The Department of Higher Education and Training (DHET), through the Planning, Policy and Strategy Branch, initiated a five-year research programme on technical and vocational education and training (TVET).
The programme, funded by the National Skills Fund (NSF) through the DHET, commenced in May 2019 and will continue until the end of June 2024.
The Institute for Post-School Studies (IPSS) at the University of the Western Cape (UWC) was contracted to conduct the research with the NSF R35 million funding.
The NSF recognised the need to fund these research projects as they encompass all three learning domains: Cognitive, affective, and psychomotor. The affective domain is reflected in personal and professional values, particularly in teaching. It includes the importance of understanding students as a lecturer or manager.
The NSF and all stakeholders and role-players in the TVET sector were invited to attend the TVET Research Dissemination Series webinar on 22 August 2024 under the theme “TVET College Lecturer Development”.
The webinar targeted TVET college management, lecturers, support staff, students, post-school policymakers, community members, public and private organisations, prospective employers, researchers, and education and training providers interested in the research findings and their relevance to their respective fields.
Eleven public and private institutions and research organisations have conducted various research projects to build the knowledge base of TVET in South Africa. This knowledge base is a foundation for planning by multiple stakeholders, including TVET colleges. The webinar, completed on 30 June 2024, marked the final dissemination of findings from the research projects.
The synopsis of the research projects during the webinar, which focused on TVET college lecturer development, covered several key areas. It included the quality of TVET college lecturing staff, projections and forecasts of lecturer supply and demand, pre-service education, and training (PRESET) and recruitment, the professionalisation of TVET lecturers, performance management and continuing professional development, TVET post-provisioning norms and a revised or new remuneration structure.
All six research projects mentioned above focused on TVET college lecturer development, culminating in the development of a quality toolkit for this purpose. The toolkit supports identifying and developing quality-related aspects of the TVET lecturer role.
The projects also synthesised findings on the dimensions of lecturer quality in a final report and created a model for forecasting future college lecturer demand and supply within colleges. This model aims to provide insights into the current market and supply of lecturers and illustrate how these trends can be forecasted in the medium to long term.
Additionally, several research projects were conducted on the initial development of TVET college lecturers. These included an analysis of existing TVET college lecturer qualifications, an examination of higher education institutions offering such qualifications, and national and international research on the professionalisation of TVET college lecturers.
These also focused on developing a model for performance management and continuous professional development (CPD) for TVET lecturers and evaluating the implementation of the TVET college staff post-provisioning norms (PPN). The collective body of research on TVET lecturers provides critical insights into areas of TVET lecturer development that had yet to be researched.
The NSF has also committed R246 million towards the TVET college infrastructure through the Technical and Vocational Education and Training College Connectivity Programme (TCCP) under the DHET.
The initiative is part of the South African Government’s comprehensive strategy to enhance online infrastructure. It will enable South African researchers to participate in international knowledge development, significantly contributing to developing TVET college lecturers.
By Tshepang Monyake, NSF Communication Officer
Picture: Shutterstock image
