CC BY
18
HARMONIZATION OF PROFESSIONAL AND EDUCATIONAL STANDARDS IN THE PERSONNEL TRAINING SYSTEM
A. V. Shin
The minimum requirements for graduates of educational institutions of secondary specialized vocational education, which are part of the state educational standard of the Republic of Uzbekistan, are intended to reflect the diversity of knowledge, skills, and professionally significant qualities of graduates in demand by the modern labor market. The only question is what is the source of information for forming these requirements?
The analysis of existing educational standards of professional education shows that the requirements made of graduates are simply adaptive qualification characteristics taken from the wage-rate reference books for jobs and professions. These regulations are developed on a good scientific and methodological basis. But they were developed for a state-controlled economy and large-scale industrial production. In the market-oriented economy, which is dominated by small and medium enterprises, vocational training qualification structure is quite different. This does not mean that the need for skilled manpower has decreased. In contrast, only the content of qualifications (as they say, competencies) demanded by employers, has changed significantly. Thus, the requirements made of graduates of secondary specialized vocational education establishments reflect “yesterday’s” production. Hence, employers are dissatisfied with the quality of graduates and the low competitiveness of graduates on the labor market. To resolve this contradiction there are professional standards, the initiative for which must belong to professional associations, which include employers, educational institutions and other interested parties of the labor market.
Professional standards can be defined as a concentrated expression of the complex of paid and steadily growing demand for work (services) demanded by the labor market, which defines the required level of skills, responsibilities, authority and responsibility. A rather clear definition of this concept is given in the international professional standards ISO 9000 as a system of establishing the level of staff for compliance with accepted standards for the sector. In the U.S. the National Skill Standards Board (NSSB), a nongovernmental organization, maintains the development and supervision of professional standards on the national level. As it states in its documents, one of the purposes of forming a national system of standards is the “arming” of workers with “mobile” skills and their certification so that people can get as many opportunities for employment in various industries as possible.
To provide widespread application of qualifications, the requirements of professional standards should form a broad set of skills among employ-
583
ees that will give them the opportunity to work in various industries. One way to achieve this goal is to develop professional standards, suitable for any industry from agriculture to the hotel industry. In order to reflect in professional standards the general, particular and individual in each type of professional activity, there are three types of standards within each of 16 industrial sectors: (a) initial standards define the knowledge and skills that are common and important for all skill levels within the industrial sector. Having mastered the initial standards, the workers receive a solid foundation for working within a given industrial sector; (b) compact standards define the knowledge and skills needed to perform key functions related to the family of jobs and qualifications. Having mastered this standard, employees can work in specific areas within a given industrial sector; (c) specialized standards define the knowledge and skills that are unique to performing certain functions at a particular workplace or enterprise. The NSSB system of professional standards can be called modular: each member of the labor market can choose what level of skill he needs. The advantage of this system is its simplicity combined with sufficient completeness of information for users of the standard.
Describing the profession on various levels of qualification, professional standards are the basis for establishment of vocational training, retraining and qualification improvement, qualification and certification of personnel, and planning a career.
The professional standard defines the main requirements of the labor market and employers of the profession, and thus lays the foundation for application of the component of the educational standard for the respective specialty. At the same time, there is an objective contradiction between the professional and educational standards as follows: employers define the professional standard by the qualification requirements, which are determined by production technology, labor costs, as well as their price ratio. Vocational education includes only training content in the educational standard, only the minimum requirements made of graduates, which can be implemented under current institutional conditions of professional training. Therefore, we should not talk about the priority of the standard in developing the requirements and their harmonization. Employers have to understand that the demands on their part are the level of the desired, while the requirements of educational standards are the level of reality. In other words, the recognition of professional and educational standards of the participants of the labor market is a compromise that is consistent with the democratic nature of market relations. Independent evaluation and certification of qualifications is the mechanism of harmonization of professional and educational standards, and, consequently, the relations of labor market participants.
584
