Technical/Vocational

Skills for the future initiative (SFI) aims to prepare the youth of Middle East and North Africa (MENA) to compete in the global economy by equipping them with skills necessary for the future of work, including essential cloud computing skills and 21st century skills. In the changing future of work, skills that can be substituted by technology are fading in demand but skills that complement technology are becoming highly valued.

The vocational education and training (VET) school study's purpose was to describe the current status of secondary VET schools in the Prešov region, identify areas preventing schools from achieving a higher quality of education, and pinpoint areas for school improvement. The main objective is to conduct an assessment of employers and secondary VET schools and work with the Prešov region education department to more effectively pursue European Union (EU) structural funds to implement needed changes in line with study findings.

In South Sudan, the importance of focusing on young people is clear. They represent the majority of the population, with the average South Sudanese being 17 years old and the average 3rd grader reported as being already 14 years old. Furthermore, South Sudanese youth have low educational attainment, inconsistent economic participation and are also affected by the widespread violence that has existed for a number of years in different regions of the country.

The objective of the report which is in two phases, is to explore the overarching factors in theCentral African Republic (CAR) that contribute to the out-of-school youth phenomenon with a view toproviding recommendations for improving existing policies and programs.

Bangladesh has achieved near universal access to primary education and gender equity at the primary and secondary school enrolments. Yet, many school-aged children, from the poorest families, either do not enrol in or discontinue school, due to poverty. Following the government’s vision of education for all, the second reaching out-of-school children (ROSC II) project provides a second-chance education to out-of-school children in targeted rural upazilas (sub-districts) and urban slums.

Moldova has made significant progress in economic growth and poverty reduction since 2000, but the growth model has mainly relied on remittances, with limited job creation (World Bank, 2016a; Merroto et al., 2016). To sustain this progress and to catch up with the living standards of other countries in the region, Moldova requires a new growth model which is driven by higher private sector growth and creation of more and better jobs.

The objective of this report is to fill the observed knowledge gaps on skills supply in Moldova by providing the first findings from the Moldova Skills Measurement Survey (MSMS). The rest of the report is structured as follows: Next section briefly describes the Moldova Skills Measurement Survey and provides definitions of the skills used in this survey, with more technical details provided in Annex A.

Over the past decade, China's transition rate from lower secondary education to higher secondary education has increased significantly, from 80.5 to 93.7 percent. In light of this impressive progress, the Chinese government aimed at raising the gross enrollment rate in senior high schools to above 90 percent by 2020. Quality and relevance in vocational and academic high school education could be a key bottleneck in further expansion. The way tracking operates between academic and vocational streams could itself be a distortion for the sector's further expansion.

Cambodia’s education sector has faced and overcome a number of challenges in recent history. Several decades of political and social unrest caused by the Khmer Rouge regime of the 1970s and Vietnamese occupation in the 1980’s dealt a severe blow to the education system and left it in a state of disintegration. Primary and secondary enrollment through to the 1980’s fell, with school attendance dramatically lower for individuals who were teenagers in 1975 compared to previous or subsequent cohorts (de Walque, 2004).

Moldova, like many other countries in the region, is facing rapid economic and demographic transitions. Employers report that inadequate levels of workforce skills hamper their productivity. Recognizing the importance of workforce development to improve the country’s socioeconomic prospects, the Government of Moldova approved the educational development strategies for 2013-2020. The main objectives are to improve the quality of education and training system and better match its outcome with the labor market needs.