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Keywords
Costing, Costs, Training costs, Vocational training
Abstract
Discusses the methodological issues in costing two common types of vocational training programmes: institutional vocational training and enterprise-based vocational training. Points out that the survey/interview approach should be used to collect data from institutions instead of from the government in costing institutional vocational training, and that more frequent use should be made of the case-study and survey methods in costing enterprise-based vocational training. Based on empirical studies on both developed and developing countries, analyses the costs of different types of vocational training programmes. Shows that training costs are influenced by such factors as the technology of training, teacher costs and their determinants, programme length, extent of wastage, extent of underutilization of training inputs and scale of operation. In general, vocational/technical education is more costly than academic programmes and pre-employment vocational training is more expensive than in-service training. Discusses the implications of these findings for training policies.
Vocational training is broadly defined as any type of job-related learning that raises an individual's productivity, and includes learning in formal vocational and technical school programmes in training centres or institutes, and in the workplace, both on and off the job. Which of these learning activities is the most efficient for which kinds of work is an important question for decision makers in developing countries today.
Tight government budgets and unmet demands for education and training have increased the urgency of controlling the costs of education and training and of improving efficiency. Thus, better information on the costs of vocational training is essential to estimate the total cost of a vocational training programme and to evaluate its economic feasibility. Detailed information on both the costs and benefits of vocational training programmes are needed to evaluate their costeffectiveness (Tsang, 1988).
This article first discusses the methodological issues in costing vocational training programmes, and then analyses and compares the costs of different types of vocational training programmes.
Analysing the costs of vocational training: an economic framework
The conventional economic approach to the study of education is to treat education as a production process (Hanushek, 1979; Lau, 1979). The same approach can also be applied to the study of vocational training. The objective of vocational training is usually to teach...