Implementation of dual vocational education and training in Spain: the case of the Basque Country

ABSTRACT

School-based vocational education and training (VET) systems are undergoing important changes with a view to strengthening their work-based learning component and, overall, their relationships with the local production environment. This paper looks at the introduction of dual VET in the Basque Country within the Spanish and European contexts. Based on an analysis of existing official information and literature as well as qualitative research carried out by the authors, the distinctive characteristics of the Basque system are documented and studied. It is shown that there has been a continuity in the ideas and relationships which have configured its trajectory from the early 1980s onwards, and that new instruments and elements of the system have been developed in the region even before those elements were fully formalised at national level in Spain.

KEYWORDS:

• VET
• dual
• Spain
• Basque Country
• education policy

Acknowledgements

This work was supported by the Department of Education of the Basque Government, PIBA Basic and applied research projects call (2018-2021), project No. PIBA2018/60

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes

1. The following are typical, illustrative quotes. “For us it is very important to respond to the firms’ needs. It would be useless to train students without knowing what firms are demanding from us” (Interview 11). ”Firms come to the educational centre because they need young workers and they have confidence in our educational offering” (Int. 14).

2. ”We see it as a kind of circle: in this moment I need a student and I take him/her as a trainee, but I also need to train other students in internships as a contribution to society” (Int. 1).

3. ”We have a close collaboration [with VET centres]. They supervise students in internships, visit the firms regularly, and invite us to forums for enterprises” (Int. 2). ”We have high trust relationships with firms, we are almost friends. Sometimes we ask them to accept trainees beyond their strict needs. Then when they come with some need we do our best to respond” (Int. 13).

4. ”Many local firms have ‘greed’. They want everything. Cheap labour and more” (Int. 16). ”Some firms want a real worker that is going to take charge of important tasks. We need to remind them that he/she is a young trainee who hasn’t finished the degree yet” (Int. 14).

5. ”Regarding internships, we think that the system is well regulated in order to avoid the risk of using them as cheap labour. There is protection against that kind of abuse” (Int. 7).