Restructuring the Turkish Vocational Technical Secondary Education System towards EU membership

Abstract

The world is going through a rapid transformation process in all fields. Those countries, which cannot keep up with this process, face numerous problems in terms of maintaining the living standards of their citizens. With the priority of enhancing the lives of individuals, the field of education is greatly affected by this process. Therefore in line with Turkey's ambition to become a full member of the European Union (EW, it has been determined that vocational technical secondary education needs restructuring. Key indicators of the need for this is a mismatch between what the education sector can deliver and demands for a suitably qualified work force. This is coupled with an increasing demand for higher education and close cooperation between the sector and industry. The EU membership process already speCifies certain elements which will shape the future organization of vocational and technical education in Turkey. These concern progression from primary education to vocational-technical education, the general structure, content and evaluation of programs, adoption of a more flexible and modular vocational education structure, and establishing curricula with basic vocational standards. These elements have therefore become key determinants of the restructuring process. In this article, the current structure of the vocational-technical secondary education system in Turkey is discussed, and the general speCifications of the system are compared with that of EU countries. Moreover, certain recent studies, which can be evaluated within the scope of the restructuring, are analyzed and suggestions are made.