Skills for work and life

8 to 10 November 2004: Innovation and Excellence in TVET Teacher/Trainer Education. A UNESCO International Meeting in Hangzhou, China.

Innovation and Excellence in TVET Teacher/Trainer Education

Hangzhou Declaration

The International Meeting on Innovation and Excellence in TVET Teacher/Trainer Education, held from 8 - 10 November 2004 in Hangzhou, China, and organized by UNESCO-UNEVOC in collaboration with their UNESCO offices in Beijing and Bangkok, and the Chinese education authorities, discussed, inter alia, the following:

• The current marginalisation of TVET vis-à-vis general and academic education;
• The current fragmentation in the fields of teacher education/training of trainers for TVET;
• The need for developing higher degree structures in TVET education;
• The lack of an established research culture that should focus on the development of TVET; and
• The challenges in promoting intercultural understanding and knowledge sharing between and among developed and developing countries.

Based on discussions of the above, the 68 participants from 25 countries who met for the first time as a collective, agreed that:

• TVET should be developed into an internationally acknowledged scientific community;
• Sustainable, reproductive and innovative national scientific systems be developed and integrated into national systems of innovation;
• International exchange of learners and educators be accelerated;
• The expertise in pedagogy of TVET should be linked to the vocational disciplines and to integrative perspectives on school-based and work-based learning;
• An improvement in vocational skills for employability and citizenship can only be realized if there is an improvement in the quality, effectiveness and relevance of teaching, and that
• An effective interaction between teacher/trainers and learners lies at the centre of quality TVET.

We recognize that achieving these goals requires innovation and excellence in TVET. Innovation, scholarship and research in all aspects of TVET must be accelerated if solutions to the challenges identified at this meeting, are to be found.

We therefore commit ourselves, in each of our own countries and organizations, to working collaboratively to improving TVET teacher/trainer education so that we may hasten the achievement of quality skills development that may contribute positively to economically vital and sustainable communities.

Weblinks

Further information at

• UNEVOC Conference Information
• UNIP