Technical Vocational Education and Training (TVET) has become one of the most important element of any nation’s education initiative and India is not an exception. India has redefined the critical role of skilling and vocational education training across all sectors and dimensions of economy.
TVET has had a two-pronged impact in terms of bridging the gap in the technical and vocational education space. It has played a crucial role in bridging the gap between traditional post-secondary technical training institutes such as Industrial Training Institutes and state-of-the-art technical training imparted through specialized institutions such as the Indian Institutes of Technology spread across the geography of the country.
Under the aegis of the National Skill Development Corporation, the ambit of TVET programmes has expanded steadily to encompass not only vocational training in trades specific to technical fields but also non-technical trades specific to the tertiary sector such as banking, hospitality.
Further, whereas Industrial Training Institutes have an eligibility criterion of matriculation (10th pass) as minimum qualification for admission, TVET education has played an important role in enhancing inclusivity in vocational training system by including school drop-outs within its mandate through schemes such as PMKVY, PMKK (including RPL schemes).
Additionally, since most of the delivery of TVET in our country is subsidized or implemented through government schemes with candidates from compromised financial status in view, it has been playing a fine role of an equalizing the rural-urban divide. Rapid technological advances and the advent of future technologies (Artificial Intelligence, Virtual Reality, Robotics) in the last five years have altered labour market dynamics significantly in a way such that TVET has had to fast adapt. New training and training delivery strategies have been adopted through industry collaborations, apprenticeship programmes. A flexible qualification framework has been implemented to cater to the changing dynamics of the labour market demand.
Changing labour maker demands due to technological advancements, AI, robotics etc have created a much higher challenges, viz a viz expectation on TVET to transform with the same pace. New schemes have been implemented from apprenticeship programmes, industry collaborations to internalization of QP NOS for skilling the youth for both domestic as well as international markets.
Along with filling the existing gap in the prevalent education and technical training system, adapting to the changing needs of the labour market due to technological advancement, a fresh challenge is being posed by the recent COVID 19 pandemic that has affected training delivery immensely. The highly communicable pandemic has forced training sessions and traditional classrooms to have shifted to the online platforms, worldwide. Since availability of internet and an interface is crucial to enable this transformation, the pandemic might act in detriment to the role TVET has played in bridging the rural-urban divide. If the imposed lockdown continues beyond few months, to cope with the challenges posed, new policies and practices will have to be incorporated.
As per World Economic Forum report (April 2020), “Billions of people are going online to stay in touch during the COVID-19 pandemic. But almost half of the world’s population has no access to the internet and fewer than 1 in 5 people in the least developed countries are connected. This digital divide impacts women more than men”.
Further, while an online medium such as Microsoft Teams, Zoom Classroom and Google Classroom is suitable for training in theory-oriented courses, making practical training such as in TVET, accessible to masses needs state-of-the-art technological innovations.
Even in developed nations, where availability of internet is more widespread, access to online education is not as equitable as it may seem. There too, the poorer section of the population has limited internet access and cannot afford either hand-held smartphones or portable computers.
It will have larger implications in the new normal post lockdown to compete in the domestic as well as in the internal market for the sections of the society that does not have access to online learning platforms. It will create larger inequality of opportunity due to lack of internet and other infrastructure shortages and we will not have the level the playing field policy initiatives which every nation has strived for and India has done tremendously well so far in terms of leveling the playing field for all sections of society and particularly marginalized sections. Hence, the inequality of outcome in terms of skilling, employability, diploma/degree course will gradually become larger due to this inequality of opportunity created by digital divide.
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The next few months will be critical for government, institutions, organisations, TVET institutions to act fast and with focused interventions in order to avoid the growing gap between learners from privileged and comprised economic backgrounds. It is equally important that we must work together to create solutions and opportunities for all, especially for students who are facing access barriers due to this pandemic and subsequently get them to enroll to online learning platforms so that their social mobility is not hampered beyond repair.
Governments must intervene at this point of pandemic to introduce measures at national level such as, financial stimulus to TVET institutes and rapid capacity building initiatives for transformation to online learning. At the policy level, TVET institutions should mandatory provide free access to online content/resources and interest-free loans should be available to poorer candidates for procuring high-speed internet connections/devices that would enable them to onboard the digital learning platforms . Crash course need to be offered on how to use online digital platforms. NSDC affiliated institutions like Apollo Medskills have started offering COVID 19 awareness crash course online. Another NSDC affiliated Training Partner, Ador Welding Academy has started an online course for welding procedures and qualifications with a minimal fee of 590 rupees. Recently, NSDC has launched a nationwide online course for woman empowerment in association with Brittania Marie Gold. The programme will offer basic communication skills, financial literacy, information and communication technology and micro entrepreneurship skills for their socio-economic self-reliance.
Further, post COVID-19, the skilling and education space will face a fresh set of risks and opportunities. Due to reverse labour migration which has hit all the sectors equally, there will be an opportunity to identify these target groups for reskilling and formalisation of their vocational expertise. As per world Bank report, “the lockdown in India has impacted livelihoods of a large proportion of the country’s 40 million internal migrants. Around 50,000-60,000 moved from urban to rural areas of origin “and the remittances are projected to fall by about 23 per cent in 2020, to USD 64 billion — a striking contrast with the growth of 5.5 percent and receipts of USD 83 billion seen in 2019,” (World Bank).
New partnerships need to be established between domestic and international institutes to conduct risk assessments and thereby suggest mitigation processes. Firm policy-level interventions would be required to make them employable and ready for work again. Whereas This could serve as an opportunity to Integrate them within the formal economy, unless handled carefully they could slip back into extreme poverty. Organisations like NSDC in partnership with both government as well as its affiliated private skilling organisations/NGOs/institutes could take the initiatives for reskilling, upskilling/ certifying and fresh skilling for these migrant laborers to enhance their occupational mobility. Focused skilling interventions for their children could be one of the effective mechanisms for their change in social positions and family traditional vocations which in other terms is called as inter-generational mobility. Hence, the focused interventions would help them for readiness of work in different sectors and the overall inclusive development of the nation.
(Disclaimer: The views expressed in the article above are those of the author Suhail Mir, Analyst, NSDC. The matter and intent of this article has not been edited by skillreporter.com. SkillReporter shall not be responsible for any damage if caused to any person/organization directly or indirectly.)
