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ETSIP represents the education and training sector’s response to the call of Vision 2030. Its key purpose is to substantially enhance the sector’s contribution to the attainment of strategic national development goals, and to facilitate the transition to a knowledge based economy. In the immediate future, it will improve the quality, range and threshold of skilled labour required to improve knowledge-driven productivity growth, and thus contribute to economic growth. By adopting a pro-poor approach to the distribution of opportunities for high quality and market-responsive education and training opportunities, ETSIP will also contribute directly to the attainment of equitable social development.
ETSIP is premised on a realisation that a weak education and training system cannot facilitate the attainment of complex and ambitious development goals. ETSIP represents a sustained response of the sector, based on a fifteen-year strategic plan accepted by the Namibian Government in 2005. For ease and feasibility of implementation, ETSIP is phased into three five-year cycles, with the first cycle spanning 2006/07 to 2010/11, which coincides with the Third National Development Plan. It is a comprehensive sector-wide programme that covers: early childhood development and pre-primary education; general education; vocational education and training; tertiary education and training; knowledge and innovation; and information, adult and lifelong learning.
In response to immediate needs, the first phase of ETSIP will focus on strengthening of the immediate supply of middle to high level skilled labour to meet labour market demands and support overall national development goals. As pointed out, the supply of labour is critical for improving not only overall productivity, but also higher value-added productivity. Because productivity growth is tantamount to economic growth, strengthening the supply of labour becomes very critical to the attainment of the first strategic development goal; i.e., acceleration of economic growth. Strengthening labour supply is also critical for its regenerative capacity to further produce skilled labour. This regeneration is best illustrated in the production of educators, firm level trainers, and researchers whose facilitation and knowledge outputs spur knowledge production, application and innovative entrepreneurship. A pro-poor expansion of the skill base will also contribute to the reduction of capability poverty, income poverty, and social inequalities.
Three components will operationalise this first strategic sector objective. These are:
(a) a pro-poor expansion of opportunities for high quality senior secondary education;
(b) a pro-poor expansion of opportunities for high quality and market responsive vocational education and training; and
(c) an expansion of pre-entry programmes for tertiary education and training. It is expected that, in the long term, as the overall quality of education and training improves, it will become less and less necessary to maintain tertiary pre-entry programmes. All that said, collectively, these components will ensure an immediate injection of skilled labour of various levels and types. The pro-poor orientation is meant to strengthen the sector’s contribution to the second strategic development goal of equitable social development.
The first phase of ETSIP will strengthen the quality, effectiveness, and efficiency of the general education and training system. This strategic sector goal is critical for ensuring an enduring supply of candidates that will take up opportunities for senior secondary education and training, tertiary education and training, and lifelong learning.
Components that will operationalise the quality improvement element of the above sector strategic goal include:
(a) clear definition of skills and competencies that learners must acquire at each level, ensuring consistency with competencies proven to be critical for effective functioning in a knowledge based Economy (KBE);
(b) strengthening of educators to ensure that they can effectively facilitate the acquisition of set skills and competencies;
(c) increasing the provision of books and instructional materials to support educators in their facilitation of learning;
(d) improving of learner assessment and system evaluation to ensure that we can verify when learners have acquired set skills and competencies; and if the system is effective at facilitating this acquisition; and
(e) strengthening managers’ and teachers’ accountability for system effectiveness and learner acquisition of set skills and competencies.
It is expected that the above-outlined quality improvement measures will lead to improved internal efficiency as evidenced in reduced drop-out rates, reduced repetition, and better throughput. Further reduction in learner repetition will accrue from improved implementation of the policy on learner repetition. Expansion of opportunities for senior secondary education and post-basic vocational education and training will reduce the currently high grade 10 ‘pushout’ rates.
Greater efficiency in resource utilization will be realised through a range of policy measures including: higher learner:teacher ratio, de-linking increments in teacher salaries from irrelevant and non-required qualifications, abating the pace of increase in teacher salaries; and improving and implementing staffing norms within the sector.
Among other factors, an underlying cause of the poor quality and internal inefficiency of the general education system is that the majority of learners enter the system without the pre-requisite learning readiness. To begin to stem this problem, ETSIP underscores the importance of pre-school education (improving learning readiness at primary school entry). This will be attained by improving equitable access to high quality early childhood development and pre-primary education and family literacy.
