Global Development

Overview of Provision¹¹⁶:

There are currently 20 Institutes of Technology and Polytechnics in New Zealand. Every town with a population of at least 20,000 has a significant polytechnic presence and many more centres with populations of a lot less than 20,000 have some polytechnic presence.

The sector generates about $US600 million in revenue, 60% of which comes from government subsidies and 20% from domestic student tuition fees. International student fees account fro 11% of overall revenue.

Polytechnics enrolled nearly 200,000 individual students in 2004 which equated to 95,000 equivalent full time students (EFTS). The average age of students in the polytechnics sector is 29 and rising.

The polytechnic sector employs more than 4,400 academic staff and 3,700 non-academic support staff. Fifty four percent of academic staff in polytechnics are female compared to 42% in the university sector and 56% are full time compared to 61% in the university sector.

The number of equivalent full time students per academic staff in the polytechnic sector has increased from 14 in 1997 to 22 in 2004. The corresponding figure for universities in 2004 was 16.

Of students completing qualifications in the polytechnics sector, 79% receive Certificate level qualifications, 11% Diplomas and 10% Degrees. In the university sector, 18% graduate with Certificate level Qualifications, 5% Diplomas, 53% Bachelors Degrees and 24% Post graduate.

The range of qualifications offered by polytechnics is extensive. The principle areas cover:

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  Agriculture, Equine Studies, Forestry
  
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  Arts, Design, Fine Arts
  
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  Aviation
  
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  Beauty & Health
  
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  Building & Architecture
  
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  Business & management
  
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  Community & Social Sciences
  
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  Computing & information Technology
  
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  Education
  
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  Engineering
  
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  Environmental Studies
  
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  Foundation
  
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  Health Sciences
  
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  Language & Culture
  
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  Marine Studies
  
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  Media & Communications
  
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  Music
  
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  Office Systems
  
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  Performing Arts
  
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  Science
  
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  Sports & recreation
  
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  Tourism & Hospitality
  
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  Trades & Technology
  
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  Veterinary Studies
  
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  Viticulture & Beverage Studies
  

Contacts:
www.itpnz.ac.nz

www.itpq.ac.nz

www.minedu.govt.nz

www.tec.govt.nz

Public Further Education and Training Colleges

in South Africa
Glen Fisher

Marianne Scott

An historical note: the concepts of ‘community college’ and Further Education and Training in South Africa

South Africa does not have a ‘community college’ system as such, but this does not mean that the community college concept has not been explored in this country, or that the influence of the American and Canadian community college systems cannot be seen in South African policy and practice. As will be shown, the policy intention behind the transformation and re-branding of South Africa’s former technical colleges as Further Education and Training (FET) colleges is to create a new colleges sector which will bear more than a passing resemblance to the community colleges of North America (and the Further Education colleges of the United Kingdom) – although, in many cases, South African colleges have some way to go before the family resemblance becomes strongly apparent in reality.

A number of South African colleges have had long-standing linkages with Northern American community colleges and, in the late 1980s and early 1990s, particularly, a north-south network of community college advocates actively promoted the community college concept in South Africa, driven locally by the National Institute for Community Education (NICE) and supported by the Tertiary Education Program Support (TEPS) project of USAID (NICE, 1995; see also Strydom et al., 1995).

Interestingly, the previous, apartheid government, in its final attempts to shape education policy in the emerging democratic context of post-1990 South Africa, lent indirect support to such a concept, in its proposals for the transformation of some technical colleges into colleges for advanced or further education – the name ‘edukon’ was mooted, but thankfully won no public support. Such colleges, significantly, would have included the academic bridging and transfer functions of American community colleges. The motivation behind this proposal of the apartheid government’s Education Renewal Strategy (ERS) was, ostensibly, one of efficiency:

…university and technikon¹¹⁷ studies have become increasingly expensive…. In view of these high costs it is imperative that only students who have a realistic chance of completing their studies successfully should be admitted to these institutions. Less costly preparatory study avenues which could lead up to tertiary studies are, therefore necessary (DNE, 1991: 59-60).
In the contested environment of a society undergoing a profound political and social transition, from apartheid to a new, post-apartheid democratic order, it is not surprising that the ERS proposals were read in some quarters as a coded attempt by the old regime to limit the access of the disadvantaged black majority, victims of a highly discriminatory school system, to higher education and, by extension, to maintain the privileged and elitist status of the universities, in particular.

