Career conversations in senior secondary vocational education

Abstract

In the Netherlands, many schools for senior secondary vocational education are implementing competence-based curricula. These curricula start from a constructivist approach and are based on the idea that young people should learn to reflect on their personal ambitions and motives, and to undertake action and initiative to direct their own learning and career development (career competencies). To realise this, many schools are implementing career guidance in which they use instruments such as portfolios and personal development plans as well as activities such as career conversations between teachers and students. Several studies, however, have indicated that schools experience difficulties in creating powerful learning environments for career guidance, especially with regard to career conversations. Most schools and teachers lack the experience in conducting career guidance in general and career conversations in particular. There is considerable research available on guidance and counselling, but this research mainly focuses on career guidance practitioners who are specifically trained to offer career education and guidance. In the Dutch school context, the role of the trained career guidance practitioner is taken over by teachers as part of their everyday work, often without specific training for this purpose. As such, this situation asks for research on its implementation and effects. The general purpose of the studies in this thesis is to contribute to a better understanding of the nature of career guidance and career conversations in Dutch senior secondary vocational education, and to investigate the effects of the guidance of teachers during career conversations. The leading research questions of these studies were the following: 1. How do teachers and students in vocational education perceive integral career guidance and the instruments used in their school? 2. What is the nature of the career conversations taking place in competence-based vocational education in the Netherlands? 3. How do students perceive their teachers’ career guidance during career conversations and what profiles can be identified in these perceptions? 4. What is the relationship between teachers’ career guidance profiles and students’ career competencies: career reflection, career shaping and networking? 5. What are the characteristics of a ‘good’ career guidance practice? These research questions were answered with five different studies, each addressing one of the questions. In Chapter 2, the first research question was answered by means of semi-structured interviews with teachers, counsellor and students of three different schools. Of each school, we interviewed 3 teachers, 1 counsellor and 8 students (on average). Interviews were recorded on audiotape with the consent of the respondents. The interviews were transcribed verbatim and coded in a qualitative-interpretative way. For each of the coded topics, a summary of the statements was made and illustrated with sample statements from the different interviews of each case. The summaries and primary data were discussed with two experienced researchers. This resulted in a final overview of summaries for each topic, based on consensus. After analyses of the separate cases, a cross-case display was made, in order to detect differences and similarities between the cases. The main findings of the study were that a majority of the teachers and counsellors perceived portfolios and personal development plans as important instruments to collect evidence on student development, stimulate students’ self-responsibility or self-direction, and support students in reflecting on identity issues and future ambitions. The study also revealed that a reflective dialogue between teacher and student was essential for career guidance instruments to be considered valuable and useful. When career guidance instruments such as the portfolio and personal development plan were not used in a context of dialogue, students were likely to perceive these instruments as irrelevant and refrained from using them to reflect on their personal identity or on plans involving their future. The career conversation was found to be an essential element in the career guidance process. At the same time, the results of this study revealed that respondents had little experience with or knowledge about the conduct of these conversations and the actual effect of the conversations on the development of career competencies of students. In Chapter 3, the characteristics of career conversations between teachers and students in Dutch senior secondary vocational education (the second research question) were studied more in-depth. For this purpose, 32 video-taped career conversations between career guidance teachers and students in four different schools were systematically observed. A category system was developed and the conversations were coded and analyzed with regard to the content that was discussed (for example whether teacher and student talked about ‘progress of student’ or ‘future ambitions’), the activities that were performed by the teacher and the student (for example ‘active listening’ or ‘giving feedback’), and the relationship between teacher and student (for example whether the teacher acted dominant or submissive). Two career conversations which encompassed all of the coding categories were coded by a second researcher. Inter-rater reliabilities for the different elements of the career conversations were determined and the Kappa coefficients indicated the categorization system to be reliable. The results of the study showed there were many teachers who still acted as traditional ‘mentors of school success’. They talked a lot about the grades and progress of the student in school, gave many instructions and arrived at agreements about how a student’s behaviour or results could be improved. The study also revealed that teachers often showed ‘traditional, teacher-dominated’ behaviour, such as giving instruction, explaining, and asking for knowledge or information the student had gained. Many teachers behaved in a dominant manner; they controlled the conversation and left little room for students to bring subjects to the agenda or to ask questions. The traditional educational culture, in varying degrees, still dominated the actual behaviour of teachers and students. Finally, the study revealed that teachers spoke very little about career issues with students. The number of fragments that were coded as ‘career issues’ (talking about students’ future ambitions and previous education as well as characteristics of the profession), was very low when compared with the content fragments. In Chapter 4, student perceptions of career conversations with their teachers were reported (the third research question). The ‘Questionnaire on Career Conversations’ was developed to investigate perceptions of students and to determine whether guidance profiles of teachers could be identified. The questionnaire was based on the category system of the observational study, and consisted of three elements (content, activities and relationship). Factor analysis revealed three scales for the content element: planning and instruments (8 items), career issues (6 items) and personal issues (4 items), four scales for teacher activities: questioning (7 items), providing information (5 items), being personal (3 items), and stimulating self-directedness (5 items) and two scales for relationship: influence (8 items) and proximity (9 items). All scales were found to be reliable (above 0.65). Data from 579 students of four different schools were collected and analyzed through cluster analysis. The data demonstrated that students noted differences in teacher behaviour, although several similarities were identified as well. Student ratings on talking about career issues and providing information, for example, were very much alike. The students perceived that they seldom talked with their teachers about career issues. Teachers were also perceived to provide a lot of information. This corresponds to the findings of the observational study, which also showed that career issues were seldom on the agenda and teacher explained a lot. The cluster analysis identified four different styles of guidance, which showed an overall general trend although significant differences were present as well. The main differences existed between having a personal or non-personal approach, and between asking questions and stimulating students’ self-directedness. One profile was labelled as ‘personal teacher balancing directive and non-directive behaviour’. Teachers within this profile were active in discussing students’ personal issues and acted in a very personal manner. These teachers were perceived to be controlling or directive in some way (for example, they had high student ratings on the influence scale and providing information), but were also perceived to show non-directive behaviour (had high ratings on questioning and stimulating self-directedness). Another profile was labelled as ‘non-personal and directive teacher’. Teachers within this profile were rated extremely low by students on talking about personal issues and on being personal. They were also perceived to ask very few questions and seldomly stimulated students’ self-directedness. Teachers within the other two profiles were rated highly moderate and were therefore not easy to ‘label’ in terms of a typical style or pattern. These medium, less extreme profiles were labelled as ‘mainstream teachers’. In Chapter 5 we reported on a study that answered the fourth research question. This study investigated the influence of the different teacher career guidance profiles on students’ career competencies, namely: career reflection (the degree to which students reflect on their motives, talents and ambitions), career shaping (being active in investigating possibilities in relation to their career and are taking actions accordingly

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