and quality, with public institutions difficult to make. The current need to regulate all providers equally may not be the most efficient way of dealing with the sector. In light of the national development prerogative to protect those most vulnerable from the risk of market failure, there is need to grant support to those providers most responsive to this group - in this instance, those ‘full time’ providers responding to the pre- and unemployed learner set. The market adequately regulates providers responding to the employed and corporate client groups.

Quality assurance of education in organizations providing further vocational education Dagmar Urbanová ABSTRACT The aim of the thesis is to analyze the possibilities of assurance of quality in private organizations providing adult professional education in the Czech Republic and to find out whether and with what impact these possibilities are currently used. The theoretical part puts continuing professional education into the context of lifelong learning, outlines the historical development of this segment of education, recalls important documents, organizations, and events that advocate autonomy, development and spreading of awareness of the importance of continuing professional education. In the second chapter of the theoretical part, the current possible tools and methods for the management and evaluation of the quality of adult education are defined and described. The research part uses a questionnaire survey to explore what methods for the improving the quality of their services the organizations providing adult education use, what the applied methods give to them, what requirements they impose to their instructors and the overall role played by the quality in their activities. Educational organizations focusing on adult professional education all over the Czech Republic are addressed. The source for...

Currently, offender education, in general, is inadequate in supporting offenders to progress to university, succeed in Higher Education (HE) and progress into sustainable employment. In the community the picture is grim regarding offender education with little literature or policy to support academically able offenders to break free of low-level attainment constraints imposed by institutionalised stereotypical support mechanisms. What little exists is focused on low level attainment: a little Maths and English and basic employability support. Probation staff are ill-equipped to support higher ability offenders due to lack of systems, limited educational offer and funding systems and targets that are designed to support short-term crime reduction targets, at the cost of well documented educational needs of offenders. What is not so well documented is that there is a significant minority group of offenders who are capable and could progress to university, if they had support, encouragement and a probation education system that acknowledged that not all offender needs are linked to basic skills and behavioural issues. It is this one size fits all education system that is at the heart of poor attainment, progression and success and this has been repeatedly reported through independent studies from OFSTED. If probation cannot support lower level education attainment above the minimum standards expected by government, what hope is there for higher ability offenders to access support and education to enable them to progress to HE? This study aims to contribute to the policy debate in community based offender education in the UK by answering the central research question of this thesis: How do you design a community based offender education model that incorporates support to access Higher Education? Preliminary aims include exploring alternative delivery and funding models to encourage and support offenders in and into Higher Education. This fresh approach to offender education is aimed at reducing marginalisation and increasing participation in HE. The literature review has been segmented into three chapters. Chapter one explores the current situation of offender education, using the Leitch report as a structure of enquiry. Chapter two progresses onto vocational training, NVQs and unitised accreditation as possible routes for offenders to gain access to higher-level skills. The final chapter of the review explores a possible model for the formation of a self-funding organisation formed for the purpose of supporting offenders towards and throughout their HE journey. This chapter uses literature drawn from corporate university texts and case studies of charitable organisations. There are overlapping themes throughout this document, drawing on a wide scope of literature to determine the benefits to individuals, organisations and society as a whole of the development of an organisation designed to help offenders gain access to support, funding and progression in and into HE. Each chapter of the literature review highlights existing knowledge on the subject area and this has influenced the design of the methodology of this study i.e. stakeholder analysis using case studies. Changes to policies related to funding for higher-level education for offenders, attitudes and perceptions of offender education and ability and support structures to help offenders achieve their true potential are required. The conclusion of this thesis demonstrates that the current offender education system in the UK is inadequate and potentially subjugates those offenders who are capable of progressing to higher education, either due to not knowing how to progress to HE, normally due to intergenerational poor levels of education, or due to having other barriers that need supporting whilst studying for a degree. Higher education is proven to change life aspirations, positively affect health and impact on families and communities for generations. Why not for offenders?

