# Antecedents of Sustainable Vocational Education and Training in ICT in Global South Countries

Javier Osorio, Julia Nieves

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Javier Osorio, Julia Nieves. Antecedents of Sustainable Vocational Education and Training in ICT in Global South Countries. 1st International Conference on Sustainable ICT, Education, and Learning (SUZA), Apr 2019, Zanzibar, Tanzania. pp.157-166, 10.1007/978-3-030-28764-1_18. hal-02515745

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# Antecedents of Sustainable Vocational Education and Training in ICT in Global South Countries

Javier Osorio and Julia Nieves

Universidad de Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, 35017, SPAIN
javier.osorio@ulpgc.es

**Abstract.** The topic of sustainability is another component of the complex issue of fostering effective vocational education and training (VET) initiatives in information and communication technologies (ICT) in Global South countries. There is no workable model of VET for Development, and simple, symptomatic solutions are no longer suitable. This paper attempts to summarize some drivers that can be considered as antecedents of this issue. They conform part of the big picture that arises when addressing long term, structural proposals. The prism of sustainability has been included as a complementary lens with which to look at it. Sustainability can serve to either shed some light on the issue or, alternatively, add some uncertainty and pressure, with the result of making it even more complex.

**Keywords:** Vocational education and training, VET, Information and communication technologies, ICT, Global South, Sustainability.

## 1 Introduction

The development of vocational education and training (VET) in many Global South countries is a complex issue. In fact, it is a complex issue all around the world, but in the case of low-income countries it faces additional challenges because of the lack of available educational and technological resources. The task of interpreting and unravelling the picture of all variables and circumstances that converge when designing and developing VET initiatives, especially in Global South countries, appears to be a difficult one. Analysis and recommended courses of action have been raised by national governments, regional organisations (Southern African Development Community - SADC, Union of South American Nations - USAN) and global institutions (OECD, UNESCO); often with the only result being that the big picture becomes even more complicated. The objective of this paper is to re-examine the issue of VET initiatives in Global South countries under the prism of sustainability which, as a general concept, can potentially influence it both internally and externally.

Most of the arguments for explaining the differences in educational development between the Northern and Southern hemispheres tended to focus on the endemic lack of resources allocated to the educational arena in Global South countries. Another
reason has been the low level of social-economic development, which serves as a
constraint to the virtuous loop that links educational and economic improvement. The
mirror of the Global North -where no doubt arises when justifying the link between
education and economic development as the key to success- may promote the view
that the formulae that apparently fits well in one part of the world can also work
equally well everywhere else. Within this landscape, during the last thirty years
another agent has irrupted becoming a major protagonist: information and
communication technologies (ICT). The nature of this actor, heavily demanding of
huge investments for it to be incorporated into the educational arena, has been
supposed to be both a source of opportunity that allows educational processes to be
aligned in countries of both hemispheres and, at the same time, a threat because of the
costly nature of technology. The acquisition of ICT may, eventually, permit resources
that could be allocated to other social or economic initiatives to be deferred. However,
some research has showed that the focus on technology is not a key driver in
educational improvement [1], thus providing a way to challenge the globally accepted
paradigm of technology as a key factor in educational improvement.

Because of the complexity of the problem, we advocate for continuing the research
on the variables and topics involved, to the extent where most of the big picture can
be depicted. Although knowing the global blueprint does not mean that a solution or
set of solutions can be outlined, at least it can encourage one to avoid symptomatic,
short-term solutions and seek for structural ones instead. The organisation of this
paper follows the proceeding structure. The first section addresses some outstanding
variables and their implications in VET development programmes. The second
section addresses the issue of taking into consideration sustainability as a filter that
can also influence VET development. The third section offers some examples of
recommended courses of action proposed by researchers and institutions aligned with
sustainability principles. The paper concludes with some final thoughts about the
implications for sustainable vocational education and training in ICT in Global South
countries.

