Magister Educationis - MEd / Insights into the experiences of students at TVET colleges can inform policies and practices.
This paper focuses on an investigation into students’ experiences of access, and barriers to
participation, and success at a TVET college in the Western Cape. I mainly used the theories
by Margaret Archer (2003), Anthony Giddens (1979; 1984), Albert Bandura (1989; 2001;
2006), Steven Hitlin and Glen H. Elder (2006), Kjell Rubenson and Richard Desjardins
(2009), and K. Patricia Cross (1981) related to structure and agency to analyse my data. Data
was collected from interviews with the exit level students at a TVET college who are
registered for a National Certificate (Vocational) programme.
The evidence of this qualitative research revealed that students experience several institutional,
dispositional and situational barriers, but find ways of overcoming these in order to complete
their studies successfully. Findings show that elements of ‘agency’ such as ‘intentionality’
‘forethought’ and self-reflectiveness are prevalent in the ways that students overcome barriers.
The findings further revealed that the majority of participants accessed vocational education
at a TVET college to improve their lives with the desire and intention to study further.
This study generally suggests that intentionality and resilience, amongst other factors, are
important elements of agency and are used to explain and interpret the positive relationship
between agency, barriers to participation and success.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:netd.ac.za/oai:union.ndltd.org:uwc/oai:etd.uwc.ac.za:11394/8453 |
| Date | January 2021 |
| Creators | Larke, Sylvia Phillipine |
| Contributors | Groener, Zelda |
| Publisher | University of the Western Cape |
| Source Sets | South African National ETD Portal |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Rights | University of the Western Cape |
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