Regardless of the actual intentions behind the ERS proposals, it was argued that they failed to address the need for transformation in higher education, and the social and political imperative for higher education to become fully representative of all South Africa’s people. Likewise, it was argued at the time by one of the authors of the present paper, on the basis of the critical American literature, that transfer programs within a college environment would have only limited impacts on black access to the universities; conversely, that the most effective way to improve black access and success was within a transformed and more conducive higher education environment (Fisher, 1993).

If one line of criticism of the ‘community college’ concept centered on the problematic transfer function of colleges in the peculiar socio-political circumstances of South Africa, a second focused on the perceived emphasis of the South African community college discourse on a vaguely defined notion of ‘community education’ (see NICE, 1995), drawing its inspiration in part from the discourse of ‘peoples’ education’ propounded by opponents of the apartheid education system. As one radical critic argued at the time,
…the theoretical indeterminacy of the concept of ‘the people’ has placed tremendous obstacles in the way of the realization of a coherent goal for people’s education. State repression has undoubtedly contributed greatly to the impasse but the imprecise notions of ‘the people’ and ‘the community’ have enabled government to attempt to take over the concept of people’s education and mould it for its own purposes. The chances of this type of educational reform succeeding seem remote… (Levin, 1991: 129).
If the concept of ‘community education’ could be challenged from a radical intellectual perspective, so too was it open to criticism from employers and from organized workers, who were primarily concerned with employment, workforce development and economic growth. Put simply, it was not clear to policy actors from both business and labor where in the community education discourse these priorities featured.¹¹⁸

When, in 1997, the recently elected democratic government appointed a National Committee on Further Education to advise on the development of education and training within this intermediate band of the new National Qualifications Framework¹¹⁹, it appeared to signal in its choice of terms not only a wider focus than the then technical colleges, but an agnosticism towards the concept of a ‘community college’, notwithstanding that the chair of the NCFE was also the chief executive of the National Institute for Community Education. In the event, in addition to considering the ‘community college model’ as advocated in its South African variant by NICE, the NCFE looked more broadly at international models, closely examining, in particular, the system of Further Education in the United Kingdom, and drawing on the English example, for instance, in its approach to a funding model for the colleges’ sector.

Ultimately, given these contestations, the term ‘community college’ appeared to generate more heat than light, and government chose to adopt the term, ‘Further Education and Training college’ – the inclusion of the word ‘training’ representing an explicit recognition of the emphasis on training and skills sought by both organized labor and the private sector.

This brief and necessarily selective account of the term and concept ‘community college,’ in the context of South Africa’s transition to democracy over the past fifteen years, serves to remind us that terms and labels have histories, and are not neutral in content or significance. It highlights, too, the complexities of policy borrowing and policy influence across different countries and contexts; and it demonstrates how contestations over language and terminology may also be conflicts over the interests and demands of competing sectors of society. In this case, it can be argued that the dispute over the term and concept of the ‘community college’ was, in a fundamental sense, a dispute over the future institutional mission and purposes of South Africa’s technical colleges.

Finally, perhaps, this short history of the term ‘community college’ and its application to colleges in South Africa is a salutary reminder that policy development and policy implementation are seldom linear and straightforward, particularly in periods of far-reaching social and political transition, but are subject to ongoing contestation and reinterpretation. It is this contestation, reinterpretation and ‘re-visioning’ of policy, and of the ambiguities and challenges of system change, that is the focus of much of the following discussion.


The development of the technical colleges system in South Africa, 1884 – 1990¹²⁰

The development of technical and vocational education in South Africa is integrally related to the development of the modern South African economy, commencing with the mineral discoveries of the late nineteenth century. The location of diamonds and gold in the remote hinterland, and at great depths, required the development of railways for the transport of heavy equipment and supplies, the development of power supplies and the mobilization of large labor forces. From these developments in turn rose new urban centers and the growth of commercial farming and manufacturing.

On the heels of these developments came the establishment of the first apprenticeships at railway workshops in Natal (1884) and the Cape (circa 1890) and the introduction of programs in mining engineering in the Cape in 1894. Over the next twenty years, certain of these technical training institutions evolved into South Africa’s first universities, in Cape Town, Natal and the Witwatersrand, while others became technical institutes.

The period between the two World Wars was one of accelerating industrialization, under the protectionist policies of the PACT government. This period saw a rapid expansion of technical college enrolments, fuelled in part by the Apprenticeship Act of 1922 which required that apprentices attend formal technical classes. Between 1935 and 1955, full-time technical college enrolments grew from about 4000 to 9000, but part-time enrolments soared from 16000 to 55000. The great majority of these were whites, while Indian and colored enrolments grew slowly off a very small base, and Africans remained largely excluded from technical and vocational education.

