Vocational Training (FP) has been proving to be a driver of youth employability in Spain for years. It is also an educational alternative increasingly chosen by young Spaniards, who are increasingly aware of the variety of opportunities it offers in an overqualified labor market. This is demonstrated by the data from a study by Fad Juventud: six out of ten VET students get a job less than six months after finishing their studies and, of them, 36% did so within three months of graduating. The research has been carried out together with the Gestamp Foundation and analyzes the perceptions and expectations of Spanish youth after carrying out 1,255 surveys on-line to young people between 16 and 29 years old.
The results, presented this Tuesday at the CEOE headquarters, show a positive assessment of young people: almost six out of ten have a very favorable perception of this training, a figure that increases to 69% among those who have completed it. However, gender stereotypes persist due to prejudices when choosing certain specialties, which perpetuates that Men still predominate in the most technical branches and women in care and communication.
Those who choose vocational training highlight their ability to specialize (67.3%), the possibility of learning a trade quickly and efficiently (64.5%), the job insertion (26.5%) and personal vocation (30.5%) as reasons to study this itinerary. This has meant that registrations have skyrocketed considerably in the last decade, especially in Higher Degree courses, with an increase of 60% compared to 2015. In Intermediate Grade, the growth was smaller, although also important, at 25%.
However, Spain still remains below the European average in enrollment: In 2022, 44% of all secondary school or higher graduates in Spain were from vocational training; while in Europe that figure was 48.3%. Furthermore, 39.2% of all Spanish students at this level were taking some vocational training course that same year, compared to 49% in Europe. The barriers? The research reveals that the main reasons for not choosing Vocational Training are lack of interest, youth’s ignorance of the opportunities offered by this educational route and a preference for university.
The lack of information about this educational route is another reason why Spain has even lower enrollment rates, despite the boost that is being given to VET since the approval of the new law, in 2022. Almost one in every Three young people claim that they did not receive adequate guidance during their training in primary and secondary education, which are the stages in which they must make the decision about which path they want to take to continue their studies. In fact, 30% consider that they received little information about FP and 7.9% who did not receive any.
“This lack of guidance limits their decisions and “can lead to them not considering vocational training as a valid training option”highlights the study, which also shows a gender gap here: 29.8% of boys consider that they received a lot or enough information, while only 17.4% of girls share this opinion.
Along these lines, female participation in FP is still low compared to male colleagues, although it is true that female enrollment already represented 46.5% of the student body in the 2022-2023 academic year. They, in addition, are mainly concentrated in sectors such as health and social services; while boys predominate in more technical areas, such as computing and electronics. Only 9% of women choose a computer science specialty and communications (compared to 24.1% of men) and 1.2% opt for electricity and electronics (8.2% in the case of men).
(Expansion coming soon)
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