New curricula in the VET Programme for Restaurant and Food Processing – competence for the future?
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.7577/sjvd.3393Keywords:
Vocational education and training, final occupational competence, restaurant and food processing, curriculum developmentAbstract
Vocational education and training (VET) in Norway is undergoing its first major reform since 2006. From autumn 2020, all national curricula in VET are under revision, and their content will contribute to shaping future skilled workers.
This article is based on national and international descriptions of future occupational competence requirements with a particular focus on professional practice within restaurant- and food production. This sector has challenges in recruiting enough skilled workers. The question of which competencies these skilled workers should possess is therefore of importance to both schools and workplaces.
Our research question is: To what extent does the first-year curriculum in restaurant and food production reflect future competence requirements as addressed in policy documents, research, and in the occupational competency descriptions from the professional advisory board for Restaurant and food production.
The data in this article is based on a quantitative questionnaire of professional practice in restaurant- and food processing, text analysis of the competence descriptions from the professional advisory board, and analysis of the new first-year curriculum for the educational program Restaurant and food production.
The theoretical foundation of the article is based mainly on policy documents as well as national and international research on competency requirements for future professional practice.
The results show that there is little difference in tasks performed by skilled or unskilled workers. The importance of being a skilled worker, in day-to-day work, is therefore relatively small.
In the preparation for the new curriculum in restaurant- and food production, the final occupational competence in the various professions is described both by the professional advisory board (2018) and in a consultation draft from the Ministry of Education.
The analysis shows that the competence goals in the new curriculum reflect to varying degrees the required competency for future working-life as described in research and policy documents.
Downloads
Downloads
Published
How to Cite
Issue
Section
License
Copyright (c) 2020 Bjørn Eben, Halvor Spetalen
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.
Authors who publish in SJVD accept the following terms:
- The author(s) retain copyright and gives the journal the right to the first publication of the work licensed simultaneously under a Creative Commons Attribution License that allows others to share the work when authorship and first release in the SJVD are recognised.
- The author(s) may enter separate, extra-contractual arrangements for non-exclusive distribution of the journal's published version of the work (for example, send it to an institutional archive or publish it in a book) referring to the first release in SJVD.
- The author(s) are allowed and encouraged to post their work online (e.g. in institutional archives and on their website) before and during the filing process, as it may lead to useful exchanges of views, as well as faster and increased citation the published work.