Made available in DSpace on 2016-04-27T14:31:35Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 Marilia Beatriz Ferreira Abdulmassih.pdf: 1508752 bytes, checksum: 8facc08cbb49458643b8aa230dff74e4 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2015-07-28 / Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior / This work takes as its object of study, the extension of the school day , part of a qualitative research approach , showing how research strategy a Case Study, which aims to analyze the extension of the school day experiences, through the More Education programs in the 2010-2013 period in Brazil, and the Full Time School in Portugal. In the first stage of the research, we sought to bibliographic sources related to the theme in question, in order to define the theoretical analysis, based on national and international authors. From there, a literature review was developed, in order to complement the analysis of the subject in question. In the second stage, it was made the selection of the participating schools of research in Brazil. The third stage consisted in data collection in Portugal, already the fourth stage, effected with field research in selected schools from the Ideb. The fifth step, happened to conversation circle where there was the participation of Monitors More Education Program and the sixth and final stage was the conversation wheel with the directors and the coordinators responsible for the development of the More Education Program at participating schools. Data analysis was performed from three categories, the first, Integral Education Conception in official and school documents guiding the implementation of the Education and School Programs More Full-time and their implementation in the schools surveyed, the second Mishaps of Programs more Education and School Full Time, and the third category of analysis were the contributions Programs more Education and School Full Time for the surveyed schools. Based on the analysis results, it is concluded that the realities investigated, show that the extension of time allows to school, as a social space of appropriation, elaboration and re-elaboration of knowledge, incorporate into their curriculum activities for the development of cognitive and attitudinal skills needed for civic education. The conceptions present in the surveyed experiences are configured to Full-Time School, where students play a formal and compulsory curriculum in a school day and return in another to participate in diverse activities and unconnected to the regular turn. The survey also showed that the activities in the analyzed schools, although not meeting all expectations of Integral Education, proposed in the documents of Education and School Programs More Full Time, comes out to be a significant effort in the education of high quality for many students. Underscoring the difficulties, the moments and the successful experiences of programs in both countries, can be highlighted as common point , in a general context , that is both increasingly moving to standardization the results over the process, this can be attributed the collection triggered the countries as a result of large-scale assessments that are submitted, influenced largely by educational globalization / O presente trabalho toma como objeto de estudo a ampliação da jornada escolar, parte de uma abordagem de pesquisa qualitativa, apresentando como estratégia de investigação um Estudo de Caso, que tem por objetivo analisar as experiências de ampliação da jornada escolar, por meio dos Programas Mais Educação, no período de 2010 a 2013 no Brasil, e Escola a Tempo Inteiro em Portugal. Na primeira etapa da pesquisa, buscou-se as fontes bibliográficas relacionadas com a temática em questão, para que se definisse o referencial teórico de análise, pautado em autores nacionais e internacionais. A partir daí, foi elaborada uma revisão da literatura, para que se complementasse a análise da temática em questão. Na segunda etapa, foi feita a seleção das escolas participantes da pesquisa no Brasil. A terceira etapa consistiu-se na coleta de dados em Portugal; já a quarta etapa efetivou-se com a pesquisa de campo nas escolas selecionadas, a partir do Ideb. A quinta etapa aconteceu com a roda de conversa onde houve a participação dos Monitores do Programa Mais Educação e a sexta, e última etapa, foi a Roda de Conversa com as diretoras e as coordenadoras responsáveis pelo desenvolvimento do Programa Mais Educação nas escolas participantes. A análise dos dados foi realizada a partir de três categorias: a primeira, Concepção de Educação Integral, presente nos documentos oficiais e escolares que orientam a implantação dos Programas Mais Educação e Escola a Tempo Inteiro e suas implementações nas escolas pesquisadas; a segunda, Percalços dos Programas Mais Educação e Escola a Tempo Inteiro; e a terceira categoria de análise foram as Contribuições dos Programas Mais Educação e Escola a Tempo Inteiro para as escolas pesquisadas. Com base nos resultados analisados, conclui-se que as realidades investigadas, atestam que a ampliação do tempo permite à escola, enquanto espaço social de apropriação, elaboração e reelaboração de conhecimento, incorporar em seu currículo atividades para o desenvolvimento de competências cognitivas e atitudinais necessárias para uma formação cidadã. As concepções presentes nas experiências pesquisadas configuram-se às de escola de tempo integral, onde os alunos cumprem um currículo formal e obrigatório num turno escolar e retornam em outro para participar de atividades diversificadas e desconectadas com o turno regular. A pesquisa evidenciou também que as atividades desenvolvidas nas escolas analisadas, ainda que não atendam a todas as expectativas de Educação Integral, propostas nos documentos dos Programas Mais Educação e Escola a Tempo Inteiro, vêm revelando um esforço significativo na elevação da qualidade da educação para muitos alunos. Ressaltando as dificuldades, os momentos e as experiências bem sucedidas dos programas nos dois países, pode-se destacar como ponto comum, num contexto geral, que ambos caminham cada vez mais para a estandartização dos resultados em detrimento aos processos; isso pode ser atribuído à cobrança desencadeada aos países em decorrência das avaliações de larga escala a que são submetidos, influenciados em grande parte pela globalização educacional

