Topical issues in training vocational educators of economy and management

Бюллетень науки и практики / Bulletin of Science and Practice

Traditionally vocational teaching is one of the priorities of the Government which is responsible for making documents determining the path of education development. For example, Presidential Executive Order No. 204 dated May 7, 2018 “On National Goals and Strategic Objectives of the Russian Federation through to 2024”, The National Project “Education”, State Programs, namely “Education Development” and “Scientific and technological development of the Russian Federation”. The listed documents are strategic and they are establishing the goal of the education which is intended to train a competitive and ‘marketable’ graduate.

In the strategic documents we can see the governments and employers’ need for specialists trained to complete practical tasks.

We also can see this focus on practical direction of training graduates (mainly, in the TVET system) in tendency to rely on the WorldSkills Standards (the WSS).

Owing to progressive introduction of the WSS, the standards have become a benchmark for the TVET system. The WorldSkills documents contain current requirements for TVET graduates.

There are necessary skills and types of activities listed in the WSS which must be acquired by a TVET graduate .

To sum it all up we can conclude that the government and potential employers are interested in acquiring specialists who are ready for implementation of practical activity in the context of the inconsistent labor market.

However, the one who is responsible for training a specialist is a teacher. That’s why we must focus on the competence of a vocational educator.

In this particular case we have chosen the area of economy and management as a subject of our study owing to the fact that these specialities are quite popular amongst TVET organizations and are in great demand in the labour market.

There is no relevant information about the competence of vocational educators of economy and management, despite the fact that several professors had been studying this subject, namely F.-I. Kaiser, L. P. Pachikova, B. A. Raizberg, V. A. Fedotov (general and special problems of higher vocational education of economy and pedagogy), A.A. Pyatyshkin (structure and content of economic training of vocational teachers), V. V. Sukhinina (contents of training vocational teachers), N. I. Zyryanova (industry training model of vocational teachers of economy and management), E. V. Evplova (developing competitiveness of vocational teachers of economy and management).

That's why in order to detect the right way to train vocational educators of economy and management so they can match the conditions of the labor market, we have analyzed specific literature and regulatory texts, such as the federal documents on vocational education, Federal Education Standards of higher education and TVET, contents of the WorldSkills Standards related to the accountancy profession (R41 RU) and contents of training of a vocational teacher of economy and management.

The TVET specialty of economy and accountancy has been chosen because of its relevance and priority amongst other economical professions.

In order to detect a link between the content and the results of training the TVET specialty of economy and accountancy and to determine the role of a vocational educator, we have analyzed such documents as:

• 1.    Federal education standard of the TVET specialty of economy and accountancy and WorldSkills Standards related to the accountancy profession (R41 RU);

• 2.    Federal education standard of the TVET specialty of economy and accountancy and Federal education standard of the higher education specialty of vocational education;

• 3.    Federal education standard of the TVET specialty of economy and accountancy and professional standard of a vocational educator, vocational education and additional education;

• 4.    Federal education standard of the higher education specialty of vocational teaching and WorldSkills Standards related to the accountancy profession (R41 RU).

According to the Federal Education Standard the specialty of economy and accountancy implies a graduate’s ability to implement such activities as documenting different kinds of transactions and accounting organization’s assets; accounting assets formations sources, implementation of stocktaking of organization’s obligations and assets; accounting budgetary and extra-budgetary funds; making and using financial reporting; tax accounting and tax planning of the organization .

These activities completely match the WorldSkills Standards, therefore the accountancy profession (R41 RU) implies knowledge and abilities, namely organizing workflow and safety, official document management, data processing, reporting and control, analyzing and predicting.

In addition to that, we should mind the fact that the students of the specialty of economy and accountancy have to learn economical disciplines of the professional cycle, that are supposed to help to master the listed activities. However, there are no specific disciplines stated in the Federal Education Standard. It’s only pointed out that realization of the educational disciplines is up to educational organizations. Thus, on the one hand, the Federal Education Standard gives educational organizations freedom to determine the details of training, but on the other, makes them unclear in some sense.

After comparing the Federal Education Standard of the TVET specialty of economy and accountancy with the Federal education standard of the higher education specialty of vocational teaching and professional standard of vocational educator, we can see that similarities prevail.

However, we should mind the discrepancies:

• 1.    There is a requirement in the professional standard for vocational teachers to have practical experience in the specialty that is being studied by the TVET students. But a graduate of vocational teaching profession simply cannot have such experience ( https://clck.ru/sGNV5 , https://clck.ru/sGNUj , https://clck.ru/sGNUL ).

• 2.    Existing conditions of training of a vocational educator do not provide for learning the WorldSkills Standards, but the existing concept of organizing the process of training of intermediate-level specialists takes into account the WSS.

These circumstances reveal several problems, namely lack of practical experience (in our case it is working experience in economy and management) and lack of preparation for teaching in accordance with WorldSkills Standards of a graduate of the vocational teaching profession.

Thus, these aspects of training vocational educators of economy and management must be minded:

• 1.    the lack of practice in accountancy;

• 2.    the lack of professional disciplines in the field of economics and management, that would catalyze the development of specialized training for the future vocational teachers and would help them to learn the basics of accountancy;

• 3.    the period of studying the specialty of vocational education.is relatively short for a graduate to master it.

If we look at this from the point of view of educational process management we can point out such levels of this management as the administration of educational organizations (a rectorate), the administration of divisions of educational organizations (institutes, faculties), the administration of smaller units of divisions, teachers, students.

The quality assurance is carried out by units of lower levels. For example, the chair is responsible for making a curriculum, approving practices etc. Teachers are free to choose whatever method of teaching they want and students are responsible for the results of their education.

That’s why in order to address the listed problems; we have to rethink the structure of practical parts of training vocational teachers of economy and management focusing mainly on the economical part with learning basics of accountancy in real working conditions.

And on top of that, the documents regulating the contents of the training vocational educators of economy and management must include the WorldSkills Standards. The students must be provided with necessary knowledge and perhaps even practice to match the WSS.

To summarize all of the above, we would like to enumerate some of the measures to improve the quality of training of a vocational educator which could help to train a TVET system specialist:

• 1.    recognizing the WSS as the benchmark in training vocational educators;

• 2.    adjusting curriculums to implement more practice;

• 3.    implementing teaching methods that would help vocational educators to master specialized skills and knowledge.

30.05.2022 г.

The harmonization of content and objectives of documents relating to training specialists of the TVET system and vocational educators of economy and management would help to train workers who are willing to show real results and will match topical requirements of potential employers.

Работа поступила в редакцию 25.05.2022 г.