Components that will operationalise this strategic sector goal include:
(a) strengthening capacity for the management and delivery of ECD and pre-primary; and
(b) improvement of teacher quality and improvement of the supply of instructional materials.
Also in the medium term the first phase of ETSIP will:
(a) strengthen and systematise the current knowledge creation and innovation system to ensure adequate capacity for the production and application of knowledge to improve productivity growth;
(b) strengthen effective demand for knowledge and innovation required to facilitate productivity growth; and
(c) develop and sustain a vibrant knowledge marketplace.
Key components that will operationalise the above sector strategic goals are:
(a) strengthening the policy and legal frameworks for knowledge and innovation;
(b) strengthening the institutional framework through the establishment of the Centre for Innovation, Entrepreneurship and Technology (CIET) and the Council on Research, Science and Technology (CRST); and
(c) ensuring the adequacy of funding for demand-led research and development (R&D).
For their combined effect, the above components will heavily depend on the effectiveness of the tertiary education and training sub-programme’s success in strengthening the supply of high quality and high level knowledge workers who can lead research and development, and who can spur innovation, in collaboration with productive sectors. In this regard, one of the strategic goals of ETSIP is to improve the effectiveness, quality, efficiency, and development-relevance of the tertiary education and training system. During the first phase of the programme, this goal will be attained through the following key components:
(a) strengthening institutional capacity for the management and delivery of tertiary education and training;
(b) building capacity for graduate studies with emphasis on research;
(c) improvement of quality and readiness of intake;
(d) strengthen quality assurance mechanisms; and
(e) diversification and mobilisation of financing resources.
For immediate and long term needs, the first phase of ETSIP will also strengthen the policy, legal and institutional frameworks to support equitable access to high quality and responsive adult learning. A critical part of an innovative and self-renewing knowledge based economy is its agility to manage and apply knowledge. Part of knowledge management, is the ability to declare obsolete knowledge obsolete, and to replace it with current knowledge. As knowledge currency becomes an imperative for global competitiveness and co-operation, adult learning becomes a vital tool for the constant re-tooling of ‘knowledge workers’ and for ensuring their sustained contribution to development. As indicated by the subtitle of ETSIP, “Planning for a Learning Nation,” ETSIP is also seen as a programme to promote lifelong learning, through its comprehensive, societal and integrated approach to learning. The emphasis which has been placed on the economic importance of education in the rationale does not mean that other important aspects of education such as the development of a democratic culture or ethics (already part of the education system) are to be neglected.
A critical part of an innovative and self-renewing knowledge based economy is its agility to manage and apply knowledge. Part of knowledge management, is the ability to declare obsolete knowledge obsolete, and to replace it with current knowledge. Effective and efficient knowledge management systems with equitable access networks are needed to support all levels of education, research, innovation and skills acquisition. As knowledge currency becomes imperative for global competitiveness and co-operation, adult learning and access to relevant information become vital tools for the constant re-tooling of ‘knowledge workers’ and for ensuring their sustained contribution to development. As indicated by the subtitle of ETSIP, “Planning for a Learning Nation,” ETSIP is also seen as a programme to promote lifelong learning, through its comprehensive, societal and integrated approach to learning. For immediate and long term needs, the first phase of ETSIP will as a crucial crosscutting support system:
(a) strengthen the policy, legal and institutional frameworks to support equitable access to information and knowledge and high quality and responsive adult learning;
(b) Improve equity and access to lifelong learning opportunities;
(c) Improve equity in access to information and learning resources; and
(d) Improve the quality and effectiveness of national knowledge management systems.
CRITICAL SECTOR PRIORITIES
During the first phase of ETSIP, critical priorities, and in sequential order are:
(a) pro-poor expansion of high quality senior secondary education, vocational education and training, pre-entry tertiary education and training programmes;
(b) building system equity, quality and efficiency;
(c) strengthening system delivery capacity;
(d) strengthening the system’s response to HIV/AIDS;
(e) strengthening the national knowledge and innovation system; and
(e) creating an enabling environment for the development of lifelong learning.
The 15-year ETSIP strategic framework took as its starting point the findings and analysis in the education sector report, “Human Capital and Knowledge Development for Economic Growth with Equity.” (2004) The strategic framework identifies five main strategic objectives:
(a) Quality/effectiveness;
(b) Equity and Access;
(c) Development relevance and Responsiveness;
(d) Delivery Capacity and Management; and
(e) Efficiency of resource mobilization and utilisation. |
