Gender policies meet VET practices – the case of health and social care in Norway

Abstract

Could the labour market gender balance be improved by introducing new types of apprenticeship-trained workers? This article investigates what happened in the wake of the Norwegian VET programme for health and social care, a new approach introduced via the 1994 educational reform. By upgrading this traditionally female-dominated area of education, it was hoped that working conditions for women would improve and that, over time, the gender balance among workers would improve. Hence, Norwegian VET policy became a means to meet and the ambitions set by national policies for gender equality. Twenty years on, health and social care remains the most popular VET programme for female applicants. However, only a minority of those attending the school-based part of the education applies for apprenticeships as health care workers; most opt to switch to general education in order to access higher education. Those who stay on typically hold part-time jobs. This area of the labour market remains segregated in terms of gender. Based on extensive quantitative and qualitative data, the article discusses what might explain this development.

Vocational students’ meaning-making in school science – negotiating authenticity through multimodal mobile learning

“…Many of the vocational students find the common core subjects demanding and of little value (Hiim, 2013;Kunnskapsdepartementet, 2009). At the same time, the students state that the common core subjects are necessary, but too theoretical (Høst, Seland, & Skålholt, 2013). Knain (2003) investigated in a case study the views of vocational students on science and their textbook in science.…”

Número Completo

“…Si atendemos a la formación profesional, las mujeres siguen siendo una minoría en el estudiantado y esta segregación no solo se repite, sino que se agrava. Aunque todavía es considerado un itinerario formativo menor (Merino y Martínez, 2012;Merino, 2012;Villar, 2017), la formación profesional podría acabar generando mejores opciones laborales para los hombres que para las mujeres y con ello, agudizando las desigualdades de género existentes (Millenaar, 2014;Niemeyer & Colley, 2015;Høst, Seland, Skålholt, 2015).…”

Incentives for apprenticeship

“…In the early 1990s, Norway created an apprenticeship in health and social care that was meant to upgrade and improve working conditions in this traditionally female dominated area. However, hospitals, one of the main employers in this area, were reluctant to hire health and care professionals from apprenticeships, and favoured employees with post-secondary qualifications (Høst, Seland and Skålholt, 2015). This may be because of differences in skills and knowledge between apprenticeships and postsecondary graduates, the stronger signalling value of post-secondary qualifications, or the lack of engagement and support from employers for apprenticeships.…”