What makes a course vocational? School-based work-related programmes in Canada in dialogue with a community of practice

Defining boundaries between school and work: teachers and students’ attribution of quality to school-based vocational training

“…Further studies of how the role of 'mistakes' as learning resource is connected with different aims of learning achievements and understandings of participation as an apprentice at a workplace may be needed. The different aims of participating in school-based vocational training also involved the fact that the teachers' roles as potential 'brokers' (Bernard 1999;Higham and Farnsworth 2012), bridging purposeful activities in school with expectations of future work as apprentices, was continuously questioned. The results thus further support the theories of boundary crossing (Akkerman and Bakker 2011;Engeström, Engeström, and Kärkkäinen 1995) and studies of school-based vocational training (Berner 2010;Persson Thunqvist and Axelsson 2012) by showing how the attribution work of defining one practice form in relation to another was left open and marked by indeterminacy.…”

“…In this specific case, the researcher followed basic courses in culinary, in auto-painting and in electrical and IT education. The three basic courses differed in their attention to apprenticeship within particular 548 C. Jonasson vocational fields (see also Higham and Farnsworth 2012). This involved differences between, e.g.…”

“…This concern is based on the assumption that students, after finishing school, may encounter difficulties with entering new workplace territories, where they must seek ways to combine their learning in a school context with what is going on in a workplace setting (Engeström, Engeström, and Kärkkäinen 1995;Konkola et al 2007). The preparing of students for future work or apprenticeship is particularly prominent within the vocational education and training (VET) system, where students are being educated and trained with a specific vocation or even occupation in mind (Harreveld and Singh 2009;Higham and Farnsworth 2012;Walden and Troltsch 2011). The potential of engaging students through providing workplace-relevant education has long been emphasised (Howard 2008).…”

“…Thereby, the potential of school-based vocational training for overcoming such difficulties may have been overlooked. As a response to these proposed difficulties with providing work-relevant school-based vocational training, several related studies have turned their attention towards describing how school-based vocational training can be organised to bridge the differences between learning in school and learning at work and thus better prepare students for the transition to future work (Berner 2010;Harreveld and Singh 2009;Higham and Farnsworth 2012;Persson Thunqvist and Axelsson 2012;Velde et al 1999;Vähäsantanen, Saarinen, and Eteläpelto 2009). Moreover, as Farnsworth and Higham (2012) have argued, some teachers' professional identities being a hybridization of teacher and vocational professionalism may be reflected in the curriculum and pedagogic approaches that align with the purpose of providing the students with vocationally relevant experiences.…”

Industry–school partnerships: boundary crossing to enable school to work transitions

“…However, this research found that as schools partner with industry they are able to access the latest knowledge and skills on behalf of their students, which may result in school-to-work transitions -apprenticeships. Similarly, Higham and Farnsworth (2012) argue that at the individual teacher level, those who maintain membership in both teaching and industry communities of practice are able to bridge educational and vocational domains, and as such are better positioned to enact a curriculum that enables school-to-work transitions. Lave and Wenger's (1991) concept of legitimate peripheral participation may in part explain why understanding and navigating the dynamics of boundaries enables the development and implementation of contextualised curriculum.…”