## 2 An Approach to the Big Picture

An important number of papers and contributions dealing with the topic of VET in
Global South countries address the issue from different but complementary
perspectives, contributing towards shedding light on the problem. Most of them
propose courses of action to face the issue and achieve better results. The general
perception is that the task appears complex because of the high number of variables
involved, and that single solutions are ineffective. Next, several of those variables are
briefly described, without the pretence of being exhaustive.

2.1 The information technology utopia

[2] categorised the ambitious policy rhetoric contained within the launch of project documents by governmental bodies and international institutions as examples of the
‘magical properties’ that policymakers attach to the new technologies in education, where the most extended assumption is that more technology equals more learning. The large number of newer and more resource-demanding initiatives that have arisen as part of the reform agendas to bring ITC into the educational setting seem to have become little more than a hardware distribution operation [3]. Despite more than two decades of research indicating the absence of any direct causal link between investment in education technology and improved learning outcomes, a remarkable number of policy statements from government officials still show their perception about the strong relationship between ICT and the quality of learning [4]. The political rhetoric does little to recognise that the relationship between technology and the classroom has always been a complex one. [5] highlighted the small amount of research that has taken place to investigate the relationship between ICT, classroom practice and learning outcomes. [1], in their analysis of ICT investment in schools in the USA and the impact upon student learning outcomes, have shown that no clear causal link exists between ICT investment and improved educational performance; indeed, their analysis confirms that socio-economic status (SES) has a far higher significance than connectivity and how many computers are in the classroom, even when equipment is available to students on a one-to-one basis. Some small overall student performance gain is evident in high-SES schools, but these gains are almost completely absent from low-SES schools, where other social and educational factors are of much more significance. [6], [7] and [8], have promoted an alternative view and commented on how idiosyncratic and dependent upon local conditions ICT implementation is. For instance, a UNESCO survey [9] acknowledged the small impact that ICT investment has had on education in the Middle East.

Across the world, governments have spent hundreds of millions of dollars on providing schools with ICT equipment and broadband connectivity [10]. The extent to which this significant investment is having any impact on innovative teaching and learning and the development of twenty-first-century skills is rather more limited. There is no automatic link between computers in the classroom and the development of the skills expected of an autonomous, self-directing learner. Another issue related to the generalised perception of technology as a central agent in education improvement is raised in low-resource environments, whereas the critical attitudes of teaching staff about technology development can, in turn, negatively influence the attitudes of recipients. In such environments, the complaints of teaching staff about the technology available locally, the electricity supply, the irregular connectivity, the bugs in their operating systems, or the age of their computers, can lead to a decrease in the amount of pride stakeholders take in their own resources [11].

There is an extant literature on ICT adoption that recognises availability and accessibility in developing countries as key factors. The literature reflects the efforts to promote the use of ICT in education in Global South countries as a component of the political will to modernise education, but funding continues to be, at large, a major constraint [12]. Since the late 1990s, based on private initiatives and sponsorships from non-governmental organisations (NGOs), several projects have aimed to equip schools with computer equipment (computers, video projectors and Internet access) and teacher training in the use of ICT. The situation among countries is different; for
instance, [12] reports that visits to 46 educational institutions in the Republic of Burkina Faso and Democratic Republic of Congo, on their own, highlight the fact that certain states do not have sufficient resources to provide state schools with computer rooms. This situation contrasts with the evidence that only a few studies that focus on the impacts of ICT on national development that can inform ICT policy and decision-making in Africa exist [13].

