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1 Background
One of the main goals of the vocational education reform of 2000 was to make vocational education programmes attractive to, and include youth with varied backgrounds and qualifications. The reform was, therefore, to a great extent a pedagogical reform. The point of departure for teaching and learning was now to be the individual student profile. The reform introduced new instruments to support the individual student's educational programme; the log book (an education portfolio used to link school and workplace learning), the personal education plan (where the individual student's actual study programme and progression has to be formulated), the contact teacher (tutor or mentor) programme, new goal descriptions, and Elevplan (an internet-based tool to aid the planning of and follow-up on the individual student's learning pathway). Previous evaluations of the reform indicate, however, that the ways in which schools implement these new roles and instruments influence students' experience of coherence, relevance, and structure - or the opposite - in the course of their educational programmes.[1] The government's “New Goals” platform from February 2005 set the goal of at least 85% of a youth cohort in 2010 completing a youth educational programme at upper secondary level. For the year 2015 the goal is 95%. The Ministry of Education therefore initiated a qualitative best-practice study of good practice for student retention in vocational youth education programmes across fields, entryways, and student groups, with specific examples of how this challenge is currently being met by selected schools. The study was performed by Danish Technological Institute. It was carried out as a qualitative analysis by means of focus group interviews at a range of schools representing geographic, entryway, vocation, and basic and main programme parameters. Focus group interviews were held with contact teachers, school programme managers, educational and vocational counsellors, and students. In addition to this pamphlet, there is a longer report containing a toolkit with a range of specific examples of tools and instruments and ideas for the retention of students in their vocational educational programmes. The full report and toolkit (only in Danish) can be found at http://static.uvm.dk/publikationer/2005/fastholdelse. VET education in Denmark - an explanatory noteVocational education in Denmark is structured as a basic programme and a main (specialization) programme. The main programme consists of alternating periods of school study and apprenticeship at an enterprise. The basic programme is made up of 7 entryways, 6 technical and 1 commercial. The technical entryways are:
The commercial entryway is:
Each entryway leads to any one of a range of specializations in the main programme. Vocational colleges and other institutions offering vocational education are approved for either the basic or the main programme or for both. Some colleges offering the main programme are organized as boarding schools. Details on the structure of the Danish VET system can be found at http://www.delud.dk/dk/publikationer/VETPortrait/index.htm (“Portrait of the Danish VET System”). A detailed description of the Danish National Vocational Qualifications System can be found at http://www.oecd.org/dataoecd/33/40/34259829.pdf (“The Role of National Qualifications Systems in Promoting Lifelong Learning - Background Report for Denmark”). For a description of the Danish VET System see also: “The Danish Vocational and Training System” at http://static.uvm.dk/publikationer/2005/VET. Foot note 1) (“Portrait of the Danish VET System”). A detailed description of the Danish National Vocational Qualifications System can be found at http://www.oecd.org/dataoecd/33/40/34259829.pdf (“The Role of National Qualifications Systems in Promoting Lifelong Learning - Background Report for Denmark”).
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This page is included in the publication "Retention in Vocational Education in Denmark – A best practice study" as chapter x of 7