Quality Analysis in Indian Vocational Education and Training Institutions, with a Focus on Industrial Training Institutes and Polytechnic Colleges

Quality in vocational education and training plays a central role both nationally and internationally and has been the subject of concrete research and development projects for a long time. In India, too, processes of quality assurance and development increasingly came into focus over the past years, due to the growing demand for skilled workers. At the same time, however, formal vocational education and training provision in India faces fundamental problems in the area of quality.

While local quality assessment is of particular importance in the given context, it has so far been characterized by incompleteness and a lack of coherence. Primarily, basic key figures are transmitted by vocational training institutions to government agencies. The micro-level of teaching and learning is yet not targeted. Hence, there is a fundamental need for research and development concerning the quality of teaching and learning processes and a research gap regarding a high-quality and complex measurement of quality data in the field.

The project QualIndia focuses on the primary research question:

How can quality in Indian vocational education and training institutions be measured comprehensively?

The basic objective of the project is to develop and provide a demand-oriented quality model adapted to the national context, which will be operationalized and tested in practice.

The study will focus on two types of institutions with major importance in India, Industrial Training Institutes and Polytechnic Colleges. This selection allows the collection and comparison of data from different parts of the system. In the main study, the quality approach will be tested in 10-15 institutions of each type. In order to capture regional differences in India, field research will focus on two different urban regions, Delhi and Bangalore respectively.

The quality model to be developed explicitly includes the areas of input, process and output of vocational education and training processes and is based on the aggregation of findings from an international literature analysis. In addition to the macro- and meso-level, special emphasis is placed on the area of teaching and learning. The development of the model and the associated indicators is carried out in an iterative process in cooperation with the Indian project partners in order to ensure a "cultural fit" at an early stage. Qualitative and quantitative instruments, such as guideline interviews, classroom observations and standardized questionnaires, are developed and used for measurement.

In addition to the application and evaluation of the indicators in the main study, the procedure is continuously reviewed through discursive reflection with the Indian project partners.

The quality model, the indicators and the measuring instruments developed together with the partner institutions are prepared in the form of a toolbox. This toolbox can be used online via Open Access. The model and its operationalization thus form a sound basis for further quality development and, if necessary, certification processes.

The research findings will be used to formulate concrete and evidence-based recommendations to improve quality in Indian vocational education and training. The scientific findings are made available to relevant actors in India and Germany as well as to a broad readership both nationally and internationally, thus fostering educational policy and scientific discourse.

Further information about the projects from the BMBF funding line can also be found on the website of the metaproject INVET. In addition, you will find an interview with Prof. Dr. Matthias Pilz, who gives a short overview of the project "QualIndia"