Work-based learning as a concept under construction. Evidence from two different internship schemes in Argentina

CLAUDIA JACINTO; JOSE POZZER

Work-based learning as a pathway to competence-based education-Research and implementation strategies from a comparative and global VET persepective

Barbara Budrich

Lugar: Opladen; Año: 2018; p. 100 - 125

With a background of a mainly school and university-based education system (only around 20% of students attend technical education), Argentina has lately started to promote policies that include work-based learning (WBL).Two WBL has been the subject of debates and new legislation. Previously there were few precedents and the country had almost no tradition in this learning modality. In fact, in the middle of the thirties of the last century, an apprenticeship system was created addressing young persons who worked and attended supplementary training courses. The promoters of these were the employers? associations. But apprenticeship was a minor practice that became less common after the 1950s. It was only in the 1990s that internships were introduced into vocational training courses for unemployed young people (as a part of youth transition programmes) and in secondary education institutions (not compulsory but optionally). The ups and downs and unexpected turns in the course of this development were due to the fact that it occurred in a context of disputes among the stakeholders in the world of work, i.e. businesses, unions and government. Indeed, the legal framework and experiences relating to work-based learning as part of the educational process, particularly in secondary education, were far from being a matter of consensus. The debates circled around two main arguments: The first relates to the issue of child labour. As the legal age for children to enter the world of work increased, it became questionable whether students below this age could participate in such internships. (By the mid-1940s the legal minimum age for working was 14 years; in the 1990s it was raised to 16 years.) A second argument was the resistance of trade unions, which considered internships as a risk that could result in the substitution of workers with interns. In the case of work-based learning as an element of youth transition programmes, these were short ad hoc programmes.3 As a result, the scope of these experiences was small. Only few companies in the country have entered into sustainable internship arrangements with technical secondary schools and/or participated in youth transition programmes. In the middle of the 2000s, with the recovery of the economy, an increased demand for skilled workers for industry became apparent. Not only was there an insufficient supply of technical workers, but also their skill sets in many cases were no longer suited to the needs of the world of work (do Pico, 2013). At the same time, youth unemployment and precarious employment were high. These were frequently linked with the low skills in those who had not completed compulsory education. In fact, even nowadays only 66% of students finish secondary compulsory education (12-17/18 years old) in due time. Young people continue to be the age-group with the highest labour informality rates: 59% compared to 35% of the active population as a whole. Thus, social and active employment policies addressed to these youth became an important political issue. In this framework, since the 2000s, new laws have been established that address both technical and professional education as well as university internships and vocational training. Other decrees regulate the system of practices in companies at the secondary educational level. At the same time, as part of active employment policies, programmes are established that promote work-based learning aimed at vulnerable young people. 1 This forms part of a long-standing debate: the ministries of education tend to favour general education over professional training (Wallenborn et al., 2009).2 In this article, we will conceive WBL as an educational strategy that provides students with authentic work experiences where they can apply academic and technical skills and develop employability skills. 3 The programme Proyecto Joven (the Youth Project) was funded by the Inter-American Development Bank and included a school-based ?demand driven? training during three months, combined with three months of work-based learning (Moura Castro & Verdisco, 2002). However, the programme was operated during a period of massive increase in unemployment figures. Consequently, it did not succeed in integrating young people into formal employment (Devia, 2003). The programme finished at the end of the 1990s, and it was only in 2008 that a new youth transition policy was installed.