## 2.2 The complexity to develop effective institutions in Global South countries

Although the neoliberal paradigm advocates for reducing as much as possible the intervention of public bodies in the economic and, even, the educational setting, a rather majoritarian consensus exists regarding the importance of institutions in promoting the development of their communities. Institutions symbolise the formal structures, informal rules and norms that govern the behaviour and expectations of different states [14]. The role of institutions in economic growth has been widely studied by researchers and has evolved over time. An institution often displays two sides of the same coin in the sense that it can either facilitate or delay development and economic growth depending on how it is structured in terms of decision-making. Good institutions have been known to promote economic growth in three major ways [15]: (a) they create environments conducive to protecting property rights; (b) they constrain the actions of the ‘elite’ (on the contrary, ‘poor’ institutions promote the vested interests of elites to the detriment of the majority); and (c), they provide the population with investment opportunities in economic activities. [16] and [17] provide empirical evidence to show that an economy with a good system of accountable government and a peaceful political terrain provides environment conducive to poverty reduction. On the side of growth, [18] and [19] demonstrate that government effectiveness positively and significantly affects Africa’s economic growth, and one catalyst for economic growth is the existence of political institutions of limited government.

For [20] developing effective institutions in Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) has been particularly complicated. Several impediments deter these institutions' efficiency. They include a proliferation of underdeveloped and ineffective institutions that make numerous African countries a high risk and unattractive environment for investors; poor political institutions that lead to economic mismanagement through kleptocratic dictatorships and political instability; weak social capital and social polarisation in SSA that prevents the intergroup cooperation necessary for economic development and leads to polarisation, which increases the risk of conflict; and finally, inadequate state capacity to reform or invest in institutions that promote economic development. Although not generalisable, [21] add another underlying reason, arguing that in developing countries public institutions often fail to provide services on an equal scale to all citizens, leading to what they call ‘political marginalisation’. Abounding on this issue, they consider that areas with higher concentrations of marginalised citizens are likely not benefitting from the distribution of public goods. Political marginalisation usually occurs in areas with little influence in the political outcomes of democratic processes [21].
## 2.3 International institutions’ role in Global South VET initiatives

Several international institutions, such as the UNESCO and UNICEF, have a long tradition of collaboration in education transformation and improvement in Global South countries. Rather recently, an institution as the OECD, established initially as an instrument for increasing the development of advanced economies, has shown interest in educational improvement in developing countries. This institution promoted a strategy -the OECD skills strategy, launched in 2012 [22]- which provides a policy framework that guides countries on how to invest in skills for creating jobs and boosting economic growth, in the context of the global economic crisis. The main objective was to transform countries into internationally competitive high skills economies. In the policy framework of the OECD, education and training policies should contribute to these strategies by [22]: (a) developing the relevant skills for the knowledge economy; (b) incentivising the participation of inactive individuals in the labour market through retraining and up-skilling; and (c) fostering entrepreneurship and supporting employers in the creation of highly skilled jobs. Given the renewed global interest in the skills sector of the education and development field, and the scarcity of solid alternative policy frameworks at a global level, it is reasonable to expect that a substantial number of stakeholders, including donors and governments in developing countries, will use the OECD skills strategy as a policy guide [23].

The OECD skills strategy policy framework rests on the OECD's traditional economicist focus on education and the primacy of human capital orthodoxy [22], [23]. The central premise of human capital theory is that investment in education and training is a key driver of economic growth [24]–[26]. More education and training will contribute to the development of individuals’ skills, which has been associated with both higher individual earnings and growing societal wealth [27]. It may be interesting to note that the Better Skills report makes repeated reference to the situation of jobs and skills in ‘emerging economies’ and ‘middle income countries’, which are cited more than fifteen times in the report [22]. The report also makes explicit reference to the situation in West, East and Central Africa [22]:41. The OECD skills strategy clearly sees skills as the key to tackling inequality and promoting social mobility because, ‘investing in skills is far less costly, in the long run, than paying the price of poorer health, lower incomes, unemployment and social exclusion - all of which are closely tied to lower skills’ [22]:18. Undoubtedly, from this perspective, these premises advocate for a wide development of VET initiatives.

## 3 The Lens of Sustainability

Most ICT sustainability issues in developing countries are related to ensuring the continuity of ICT projects, so as to develop ways in which to alleviate the challenges associated with the use of ICT [28]. Among the challenges faced by ICT initiatives in Global South countries are: limited access to infrastructure, limited formal education, insufficient training and capacity building, financial and political constraints, and social and cultural challenges [28]. Sustainability focusses on two views of analysis, that is, the sustainability of ongoing ICT access, independent of specific technologies
or projects, and the sustainability of development results through ICT-enabled
development -e.g., education, health, empowerment, etc. [29]. ICT sustainability can
be categorised into social and cultural, institutional, economic, political, and
technological sustainability, which should be developed harmoniously in order to
promote the overall ICT project sustainability [29].

