Recent ELVET specific policies and measures

This section maps out the ELVET specific measures the European countries have in place and the measures that rely on traditional VET pedagogies as means of reducing early leaving. They have been identified from European and international literature (19) or through interviews (national stakeholders and practitioners) in eight countries (Belgium, Denmark, Germany, France, Croatia, Italy, Austria and Portugal). The measures selected concern lower and upper secondary level VET; the review excludes policies/measures introduced to tackle early leaving from higher and continuing VET, albeit some of the second chance measures discussed may operate on the borderline between initial and continuing vocational education and training (IVET and CVET).

Overall, the initial mapping resulted in the identification and mapping of over 330 policies and measures across 29 countries (20) and over 100 measures were examined in greater detail:

 early leaving measures specific to the VET sector only could be identified in 20 countries (Belgium (French and Flemish Communities), Bulgaria, Denmark, Germany, Estonia, Ireland, Greece, Spain, France, Italy, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, the Netherlands, Austria, Poland, Slovenia, Finland, the United Kingdom and Norway);

 VET relevant early leaving measures, which however have broader target groups or goals (e.g. within the general education sector), could be identified in further 11 countries (Belgium (German- speaking Community), the Czech Republic, Croatia, Cyprus, Latvia, Hungary, Portugal, Slovakia, Sweden, Switzerland and Iceland);

 no measures to address early leaving in VET could be identified through the chosen research method in three countries (Romania, Liechtenstein and Turkey).

The measures identified have been considered according to the timing of the intervention in the context of a journey of a typical VET student or a dropout (prevention, intervention and compensation), the level of the intervention (system level versus individual providers) and the type of IVET (school- based VET versus apprenticeships and other forms of work-based learning).

Chapter 6: Early Leav ing from Voc ational Educ ation and Training

Figure 6.8: Map of measures to address early leaving from VET

Measures to address early leaving from VET

_{Prevention Intervention Compensation}

VET transition/exploration programmes VET preparatory programmes and study guarantees

Early warning systems and units

Financial incentives to reduce ELVET

One-to-one support: apprentice coaching, mentoring and case

management

Opening up VET for new groups of learners

ELVET resources or expertise for VET schools

Complex interventions by multi- professional teams

Second chance VET programmes

Training of teachers and in-company trainers to deal

with ELVET

Short term time-out measures

Comprehensive reengagement programmes making use of VET

pedagogies Source: Cedefop.

P r e v e n t i n g e a r l y l e a v i n g f r o m V E T

Preventive measures (21) take many different forms and sizes but five types are examined in this section which are both early leaving and VET specific.

Transition programmes

Many VET students drop out completely or change their course soon after starting their studies if they realise they have made a wrong course selection. As already mentioned, many early exits from VET are caused by unprepared, ill-informed and unsupported transitions.

There are a few distinctive VET specific approaches that countries have adopted to facilitate more

supported, prepared and informed transitions to young people who are vulnerable to disengagement. Some countries offer VET study/career exploration programmes that essentially give young people who are interested in VET but have not been able to enrol in any course, an opportunity to spend a period of time trying out different courses, visit companies and undertake work-based training in companies or in different workshops and improve their previous test results so as to improve their chances of finding a right VET school or an employer to take them on as an apprentice.

(21_{) Preventive measures are typically system level responses – as opposed to provider level responses (intervention}

measures) – which seek to address risk factors that could have a negative impact on young people’s motivation and desire to complete their studies. At times the difference between ‘prevention’ and ‘intervention’ measures is marginal and some measures could potentially be grouped in either one of the categories.

These career exploration opportunities help young people to learn about occupations, understand what studies and work in different sectors is really like and learn about their own interests as well as their strengths and weaknesses. The programmes can also include on-going and follow up support from a case worker, for example until the end of the first year of vocational training, so that they have someone to turn to when they face difficulties. Participation in such programme typically results in a certificate and/or exemptions and participants are typically in a much stronger position to find a training place than before the programme. Transitional programmes were identified for example in Germany, the Netherlands and Finland.

VET preparatory programmes and study guarantees

Some countries like Germany and Austria have operated youth guarantee schemes in the VET sector, the apprenticeship sector in particular, already for some time. They have well established pre- apprenticeship programmes to ensure that all young people who are looking for an apprenticeship contract with a training company, but do not succeed in finding one, are offered alternative forms of training in which they can get prepared for a training contract.

They essentially help unqualified young people to up-skill and become better prepared to obtain and retain an apprenticeship place. They usually involve an on-the-job training period in a company, several companies or in a workshop, alongside some school-based learning. Usually the on-the-job training does not pay as well as an actual apprenticeship place and employers are heavily subsidised by the state. In recent years, such programmes have been introduced in the German-speaking Community of Belgium and Denmark too.

