Rebuilding vocational education

National reforms are shaking up system, modernizing standards and including innovative approaches

Vocational education has recently become a testament to China's resolve to diversify how it provides higher education, particularly in asking businesses to help support vocational schooling and assist with its management and development.

Experiments with this have achieved a wide range of success and led to an accumulation of valuable experience in many different fields.

The institutional framework of schools, which produces different methodologies for different kinds of professional education, encourages industries, enterprises and other social forces to participate in reform of the system.

The "decision on accelerating the development of modern vocational education", initiated by the State Council, the nation's highest executive organ, has brought positive feedback. Comprehensive reforms have taken place and pilot reform projects have made substantial breakthroughs.

To mobilize the enthusiasm of private capital to invest in vocational education, we must clear out the policy debacles that set the bar too high for them. It is extremely difficult for them to gain access to government procurement programs, meaning they cannot participate in the development of curriculum or textbooks. The central government's reform decision emphasizes that both public and private firms should have the same legal status, without discrimination. New policies have been introduced to further mobilize social forces to participate in setting up new schools.

The reform decision provides greater room for innovation in the school system, given that schools can be set up by joint venture, in a cooperative format or by a sole investor. It encourages exploration and the development of mixed ownership of vocational schools. Policies allow the combination of capital, knowledge, technology, management and other elements. And each of the corresponding parties should be involved in the school's management and enjoy corresponding rights.

Optimizing mechanisms and taking part in management are the first tasks. It proposes that public and privately owned vocational institutions give recognition to existing successful practices in management and purchasing services. Second, it guides social forces to jointly develop curriculum and textbooks and other educational resources, breaking the ownership threshold. Third is to increase government subsidies, government services, student loans, incentives and other institutional funds. And fourth, it encourages social forces to participate in vocational education management and evaluation.

The decision also encourages governmental institutions to formulate laws and regulations to promote school-enterprise cooperation and incentives to encourage industries and businesses to organize or participate in vocational education. These moves hold great weight.

Based on the number of interns a business has recruited, the reform decision will assess their performance and provide reasonable tax incentives to these companies. Also attracting attention are various forms of support for enterprises to build both production and teaching training bases.

Through targeted incentives, businesses and schools can clarify their rightful roles and responsibilities to motivate students.

The reform decision also reaffirmed the role of industry guidance and increased responsibilities to carry out quality evaluations. This strengthens industry guidance for capacity-building, development of industry classifications and guidance policies; settles policy on how to achieve the transfer of government functions and strengthen government supervision services while giving policy support; and establishes forecasts of human resources demands and a system to regularly publish employment status information. It solves the existing problem that policies cannot be implemented though sub-level institutions. While creating a new method of government guidance - so that modern industrial organizations can also play a role in governance - it enhances the ability of private entities to organize their own affairs.

As important educational institutions, vocational education schools are key in forming a modern school system and a reliable governance structure, which can solve the problems of policies not being implemented properly at lower levels.

The reform, aimed at the building blocks of the system, proposes new requirements for construction of vocational schools and a modern school system.

This helps improve the leadership and supervision of modern vocational school teachers, and it solidifies the common principles of modern school systems in general. But it also reformulates the characteristics of vocational schools in order to improve teaching and the management of specialized vocational schools.

For example, the inclusion of multiple parties with different interests creates the demand to participate in the school council or board of directors, so that schools, businesses and communities together consolidate vocational education from their involvement in school management. To improve performance appraisals and the management of vocational educational institutions and their internal mechanisms, vocational schools are expected to change some of the negative effects of their former copycat management methods that do not meet the standards of the vocational education law.

The author is deputy director of the Chinese Society of Vocational and Technical Education. The views do not necessarily reflect those of China Daily.