Editorial Comment
TVET Colleges in South Africa owe themselves a reputation that will make them institutions of choice to leaners who exit matric with particularly mathematics and natural science. Trends in the country have always indicated that students enrol at TVET colleges as a last resort after failing to secure admission in universities or because they obtained a diploma matric certificate which bars them from registering with universities.
There is a grey area created by mismatch between founding TVET ideology and the actual practice on the ground. There cannot be any convincing reason for these institutions to be a shadow of themselves than their detachment from their founding principles; but what is it that TVET colleges in South Africa do parallel to their expectation?
The initial design of TVET colleges was to expose students to more practical activities than theoretical speculations that are better left to universities. Secondly, the staff in TVET colleges is a compromise of skills, many of these lecturers do not know what the industry looks like; the administrative requirements to employ a lecturer falls short of skills inquiry. Thirdly, the management in a college need to think like business executives and not government bureaucrats.
Despite the financial grants received from the treasury, TVET colleges cannot afford modern machines and related stock needed for state-of-the-art training. Either the costs of consumables or the workshops often would pose a problem.
Take for example a mechanical engineering campus in a TVET college. In an industry responsive training the practical experience should include latest different car engines as they evolve. The money to purchase a variety of car engines, gear boxes etc frequently may not be available. The absence of modern and well-equipped workshops cannot be overemphasized. Modern machines and industry standard workshops mean nothing without skills and experiential knowledge. The third and final challenge is the bureaucratic culture that throttles operational systems.
We ultimately end-up with institutions that value their existence but do not see the forest for trees. Nothing fills the utility void and thus where communities are betrayed. TVET colleges by their nature are expected to lead in practical responses to technical hitches. Many of the college grandees could make a legacy of these institutions by acquiring skills. Skills acquired should dovetail with technological changes. If skills are overtaken by the speed of technology, you have useless grandees.
In situations where skills are not up to date with the times. Institutions of learning are not necessarily rejected but questioned. Parents and prospective students do not fathom the overall reason to associate with the institutions. This is a question easy to politicize yet difficult to resolve. The answer does not need to be communicated, industrialization and technical savvy should self-manifest for colleges to be prioritized.
It is only when systems are in alignment with reality that frowned upon TVET colleges can create a name for themselves. Or else continue rubber stamping fake embodiment of skills to their victims.