Breaking barriers: challenges and opportunities

This article appears in Chapter 1 - Transforming, which deals with various concepts of leadership in the context of technician education and training (TET). Basu introduces his topic by claiming that technological developments have increased people's ability to do both good and evil, to increase or decrease wellbeing and that, given these options, policy makers must be sensible and make appropriate choices for the TET sector. He discusses the changes and the challenges - including demographic changes and increases in the labour force; trade liberalisation and globalisation of the workforce; and the implications of poverty and unemployment. He raises the issues of environmental degradation and dwindling natural resources and insists that helping people to break out of the cycle of poverty must be a major concern of national policy makers. Finally, he looks at innovative TET processes in teaching/learning, the effects of the information technology (IT) revolution, certification and accreditation, and the importance of enhancing international cooperative programs for TET. Basu concludes that the World Bank and other development agencies must continue to finance TET and leave the leaders to accept the challenges and create opportunities for TET to be a tool for human development.

The volume of collected papers is indexed at TD/IRD 88.87. Show less