Cette thèse propose une analyse de l'investissement éducatif au niveau individuel. Elle développe une perspective dynamique qui cherche à analyser les liens entre éducation et trajectoires sur le long terme. Pour ce faire, nous utilisons un modèle de microsimulation dynamique. La première partie de la thèse porte sur l'éducation initiale. Elle cherche à évaluer l'impact de la diversité des trajectoires sur l'hétérogénéité des gains monétaires associés à différents niveaux de diplôme. Nous y montrons tout d'abord que certains diplômés, en raison des trajectoires défavorables qu'ils connaissent sur le marché du travail, ont une probabilité non négligeable de ne pas valoriser financièrement leurs études. L'analyse des gains liés à l'éducation initiale est ensuite élargie aux comportements conjugaux des individus. En particulier, nous montrons que la prise en compte des revenus salariaux des conjoints réduit les inégalités entre les diplômés, et ce, malgré l'existence de phénomènes d'homogamie éducative. La seconde partie de la thèse est consacrée à la « formation continue » (FC) ou « postscolaire ». En tenant compte des facteurs familiaux et professionnels qui peuvent jouer sur l'accès à la FC, cette partie a pour objectif de mesurer le niveau des dépenses dont bénéficient les individus pour se former une fois leurs études initiales terminées. Les résultats mettent en lumière une forte hétérogénéité de ces dépenses et le rôle divergent des différents dispositifs de formation. Ils montrent également que les montants investis dans la formation postscolaire des individus demeurent faibles au regard de ceux engagés pour la formation initiale. / This thesis provides an analysis of investment in education from an individual point of view. Using a microsimulation model, we develop a dynamic perspective that aims to take into account the long-term relationships between education and individual trajectories. The first part of the thesis focuses on initial education. Its objective is to assess the impact of the diversity of trajectories on the heterogeneity of education benefits. We first show that some graduates, because of their vulnerable position on the labour market, are exposed to negative return to initial education. Our analysis of initial education benefits is then extended to marital behaviour. We more particularly show that taking into account spouse's labour market income reduces inequality between individuals despite the existence of educational homogamy. The second part of the thesis deals with further education and training (FET). Considering family and professional factors that may affect access to FET, we measure the level of expenditure received by individuals to train throughout their career. The results point out the heterogeneity of these spending and indicate that investments in FET are low compared to those invested in initial education.

Final work on the topic Specific educational needs of visually impaired teachers in the framework of further professional education with a focus on needs and possibilities related with lifetime education of visually impaired teachers in the Czech Republic. The thesis is divided into theoretical and practical part. Theoretical part is focused on disabilited people - people with visual impairment - support, rehabilitation and usage of compensation aids. Furthermore, it maps the social system of services that are grouped together and are helping to people with visual impairment. The key topic is the education system in the Czech Republic and the Slovak Republic. Practical part analyzes possibilities of further professional education of visually impaired pedagogical workers and it aspires for the identification of needs and current offer of this education to be realized. Through the research interview were searched needs and possibilities of the market with another education for specific target group of visual impairment people. KEYWORDS Lifelong learning, continuing vocational education, compensation aids, blind people, educator, professional growth, school, educational needs, visually impaired.

