In 1995, I moved jobs from Gwent Tertiary College, a large vocational school in Wales, to take up a post as a researcher at the Institut Technik und Bildung (ITB) at the University of Bremen in Germany. I had never worked in a university before and was excited by the prospect of being a ‘proper’ researcher. More than that, I was deeply impressed by the central tenet of ITB’s work: the social shaping of technology. At that period, there were growing worries in Germany about the impact of new technologies on skilled work, particularly in the engineering industry. Some of […]

We often assume that because young people have grown up with smartphones in their hands, they are inherently equipped for the digital demands of the modern workplace. We label them “digital natives” and expect that their fluency with TikTok or Fortnite will naturally translate into proficiency with professional tools and critical thinking online. However, a new report from AQA, titled “Digitally native or digitally naïve?”, challenges this assumption head-on, revealing a complex landscape where high usage of social media masks significant gaps in essential digital skills. For vocational education and training (VET), where preparing students for the realities of the […]

For some time, there has been a growing concern that many vocational schools lack a developed, cohesive policy around Artificial Intelligence. While comprehensive survey data specific to the vocational education and training (VET) sector remains scarce, a recent report from the Higher Education Policy Institute (HEPI) sheds light on how UK universities are navigating this complex landscape. The findings are both revealing and, in some ways, uncomfortable. They offer critical lessons for teachers, trainers, and managers in vocational education as they consider how to integrate AI thoughtfully and effectively into their own institutions — and they resonate closely with work […]