There is a saying that college graduates choose to "return to the furnace" because of the current employment pressure, and even think that this is a waste of resources. As a front-line worker in vocational education, the author believes that such prejudice needs to be broken in time.
In the past, due to the deep-rooted traditional values of "those who work hard to govern people, and those who work hard to govern people", vocational education has not been taken seriously, and most parents are reluctant to let their children choose vocational education, and even despise vocational education, thinking that vocational education is a kind of education for losers, and there is no future for vocational schools, and only by being admitted to university can you find a good job, even if you choose to go to vocational schools, it is often a helpless move.
However, the reality has changed. According to the statistics of the Ministry of Education, the number of ordinary college graduates in the country is expected to reach 11.79 million in 2024, an increase of 210,000 year-on-year, and the employment situation is grim. But at the same time, the shortage of highly skilled talent is becoming an obstacle to the transformation of China's manufacturing industry. According to the statistics of the Ministry of Human Resources and Social Security, in 2022, skilled talents in China will only account for 26% of the total employed population, and high-skilled talents will account for 28% of skilled talents. According to the data, it is expected that by 2025, the shortage of skilled talents in the ten key areas of the manufacturing industry alone will reach nearly 30 million.
In this context, it is no longer a helpless move for college graduates to "return" to vocational colleges to regain vocational skills, but an active choice based on their own development needs. This shows that more and more college graduates have changed their concept of vocational education, they are no longer bound by traditional concepts, no longer think that studying vocational schools is a "shameful" thing, but think that if you want to achieve high-quality employment, you need not only the "stepping stone" of academic qualifications, but also the "diamond" of technology. Higher education provides a broad range of knowledge and academic backgrounds, cultivating thinking skills and comprehensive literacy, while vocational education pays more attention to the cultivation of practical skills, and in the highly competitive job market, talents with both solid skills and higher academic qualifications will have an advantage. It is foreseeable that these highly educated and highly skilled talents who take the initiative to seek change will surely seize more development opportunities. And they are the proof of the increasing attractiveness of vocational education, and the starting point for breaking through the public's prejudice against vocational education. As their exemplary role gradually emerges, more and more students may take the initiative to choose the type of education that suits them, and when people see that the development prospects of vocational education are getting better and better, the prejudice and discrimination wrapped around vocational education will slowly dissolve.
In order to further establish a consensus that "theoretical knowledge and practical skills are equally important" in the whole society, form a good atmosphere of respecting technology, and completely open up the channel between the supply side and the demand side of talents, vocational schools should first accelerate the integration of production and education, closely combine the talent needs of the current social reality, optimize the school's professional settings, professional courses and training models, enhance the adaptability of vocational education, and truly combine theory and practice, professional and industry, internship and employment, and optimize the talent training model. At the same time, it is necessary to strengthen school-enterprise cooperation, break the "old way", actively cooperate with enterprises and industries, introduce advanced management models, training methods and education mechanisms of enterprises, and form a new school-running system of industry-university cooperation. At the same time, it is necessary to continue to improve the attractiveness of vocational education, work hard in school management, professional characteristics, teaching quality, moral education, etc., and work hard for the growth and development of students step by step, so as to win the reputation of students and the praise of the society, run the brand and characteristics of vocational schools, and reflect the superiority of vocational education.
The "return" of college graduates to vocational schools allows our front-line vocational educators to see new opportunities for the development of vocational education, and also makes us more convinced that only by vigorously developing high-quality vocational education and breaking the single test-oriented education training model can each student find a suitable development path according to their own advantages and specialties, and make vocational education the preferred choice for more students.
The author's affiliation is Wanbei Economic and Technical School, Linquan County, Anhui Province).
China Teacher Daily, January 31, 2024, 14th edition
Author: Zhang Fei.