Thesis (MEd. (Community and Continuing Education)) -- University of Limpopo, 2015 / The research was carried out in Capricorn College for FET. The main aim of this study was to identify the educational needs of Capricorn College for FET. This study attempted to answer the following research question:  What are the educational needs of Capricorn College for FET? This study was designed within a qualitative research paradigm using multiple-case studies. A document analysis, semi-structured interviews, observations were used to identify the educational needs of Capricorn College for FET. Semi-structured interviews allowed me to ask questions to participants while allowing the flexibility to probe further details. Semi-structured interviews helped me to have a broader view and clear understanding of educational needs that might exist in all campuses of Capricorn College for FET. Through observation educational needs of learners, educators and campus managers were noted. Findings of this study show that there are educational needs at the Capricorn College for FET such as; the lack of funding, lack of staffing, poor learner recruitment, poor infrastructural resources and poor quality of teaching and learning. Recommendations were made for educators in the three campuses to be trained so that they can acquire knowledge about teaching methodologies. More funding should be provided to the college to enhance the smooth running of the college. The college should be equipped with resources that are required for teaching and learning. More learners should be able to study and equipped with relevant skills for job market. Capricorn College for FET should use recruitment strategies that may benefit almost learners in the country. The Department of Higher Education and Training should make sure that Capricorn College for FET be provided with necessary and enough infrastructural resources. Teaching and learning materials should be supplied to this institution and on time. In that way it will enhance the effective teaching and learning at the college.

The central arguments in this thesis rest on two premises. Firstly language and context are intimately bound up in the social construction of workplace gender inequalities. Secondly, organisational understandings and management of women�s access to employment opportunities and rewards in modern bureaucratic organisations are constituted through discourses or systems of organisational knowledges, practices and rules of organising. This study uses the concept of discourse to account for the productive and powerful role of knowledge and language practices in constituting the organisational contexts and meanings through which people make sense of and experience complex organisations.

This field study examines the comparative effectiveness of traditional and humanistic teaching methods. In part I the origins of humanistic teaching and their relationship to Gestalt therapy are considered. The influence of Humanistic education adult learning theory is also discussed. Part I concludes with an assessment of humanistic teaching. Part II: To measure the comparative effectiveness of the humanistic and traditional teaching methods, three groups of first year students in General English classess in a College of Technical and Further Education were selected. The effectiveness was measured in terms of differences in 1. Self-esteem. 2. Spelling Ability. 3. Attrition rates. 4 Academic Results. It can be concluded that there is: No difference in measures of self-esteem between groups, on the basis of the teaching method used. A large increase in the measure of self-esteem was observed in one of the groups that was taught with humanistic teaching strategies. Spelling measures showed no significant changes in any of the groups. Attrition rates were significantly reduced in groups that received humanistic teaching. Academic results of students completing the course showed no significant differences.

This thesis examines the impact of neo-liberal economic restructuring on teachers, specifically teachers in technical and further education. Historically, there has been limited research undertaken on teachers as workers, and even less on TAFE teachers. During the period covered by the study, TAFE was buffeted by the massive changes, social, political, cultural and economic, that were occurring on a global scale. As a result, TAFE has been a system in crisis. The consequences are addressed by an empirical study that examines NSW TAFE teachers' experience of the great changes that have occurred to their work since the late 1980s. Forty-one teachers were interviewed in tape recorded sessions lasting around one hour each. The respondents were drawn from twenty-seven teaching sections across all the major industry areas represented in TAFE. Twenty of the teachers were from metropolitan locations, twenty-one were regional. Nine managers were also interviewed, from Head of Studies to senior management levels, covering those with local as well as state-wide responsibilities. The changes to TAFE have been driven by a pervasive neo-liberal ideology adopted by both major parties in Australia. This study documents the experience of TAFE teachers as that ideology led to a corporatised vocational education and training system strongly oriented to the market. It also records their responses to the narrowing of curriculum that resulted from the "industry-driven" vocational education and training policies of governments. The study gives voice to their grief, frustration and anger as their working conditions deteriorated and their commitment to quality education was undermined. The study documents the teachers' resistance to the processes of organisational fragmentation, the increasing incidence of cost-driven, rather than educational, decision-making, and the commodification of curriculum driven by a series of policy decisions taken at both national and state level. The study compares these experiences with those of the TAFE managers, whose response to the crisis, while differing from that of the teachers, supports the teachers' commitment to public education as a social good. The study concludes that the NSW TAFE teachers' resistance has continued to act as a brake on the excesses of neo-liberalism. Some possibilities for an alternative vision of technical and further education thus remain.