How Singapore has overturned perceptions of vocational education, showing Hong Kong the way forward
- Lion City’s Institute of Technical Education offers a new look to skills-based learning, with impressive campuses, facilities and recreational amenities
Bruce Poh led Singapore’s Institute of Technical Education (ITE) as chief executive officer for a decade, overseeing significant strides in the city state’s reforms to vocational education.
Where skills training once happened in basic workshop-type settings, the ITE now boasts campuses that surprise visitors with their impressive premises, teaching facilities, recreational amenities and programmes designed to prepare students for jobs.
Like many Asian societies, Singapore places great emphasis on academic results. But, in catering to children who are less academically inclined, the ITE has drawn the envy of its counterparts elsewhere, including in Hong Kong.
In a perception study last year, the publicly-funded educational institution scored an aggregate of 79 per cent, meaning public acceptance for the agency and vocational education had more than doubled from 34 per cent in 1997.
With Hong Kong in the midst of reviewing its vocational education policies to raise the profile of skills training, City Weekend speaks to Poh – who helmed the ITE from 2007 to 2017 – on Singapore’s experience. He is now CEO of ITE Education Services, the institution’s private arm providing training and consultancy services.
Sense of place