However, another side of sustainability, which has been explored less, is that
related to the link between expectations and real professional opportunities for those
involved in VET programmes. No policy framework on education policies can aspire
to provide better welfare opportunities if it operates in a context of high
unemployment rates and low-paid jobs [22], [23]. Additionally, problems in the
supply of skills can be due to poor information on the needs of the market and/or to
the low capacity of education and training systems to respond to these needs. An
informed educational planning initiative would ensure that the supply of skills is
sufficient, in terms of both quantity and quality, to meet the current and emerging
needs of the markets. Even in the case that education systems cannot satisfy the needs
of the local markets, the availability of this information would allow governments to
develop their own strategy to attract talent from abroad. In a global knowledge
economy, governments are not merely encouraged to facilitate internal mobility
among local labour markets; importing skills and talent from outside the country is
also seen as very effective solution for dealing with the skills-shortages of national
economies [23]. In other words, developed countries can become the magnet
economies for highly skilled jobs. It is under this perspective that it is worth applying
the prism of sustainable education and learning over the big picture: is it fair to attract
talented and skilled workers from developing countries towards magnet economies,
thus possibly meaning that they will never contribute to the well-being of the
communities which made the effort to provide them with those skills?

This question could shed new light to the view of the big picture or, alternatively,
make it even more complex. A first matter of concern would arguably be the interest
for lower income countries to spend their money in VET development policies
knowing that a portion of skilled trainees would eventually leave their communities in
seek of better opportunities in magnet economies. A second concern, just obviating
the implications of the first one, is that the reality of the economy, contrary to what
human capital theories would argue, is characterised by a rapid expansion of the
global supply of skills and the incapability of the demand to follow this pace and to
generate enough highly-skilled jobs for this highly skilled population. As a
consequence of this imbalance between the supply and demand for skills, countries
will need to deal with the social discontent produced by the false promise of
education and skills, as well as the social problem of growing unemployment and
underemployment among trained professionals. A final consideration under the prism
of sustainability in education and training, with implications for the dominant
paradigm, which advocates continuous economic growth, is that relating to the current
'productivist' model of development. This model influences the social-educational
system downward, thus focusing educational policies towards the objectives of
continuous economic growth, as if no other alternatives could be feasible and/or
desirable. If, as it seems, this paradigm of continuous economic growth is accepted as
the driving force for development and social welfare, then it is necessary to study its
environmental repercussions. The investment and use of information technology has
potentially negative environmental implications. These implications need to be
addressed if the well-being of future generations is not to be compromised. The type
and magnitude of the negative impacts of ICT on the environment should also be
studied from the perspective of sustainability. Consequently, policies aimed at
minimising environmental damage ought to be developed in parallel with VET
initiatives.

4 Recommended Courses of Action

As stated at the beginning of this paper, no easy solution can be provided for improving the development and effective success of VET initiatives in ICT in Global South countries. To pretend such a task would, very likely, only lead to symptomatic solutions, thus deferring the design and implementation of structural solutions with long-term beneficial outputs. Instead, some general guidelines to address root problems -proposed by various researchers- are summarised below; an integrated view might be the key to start unrevealing the big picture.

