The UK National (and Scottish) Vocational Qualification System: State of the Art or in a State?

The creation of a new competence‐based framework of National (and Scottish) Vocational Qualifications (N/SVQs) in the UK has been fraught with difficulties and the ensuing debate has sharply divided those involved in education and training. Some argue that the N/SVQs are doomed to failure because the underlying philosophy is fundamentally flawed or see their introduction as part of a political conspiracy of the right to wrest power away from liberal educationalists; others see national standards and N/SVQs as a way of ensuring that education and training better meet the needs of employment; a few hold on to the original idealistic vision of opening up access to qualifications and giving credit where credit is due, especially for those workers who have been disadvantaged in the education system. Early implementation has been puncuated by scandals and, with a few notable exceptions such as the Care Sector, take‐up rates have fallen well below what is necessary for achievement of National Education and Training Targets for the year 2000. In 1996, the publication of three major reviews of 16–19 qualifications, of assessment in General National/Vocational Qualifications and of the top 100 most commonly used N/SQVs, marked a crisis in confidence in the emerging UK system. Yet variations on the outcomes‐based approach established by NCVQ/SCOTVEC are increasingly finding favour in the European Union and in New Zealand, Australia and the new South Africa, not least because they hold out the promise of greater transparency for all stakeholders. Extensive changes are now anticipated but they may be too little too late to get this radical innovation back on course.