GUYANA is currently undergoing a change in the mode of training in Technical Vocational Education and Training (TVET) from traditionally based education training to Competency-Based Education and Training (CBET), which is a step towards receiving the Caribbean Vocational Qualification (CVQ).

This was disclosed by Assistant Chief Education Officer for Technical Education, Mr. Patrick Chinedu in an interview with the Guyana Chronicle on Thursday.
According to him, this will see persons learning as they wish to learn, at their own pace, while also providing the opportunity for persons who may have learnt a skill or trade but don’t have a certificate to show, to now acquire such a certificate.
This, he explained, is done using prior learning assessment and recognition where they can assess what skill persons have with the possibility of giving them some kind of recognition to determine the level of their skill.
Mr. Chinedu said that if these persons do not meet the requirements for the CVQ, they will advise them about the modules they need to complete to have that CVQ certificate.
He also explained that CBET brings industries and institutions together since it is based on occupational standards and competency skills which industries need.
According to him, industries would come to them through the council for TVET and tell them what skills they need and they would sit and put that together in the form of a training module which the institutes would use to train persons for the world of work.

QUALITY ASSURANCE
Chinedu said that when a student completes a module and believes that he or she is ready, that skill is assessed to determine whether the student is competent or not, and this process has a very high level of quality assurance.
Meanwhile, he stressed the importance of TVET in the development of the country’s economy, while commending the Government of Guyana for its efforts to make technical education accessible to every Guyanese by building more and more institutes.
He also noted that in the various technical institutes in Guyana, more and more persons are pursuing programmes in areas where persons were not enrolling previously.
According to him, they believe that skill is wealth as long as persons can make good use of it, and they are going to continue to promote TVET in order that every Guyanese can acquire a skill.
Chinedu alluded to the National TVET Strategic Action Plan 2013-2020, which sees the Government of Guyana through the Ministry of Education undertaking a comprehensive reform of the TVET subsector as part of a wider strategy to provide the skilled labour necessary to drive the economy.
He said that this plan is in its draft stage and they hope to have it finalised within the next couple of weeks.
Chinedu also observed that Guyana has the potential to move from where it is now to having world-class technicians, services and products, since technical education is becoming a knowledge-based education system.
According to him, technical education in Guyana is something that has to run from nursery school right through to university, since it provides a career path.