Regarding the ICT utopia in education, [3]:723 argues that for educational
technology to have an impact in classrooms as dramatic as it has been credited with
having on the streets, through social networking, a more fundamental shift in thinking
about education is required. The development of the 21st Century skills for
employability that the youth of today are said to need in order to succeed in a
globalised employment marketplace will not be achieved simply by more or less
successful computer hardware distribution strategies and improved connectivity in
schools. [11] summarise the lessons learned from the UNICEF's Child-Friendly
Technology Framework programme in eleven countries around sub-Saharan Africa
and offer some best practices guidelines: (a) Don't Get Distracted by Devices or
Upgrades: with the goal of moving away from technology as the focus of
improvements in education, emphasising rather the importance of well-designed user
experiences as the key to holding stakeholder's attention and engagement into the
learning process; (b) Offline, No-tech Activities are a Critical Foundation for
Technology Initiative Success: for every lesson and every step in curricular
progression, there should be a complimentary robust offline component, which can be
completed when the infrastructure is non-cooperative or available; (c) Always
Consider the Teacher as a Primary Beneficiary: the experience of UNICEF's Child-
Friendly Technology Framework showed that teachers were the hinge upon which
programme success was leveraged; (d) Partners Create Sustainability: a way to
highlight the benefits of promoting collaboration or support from NGOs, local
governments and companies so as to succeed in connecting classroom initiatives, thus
fostering long term collaboration; (e) Budget Yourself Out of Business, with the aim
of including the wider community as actors that can collaborate in generating
connections, prompting students to reach out for resources even in the case of
educational funding ends; and (f) Monitoring and Evaluation, in order to better adjust
the scarce resources to enhance field demands.

As regards the problems derived from the need to develop effective institutions,
[30] argue for adopting a microeconomic approach that explicitly takes political and
bureaucratic incentives and constraints into account. Such an approach can provide a
fruitful, and complementary, way forward. They conclude that innovations in the
measurement of performance and ability in education and health open up ways to
influence the political economic equilibrium. A number of researchers have pointed
out some institutional ingredients that can contribute to accelerating the effectiveness
of Institutions to foster economic growth. Among them, well-defined property rights
[31], the effectiveness of interest groupings [32], political stability and credibility
[33], control of corruption [34], regulatory and bureaucratic quality [35], avoidance of
the coexistence between weak institutions and powerful industrial groups [36], strong
and adequate political institutions [37], and [38] the illustration that the investment
rate is positively correlated with per capita GDP growth when accountability is taken
into account.

Under the vision of VET programmes as a means to develop skills in the
workforce, the OECD skills strategy [22] stresses that investing in skills is just the
first step; successful skills policies also need to ensure that available skills are used
effectively so that no investment is wasted. Despite the fact that in the short term a
'skills surplus' may develop, in the long term investing in the skills supply will
always pay off because it can help to transform the kinds of employment on offer in
such economies, as employers can more easily recruit skilled workers who, in turn,
improve the quality of the work that they do.

5 Final Thoughts

At first glance, taking into consideration the contributions of the academic
community, it could be argued that a developing country, with good institutional
quality and good regulations, lack of corruption, good intellectual property laws, a
stable democracy and/or rule of law, etc., would be able to attract internal or external
investments in educational ICT and, coupled with good government policies -
including the promotion of VET initiatives-, could eventually lead to technology
readiness and a high level of professional ICT usage. From this point on, there can
also be a direct relationship between ICT development and levels of human
development and economic growth. However, this apparently straightforward route
map, has demonstrated that it does not adhere to any simple or fluid set of activities.
In any case, under the hypothesis of Global South countries having developed their
full capacity to promote effective educational, and consequently, VET initiatives, the
challenge of sustainability as a complex issue surrounding any model of vocational
education and training for development still remains.

Far from the neoliberal imaginary with which policies from the Global North are
imbued, as a prospective conclusion about the ITC utopia in Global south countries, it
could be stated that for promoting the development of twenty-first-century skills
amongst students, the strength of local traditions and social-economic status are of much greater importance. The recognition that the problem is not (only) in the supply of skills, implies that education systems cannot address skills problems alone and a more coordinated national strategy is needed. Furthermore, as [39] argued, there is still no workable model of vocational education and training for development. As a final point of consideration, it could be worth stressing that most of the above discussion focuses on topics and concerns that have little to do with engagement in debates about skills for sustainable production and consumption.

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