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This is an overview of the [vocational education and training] VET system in Norway. Information is presented according to the following themes: (1) general context: framework for the knowledge society; (2) modernizing VET to support [lifelong learning] LLL, internationalization and mobility (3) VET to support recovery from the crisis (4) historical background, legislative and institutional framework; (5) initial vocational education and training; (6) continuing vocational education and training; (7) training VET teachers and trainers; (8) matching VET provision (skills) with labour market needs (jobs); (9) lifelong guidance for lifelong learning and sustainable employment; (10) financing: investment in human resources; (11) authors, sources, bibliography, acronyms and abbreviations. This overview has been prepared in 2011 and its reference year is 2010.

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Where a high proportion of teachers who practice in primary and secondary schools are trained in a pre-service university setting, further education (FE) colleges train the majority of their teaching staff on an in-service, part-time basis. This paper discusses the experiences of eleven new teachers, based in two FE colleges, during their first year of an initial teacher training (ITT) course and examines the support provided by subject-specific mentors, both in terms of their expectations and actual experiences of being mentored. Q methodology was used as the main data collection tool, with the addition of post Q sort interviews. Forty eight statements, developed using focus groups with trainees and an extensive literature review, were sorted by the eleven trainee teachers. Findings indicated that all the participating trainees painted a positive picture about what a mentor could and should offer an in-service trainee in FE. However, in reality, differences in experiences were reported. In addition, there was evidence of the trainees finding support outside of the mentor-trainee dyad, in the form of communities of practice.

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This paper discusses the various ways adopted by governments and institutions to expand the supply of teachers, raise the morale of the profession, support teachers' work and improve their skills. Distance delivery has proved to be an enduring strategy. One reason for this durability is because, as a strategy, it has been able to benefit from changes and improvements in technology and communications. Another, and perhaps more significant, reason for the persistence of distance education as a strategy is that it can be cost effective. There are certain economies made possible by being able to avoid substantial capital investment in buildings and by being able to limit investment in classroom teachers.

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In response to the changes in the field of career and technical education (CTE) caused by recent school reform initiatives in the US, teachers are now expected to have a more thorough understanding of career development processes so that they can assist school counsellors to provide students with the direction needed for future careers. Consequently, CTE teacher educators also need to consider new directions for their programs. This article is intended to stimulate further thinking and debate about a possible future role for CTE teachers. It provides an overview of some of the relatively new secondary education reform initiatives, addresses the current competencies required by CTE teachers and offers a rationale for providing occupational teachers with career counselling skills. The article also highlights several major problems and concerns CTE teacher educators face that indicate a need to include career development processes and theories in their teacher preparation curricula and explains the Career Development Facilitator curriculum and national certification process, showing the importance of infusing the curriculum into teacher education programs to meet career development goals. An active teacher education infusion model is also presented. Show less

The practices of part-time teachers in higher education are often different and sometimes divorced from the activities of their full-time colleagues. This is particularly true in the UK Open University where course design and production are the domain of full-time academics, and student learning is traditionally supported by part-time teachers. Higher education in the UK is increasingly responding to quality agendas that demand evidence of competence in teaching together with coherent learning and assessment strategies for students. Such demands can have positive benefits for learning across an institution, but introduce particular challenges wherever universities rely on part-time tutors to supplement full-time academics' work; they present even more difficulties where the tutors are geographically dispersed. One idea emerging from a three-year research project in the Open University draws on theories of activity and practice to suggest that, even in a distance-learning context, staff development for part-time teachers should be embedded in conversations with the academic practices of full-time staff. Such connections would enhance the coherence of student learning in line with quality agendas.

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This paper explores aspects of the experience of lecturers on an in-service teacher training programme at the University of Wolverhampton. The progress of a group of 12 students was tracked from September 1993 to June 1995. Their experience was investigated to gain some insight into how learners approach and progress through a competence-based programme. A number of factors considered significant in promoting achievement in a competence-based programme were identified. These are considered in the light of relevant literature. Show less

Known as the Karmel Report and tabled in 1973, this report greatly influenced how schools in Australia were funded. On 12 December 1972 the newly elected Whitlam government appointed an Interim Committee for the Australian Schools Commission. Chaired by Peter Henry Karmel, the Committee was to examine the position of government and non-government primary and secondary schools throughout Australia and to make recommendations on the financial needs of those schools, and the measures to assist in meeting them. The report identified many inequities in the funding system, which for the first time led to the federal government providing funding to state schools. The Interim Committee consisted of Peter Karmel (Chairman), Jean Blackburn (Deputy Chairman), Greg Hancock, Edward T. Jackson, A. W. Jones, F. M. Martin, Peter Tannock, M. E . Thomas, Alice Whitley, and Wilfred A. White. The report was also issued as Parliamentary paper no. 55 of 1973.

Edited excerpt from Australian Policy Online website. Show less

The Australian Council of Deans of Education Vocational Education Group (ACDEVEG) 2020 conference, with the theme 'Vocational Education and Training (VET) teacher development around the world' was held online over two evenings, on 14 and 15 December.

The presentations are: A cartography of the VET teaching qualification landscape across the four nations of the UK / Gary Husband; Structures of TVET teacher education in Germany / Frank Buenning; Trends in the development of TVET teacher training in selected countries in South East Asia / Harry Stolte; A profile of the VET workforce / Joy de Leo; E-Learning engagement framework / Petrea Redmond; Factors affecting the quality of VET delivery / Hugh Guthrie and Melinda Waters; VET teacher-trainees' reflections on the utility of learning theories / Erica Smith; TAFE teacher classification and qualification standards in industrial awards and agreements / Keiko Yasukawa and Marg Malloch. Show less

This paper explores the potential of a poststructuralist and rhetorical analysis in appreciating more fully the discursive work of assessment tasks as mechanisms of power/knowledge within discourses of professional development. It is argued that such analysis may reveal detail in the way in which assessments work as material elements within a body politic, and what they attempt in the investment and positioning of bodies as subjects and objects of knowledge. The paper examines in detail the work of two assessment tasks from an in-service programme of professional development for further education lecturers in Scotland to see what can be said of their rhetorical accomplishment. Analysis shows the devices and techniques at play. Such analysis may offer educators an alternative discourse to explore the effects of the assessment tasks that they set for their students.

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In early 2020 the [New South Wales] NSW Teachers Federation commissioned an independent inquiry into the work of teachers and principals and how it has changed since 2004. The expert panel that conducted the independent inquiry was chaired by Dr Geoff Gallop, former WA Premier and Education Minister. The other panel members were Dr Tricia Kavanagh, former Justice of the NSW Industrial Court and Deputy President of the NSW IRC and Patrick Lee, former Chief Executive of the NSW Institute of Teachers. The Terms of Reference directed the Panel to inquire into the changes that have taken place in the practice of the teaching profession in the public schools of NSW. The starting point for the Inquiry was 2004, the last formal inquiry into the value of the teaching profession, which was undertaken by the Industrial Relations Commission of NSW.

The Panel was directed to examine the impact of policies and mandated changes in practice imposed by governments and their agencies. Seven parameters of significant effect on the practice of teaching, and the context within which teachers' work, were specified without limiting the matters that might be considered (e.g. the impact of technology, regulation, industrial arrangements, changes in roles and expectations, movements in attraction and retention, changes in curriculum, assessment and reporting, and the impact of research and reports).

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