During this period, technical colleges enjoyed considerable autonomy and close linkages with local employers and communities, functioning in effect as “…the peoples’ universities. Their organization was flexible and adaptable, so that they could readily meet the educational needs of all ages and all levels in almost every conceivable subject. For the most part it was education provided cafeteria style (Malherbe 1977: 173).

The assumption of political power by the National Party in 1948, and the introduction of its policies of apartheid and racial exclusion, saw the weakening of the technical colleges sector, as the new government asserted centralized control over the colleges, and sought to promote the development of Afrikaans-medium institutions and the establishment of school-based technical and vocational education in the predominantly Afrikaans-speaking rural areas, beyond the reach of urban institutions. State funding of technical colleges fell sharply relative to higher education, laying the basis for the present ‘inverted triangle’ of FET college and higher education enrolments.

Shortages of skilled personnel to meet the rapidly growing needs of commerce and industry prompted the passage in 1967 of the Advanced Technical Education Act, transforming a number of the larger urban technical colleges into colleges for advanced technical education (CATEs – later ‘technikons’). By 1969 there were six such colleges enrolling over 23000 students.

The late 1970s and the 1980s marked a period of steadily intensifying political conflict and of declining economic growth; but also a shift within government away from heavily interventionist economic policies towards a more market-friendly approach. By the beginning of the 1980s, skills shortages had again become a pressing concern for government and for the private sector. This time, however, the issue was bound up with the pressures of increasing black urbanization, and the demand of sections of big business for greater political and economic liberalization. The racial basis of education and training, and the concentration of technical and vocational skills within the relatively small white population, were increasingly contested politically, and challenged on economic grounds by some large employers.

Technical and vocational education for black people, especially for Africans, had always been limited: over the quarter century from 1946 to 1970 African enrolments rose from a mere 2015 to a miserly 3652, while colored enrolments at the end of the 1960s barely exceeded 2000, and Indian figures stood at some 1300 full time and 4500 part time enrolments. Now private sector actors, and the state, sought to address this issue, often however from competing political and economic perspectives.

Technical training institutions for blacks were established in urban townships, in some cases with significant financial support from the private sector (see Chisholm, 1984; Swainson 1991). By the beginning of the 1990s the technical colleges sector compromised a total of 123 institutions, including 67 white, three Indian and eight colored colleges. Technical colleges for Africans included 22 in the then-Republic and a further 23 in the so-called ‘independent’ homelands for Africans. Still, by 1991 African technical college enrolments equaled only 0.45 per thousand of the African population, as opposed to 10 per thousand for whites. Put differently, of the 76,435 technical college students in 1991, after a decade of so-called reform, fully two thirds were white.

The 1980s, in short, saw important efforts by the state as well as by employers and by a black trade union movement which was growing rapidly in strength and determination, to address the issues of skills and of technical and vocational training. State initiatives however were compromised by a narrowly instrumental concept of ‘skill’, as understood by the 1981 Report of the De Lange Commission (HSRC, 1981) and by the inability of the National Party government to embrace a wider program of social and political reform.

Furthermore, following the Soweto uprising of 1976, both education and the workplace were emerging as critical ‘sites of struggle’ against an increasingly embattled and repressive apartheid regime. Legislative reforms in these and other arenas were dismissed as irrelevant and illegitimate by significant sections of the population, and quickly ground to a halt. In the words of the mass democratic movement’s National Education Policy Investigation (NEPI),¹²¹ the 1980s in South Africa marked a period of ‘stalled reform’ (NEPI, 1993a).

Political transition and education policy contestation, 1990 – 1994

The un-banning of the African National Congress (ANC) and other liberation movements in February 1990 set in train a far-reaching process of change in South Africa, marked most obviously by the transition to a new, ANC-led democratic government in 1994, but with long term consequences which are still playing themselves out in the social, economic and political terrains today.

While national and international attention was largely focused, understandably, on the transitional and constitutional talks that were taking place between the principal actors, the period from 1990 to 1994 was also one of considerable ferment and debate across many areas of public policy, not least the politically symbolic and fiercely contested arena of education and training.
As has been seen, the apartheid government sought to shape education policy in a period of rapid and unpredictable change, through the release of its Education Renewal Strategy. At roughly the same time, under the auspices of the National Education Coordinating Committee, a broad grouping of anti-apartheid organizations, the National Education Policy Investigation (NEPI) mounted an unprecedented extra-governmental policy inquiry into almost all aspects of education in post-apartheid South Africa – although, mindful of the political leadership role of the ANC, other liberation organizations and the trade unions, NEPI was careful to cast its research and consultation in terms of the development of ‘options’ for the consideration of a future, democratic government, and not of policy choice or recommendation.