Germany, Luxembourg and the United Kingdom (England, Wales) also offer skills based bridging/preparatory programmes that prepare young people for VET (albeit offer no guarantee of further training as such). They are usually for students who are not sufficiently qualified/skilled to enter the next stage and give an opportunity to catch up on learning, gain new skills, improve grades and gain work experience.

Financial incentives to reduce ELVET

Performance-based funding of VET can be linked to ELVET goals as a way of encouraging and even ‘forcing’ providers to invest in measures to address the problem. Per capita student funding is linked to qualification completion and dropout rates at least in Slovenia, Finland, and the United Kingdom. In addition, in the United Kingdom, provider funding also depends on the success rate of VET graduates in terms of long-term employment. For example, former students and apprentices may be tracked to see whether they are in employment following the course.

In France, though the incentives are not directly financial, the approach to prevent dropping out relies on making schools more strongly responsible for the pathways of their students. Heads of schools have formal responsibility to ensure young people’s pathways even once they dropped out from their institution, meaning that they are on one hand incentivised to prevent dropping out and on the other

Chapter 6: Early Leav ing from Voc ational Educ ation and Training Financial incentives for employers to take on apprentices, especially from at risk backgrounds, are in particular need during economic downturn. The prospects of weaker apprentice candidates finding a placement diminish in a tight labour market as they compete with candidates with more solid education or employment backgrounds in a market with fewer placements to offer. In generic terms, it is a long standing mainstream tradition for some countries to offer a wage subsidy to employers who take on an apprentice, whilst in others it is a more recent trend. It is nevertheless clear that many countries have attempted to mitigate the effects of the financial crisis on the level of early leaving from VET by introducing new or temporary financial incentive schemes to encourage more companies to take on low qualified youth and other vulnerable young people at risk of ELVET as apprentices despite of the economic turmoil. In Germany, Ireland, Finland and Norway, such subsidy schemes have targeted early school leavers.

Another way of incentivising employers to reduce ELVET is through performance-based bonuses where companies receive a bonus upon an apprentice’s successful completion of a year or the whole apprenticeship. Such incentives exist in the United Kingdom (Northern Ireland).

Apprenticeship grants for students may incentivise students to remain in their apprenticeship. Some countries base the apprenticeship grants on situational circumstances, whilst others distribute them according to universalistic welfare principles. Bulgaria, Lithuania and the United Kingdom have ELVET specific incentives in a sense that apprentices may receive additional financial support if they are in financial difficulties for example due to caring responsibilities so as to reduce the risk of them dropping out due to financial concerns.

In relation to school based VET, in Sweden the study allowance available for any upper secondary level student (academic or vocational) may be removed if the students show signs of dropping out, like high levels of truancy. The threat of removing the allowance is hoped to act as an incentive to remain in learning. In Lithuania, students may be awarded a (financial) bonus for good performance and attendance.

ELVET expertise and resources for VET providers

Individual VET providers do not always have the expertise to address high levels of early leaving or they are lacking the drive to prioritise the topic. There are programmes for example in Belgium (French Community), Denmark, France, Italy, Portugal and Finland that offer individual VET providers with additional resources or expertise to handle the problem. Typically this involves either additional funding or an external expert coming into the school/institute to oversee or help develop and implement a comprehensive ELVET prevention strategy. The expert stays for a period of time or visits the provider on regular basis to support implementation on an on-going manner and help the provider to tackle problems as they emerge. The expert is normally employed by the authority in charge of the programme or the schools/providers may be given funding to employ one.

The provision of ELVET expertise to the providers goes hand in hand with the need for better ELVET data. There are now many countries that have new ELVET data tools and programmes in place to guide developments in this field (e.g. Belgium (Flemish Community), Bulgaria, Denmark, France, Italy, the Netherlands and Norway). Most of the new tools cover both general and vocational education (although ELVET data related to apprenticeships is outside the remit of some of these tools) and Denmark is the only country where a VET specific ELVET data collection tool has been drafted to help VET schools and authorities to tackle the problem.

Training of teachers and in-company trainers to deal with ELVET

The quality and preparedness of VET teachers and in-company trainers to work with at risk groups and identify and support those who are starting to show signs of losing an interest in their studies have an impact on ELVET. Improvement of VET teachers’ skills is particularly pertinent for the VET sector in countries where the sector attracts higher than average share of students from disadvantaged backgrounds. Recently VET teachers in Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Hungary and Slovenia have received training on how to support and deal with students demonstrating signs of dropping out. The training can include practical advice on how to explore and find out why students are absent from school, how to identify students that have emotional or psychological problems and therefore display risk signals that without being addressed may lead into disengagement, how to improve student motivation and how to improve their attendance rates. In the United Kingdom (Wales), professional standards for teachers have been introduced to support the identification of young people at risk of early leaving.

