Introducing the R4D Project
The R4D project is an exciting opportunity for us to learn a lot about what makes TVET work and how it impacts young people. Through this project, we should be able to continue giving CEMETS summer institute participants ever-more-accurate and –useful research findings to improve TVET programs all over the world. This post describes the new six-year, five-country research project in which CEMETS is a key partner.
By Katie Caves
CEMETS, the KOF Swiss Economic Institute’s Education Systems Research Division, and our partners in Benin, Costa Rica, Chile, Nepal, and the ETH Zurich Development Economics Chair are all working together on a new project that kicked off last June. The project is funded by a Swiss National Science Foundation grant on “Research for Development,” or R4D. Our R4D project is called “Linking education and labor markets: Under what conditions can Technical Vocational Education and Training (TVET) improve the income of the youth?” (Quick note: The project uses the abbreviation TVET, for technical and vocational education and training. It’s similar to the VET abbreviation we usually use here for vocational education and training, but common in slightly different contexts.)
The project is a six-year effort carried out by researchers in all five countries involved. We will be investigating four main research questions:
- Q1: How can we define and measure social institutions of TVET?
- Q2: How can we measure the youth labor market situation in low and middle income countries?
- Q3: Does improving the linkage between the actors of the education and employment system reduce unemployment, improve gainful employment, job quality, and thus income of the youth?
- Q4: How can the implementation and continuation of systemic changes in TVET be enhanced?
You can find more information on the project website, but Figure 1 is a really useful summary of the project. The first question, shown in gold, is about defining and measuring good TVET. This can be a tricky prospect, but we already have a strong tool in the KOF Education-Employment Linkage Index (KOF EELI). We’re going to need to refine the KOF EELI to make sure it accurately represents developing countries. For this question, we’ll be identifying and trying to compare all the things that make a TVET program or system better or worse.
Figure 1: Research questions and methods for the R4D project
The second question, shown in teal, deals with the outcomes of TVET. If a TVET program is doing its job, young people should be successful on the labor market because their skills and numbers match labor market demand. The situation as a whole is much bigger than just employment and unemployment, which is why we have already developed the KOF Youth Labor Market Index. Again, we’ll need to make sure what we’re measuring is the right stuff for developing countries with high levels of informality. For this question, there’s also the issue of collecting the right data. Different countries collect different data and use different standards to define key concepts, so we’re going to have to collect a lot of our own data in key countries.
The third question, shown in pink, is one where CEMETS starts to play a bigger role. Assuming we know what better TVET programs are (Q1) and how to measure better outcomes for youth (Q2), we need to know if better TVET leads to better outcomes. This question is all about change over time, so CEMETS will be working with reform teams from Nepal, Benin, Costa Rica, and Chile every year for six years starting in 2017 to support reforms and monitor progress and changes. Teams from those four countries will attend the summer institute every year, and we’ll get to watch and support them like all CEMETS reform lab cases.
Finally, the fourth question in navy blue is CEMETS’ main mission for the project. Assuming we can define and measure good TVET (Q1) and good outcomes (Q2), and that better TVET improves outcomes (Q3), how do we move from worse to better TVET? If our hypotheses are true, moving from worse TVET to better TVET will improve the employment, working conditions, skills matching, and transition smoothness of young people. That in turn helps improve economies and possibly encourages development. Therefore, improving TVET is an important policy goal. So how should policymakers go about it? CEMETS and all of our partner countries will be studying the implementation process of TVET reforms in the four countries involved in this project to answer that question. At the same time, CEMETS is already working with our existing cases to see what we can learn from them to feed back into this process.
The R4D project is an exciting opportunity for us to learn a lot about what makes TVET work and how it impacts young people. Through this project, we should be able to continue giving CEMETS reform lab participants ever-more-accurate and –useful research findings to improve TVET programs all over the world.