The private sector, likewise, was closely engaged in the education and training debate, and, while it did not put forward its views in one, overarching policy statement, the sum of its statements and interventions lent strong support to the qualitative improvement of basic education and to improvements in the scale and quality of technical and vocational education. The Congress of South African Trade Unions, at the same time, was a powerful advocate of the systematic skill-building of both the existing workforce and of work-seekers and the unemployed. The international community was also active in the policy debates that accompanied South Africa’s political transition over this period, through the development of reports and proposals on primary and higher education (USAID) and human resources (Commonwealth Expert Group), while a variety of special interests in education and training sought to mobilize themselves and stake out their positions in the fluid and evolving policy arena (NEPI, 1993a: 40).

As the NEPI reports noted (NEPI, 1993a: 39 – 47), there was some common ground amongst these various policy interventions and between the various stakeholders and policy actors. These included broad agreement on the need for a unified national education system and policy framework; the need for improvements in the quality of basic education and in the range and relevance of vocational education and training; the importance of adult education and training; and improved access to and success within higher education by the black and particularly the African majority. However, agreement on broad principles masked significant differences of approach amongst the various players.

Key amongst these were competing interpretations of the meaning and priority to be accorded to concepts of equity, equality and redress; the centralization or decentralization of educational control; access to education and the nature of the curriculum; educational financing and management; the organization of higher education; and the nature of democratic policy making in a post-apartheid state.

In the arena of vocational education and training, agreement on broad principles hid significant differences of emphasis amongst the players. The key state and private sector proposals were outlined in ‘The NTB/HSRC Investigation into a National Training Strategy for the Republic of South Africa’ (NTB/HSRC: 1991), which proposed the introduction of a competency-based modular training system, the establishment of Industry Training Boards, and the creation of a sense of partnership between the main stakeholders in the training system.

The National Training Strategy proposals, however, while they emerged from an extensive process of consultation between government and employers, were developed without the participation of the trade unions, particularly the largest confederation, COSATU, which had put forward detailed and comprehensive proposals of its own. COSATU envisaged a national system of vocational education and training financed by the state and employers, with active union involvement in the management of industry-based training, and with training linked to a comprehensive qualifications framework allowing learner mobility both horizontally and vertically, right up the occupational ladder.

Employers on the other hand favored more flexible and diversified forms of training, and expressed competing views regarding the role of the state, employers and workers in the financing and management of training.

There is not space here to explore in more detail the intricacies of the education and training policy debates of this period;¹²² for present purposes however what is important to recognize is the thrust of the education and training policy debate, amongst what one might term the broad democratic movement, including NEPI, towards the coordination of education and training, within an integrated system of qualifications and provision, and its alignment with economic policy and a national growth and development strategy. Training policy, in particular, notwithstanding the differences of emphasis and approach noted above, drew on a rich and vibrant process of debate and engagement between the state, employers and organized labor – while, in contrast, state policy on education was largely a closed affair, conducted within the state education apparatus (NEPI, 1993b).

The actual playing out of these debates within the technical colleges sector, ‘declared’ as FET colleges in 1992 in terms of the FET Act, No. 98 of 1998, provides an interesting illustration of the long and winding road from education and training research and analysis, to policy development and policy implementation, over the past fifteen years.

Colleges were and remain the responsibility of the Departments of Education. While the thrust of policy regarding vocational education and training in the transitional period of 1990 – 1994 saw a broad convergence of principle between the state, employers and organized labor regarding systems coordination and the integration of education and training, it has been argued that the then-government’s Education Renewal Strategy, and its proposals for the development of technical colleges as ‘edukons,’ were developed within a relatively closed educational discourse and in isolation from the vocational education and training debates that were occupying the minds of employers, unions and other government departments.

As will be seen in the following section, the commitment to coordination and integration was followed through, albeit in different forms and with different emphases, in the development of new education and training policies and human resource development strategies, in the first term of office of the new, post-apartheid government. Yet, from the vantage point of the present,¹²³ it is one of the ironies of the post-apartheid period that the ‘separate development’ of the colleges sector, symptomatic of a wider dichotomy between education and training has, in the actual implementation of policy, stubbornly persisted, long outliving its apartheid-era origins.