I n t e r v e n t i o n m e a s u r e s

Early leaving and VET specific intervention measures (22) range from early warning systems and support provided by mentors/case workers and teams of professionals, to external time-out measures. Career guidance has not been examined as part of this exercise as it is seen as part of the broader framework of support for young people (see Chapter 5 on the role of education and career guidance in tackling ELET).

Early warning systems and units

Early warning systems and units have been developed as a proactive response to the need to intervene as soon as students start sending distress signals rather than acting in a reactive manner when he/she has already made their decision to leave. Some early warning systems are purely focussed on monitoring absenteeism, while others are more sophisticated with a specific unit having been set up. They might involve recruiting a dedicated professional at the VET school (or local authority) in charge of tracking down absent students, meeting with students to find out why they are absent and what problems they might be facing, communicating with parents and escalating a concern about a student if they feel like the tools and resources they have available are not going to be enough to help him/her.

Such systems or units are available in VET schools for example in Belgium (French and Flemish Communities), Bulgaria, Lithuania, Malta, the Netherlands and Slovakia. Some of these cover both general education and vocational training strands while others are specific to the VET sector.

It is not uncommon for VET schools which may not benefit from a specific ‘early warning measure’ as such to set up their own individual procedures for detecting at risk cases. In some schools, this work is done by assigning VET students with individual pathway counsellors, teachers are requested to complete assessments of students’ behaviour/attitude or regular meetings are held with work-place

Chapter 6: Early Leav ing from Voc ational Educ ation and Training trainer/employer may also lead into a decision on the part of the apprentice to leave training prematurely.

To prevent such situations escalating to a point where an apprentice wants to exit the training early, apprentice coaching programmes have been developed in Belgium (German-speaking Community), Germany, Austria and the United Kingdom. They involve employment of volunteer or paid coaches who remain in contact with the apprentices from the start of their apprenticeship journey until the end. They identify potential problem issues and work together with the student, provider and the employer to address them in the hope of reducing the risk of them dropping out. They might also offer technical and academic support for apprentices, such as special teaching and socio-pedagogical support if required help to reduce language and educational defects and/or foster the learning of theoretical knowledge and practical skills. They may also provide conflict management assistance.

While the coaching programmes can yield very positive results, the current challenges relate to the over-reliance on volunteer mentors and over-supply of different apprenticeship mentoring/coaching initiatives operating parallel to another, leading to confusion among employers (Germany) and low take-up due to lack of awareness of the initiative among employers (Austria).

Mentoring, coaching and other measures that offer one-to-one support for at risk students attending school-based VET could be identified from Belgium, France, Hungary and Austria. Some of these are available for students from schools of both general and vocational training but many, such as the one from Hungary, have targeted activities for VET students. The peer-to-peer coaching example from the Flemish Community of Belgium is particularly unique in that it involves training previous dropouts as mediators/coaches.

Complex interventions by multi-professional teams

The degree of support required by at risk students varies according to their personal, health and family circumstances. Some students identified as being at risk of dropping out may get easily ‘back on track’ with their studies with the help of a mentor, for example, but students with more complex issues may require more or different support than guidance practitioners, mentors or coaches can offer. They may need support from individual professionals such as counsellors or psychologists or teams of professionals, for instance multi-professional school care teams and student support services.

The VET legislation in many countries stipulate that students should have an access to support services such as career, psychological, counselling, special and/or social pedagogical services. In practice, this however does not always materialise. Previous research has indicated that the availability of multi-professional support has been more sparsely available within the VET sector than within the general upper secondary sector (see Section 4.3 on multi-agency partnerships in tackling ELET) even if many VET schools, albeit not all, host a more challenging student population and display higher than average early leaving rates (23).

This is one of the reasons why countries like Belgium, the Czech Republic, France, Hungary, Cyprus, Latvia, Lithuania, the Netherlands, Portugal, Slovenia, Finland and Iceland, for instance have recently reinforced the availability of professional counselling and support services within VET schools (24).

Short term time out measures

(23_{) E.g. shown by field work carried out as part of European Parliament, 2011.}

Short-term time out measures offer VET students facing personal or academic difficulties a respite from their studies in an out of normal classroom or school setting. They can first focus on addressing their personal problems or short-comings in behaviour or skills and then getting one-on-one and small group support to catch up on their studies. Their key characteristics include small group sizes, flexible approach, specialist educators/counsellors who work in close contact with other professionals and out- of-school premises which often only very remotely resemble classrooms. Examples of such measures available for IVET students could be identified in Belgium (French and Flemish Communities), Germany, France, Luxembourg, Hungary, Austria and the United Kingdom, for example.

C o m p e n s a t o r y m e a s u r e s ( r e i n t e g r a t i o n v i a V E T )

VET has a big part to play in the reintegration arena. First, many early leavers from both general and vocational education choose VET when they return to learning. Thus VET systems accommodate an important share of learners who have either dropped out or decided to change their studies from one