Vocational Training Debate: Why the Faculty Issue Matters More Than the Bubble

Vocational training isn't the bubble: the problem is who teaches

A classroom in a senior telecommunications course. The teacher who just took office passed an exam asking about the Constitution and the Statute of Autonomy, with a syllabus unchanged for over twenty years. Students ask how to splice fiber or lay data cables. The newcomer has never done it either. His plan was to secure the post and continue signing projects in the afternoons. This scene, recounted by a participant in a forum thread about vocational training exams in Aragon, sparks a discussion that begins with the incendiary headline — vocational training is useless and hides a bubble of teachers with no work experience — and ends in a very different place.

What the bubble thesis argues

The starting point is a local newspaper article calling vocational training a bubble and questioning the usefulness of its degrees. The majority response is not that vocational training is perfect, but that the diagnosis points to the wrong place. It is argued that vocational training works reasonably well and that the real risk is dismantling it: first by eliminating technical teachers, those who come from the trade, and then by converting all courses into dual programs.

This second move, they argue, would empty centers in small and medium-sized towns and prevent thousands of young people from receiving training. The result would be the same as already discussed in the German model: less general education and more early tracking.

Does vocational training help find a job?

The figures circulating are from two different eras. The older ones: a medium-level course paid €1,200 net in twelve installments, a senior course €1,500, and an engineering degree €3,000, according to one participant’s memory. This gap has blurred, along with the expectation of those who enroll calculating what they will earn. The testimonies from specific sectors take over: a participant in the sector claims that good graduates in ASIR, DAI, and DAW exceed €30,000 annually within five years, and that in programming, those who stand out can easily reach €40,000.

The reverse exists. Some recount having completed two courses with the promise of job opportunities, only to find it false. In these cases, the degree opens no doors.

There is a third group that breaks the statistics: professionals with university degrees who found employment after completing a vocational course. And another who claims the opposite, that they completed a senior course but never worked in their field until they added a university degree.

Dual vocational training and companies unwilling to pay

The dual model — part of the training in the company — is the axis of the dispute. One participant quotes the head of a multinational who explained that their company preferred the classic course for two reasons that should not be separated: the dual student graduates with a more limited theoretical base, and the ordinary course student does not need to be paid. In their company, they add, they have not seen a single dual student enter in a year.

The criticism goes beyond pedagogy. It is said that excessive specialization limits the student for life, as it slots them into a specific task, and that the company ends up designing the curriculum to its measure and convenience.

Faculty: memory-based exams and mandatory master’s degree

Here the reproach coincides in direction, not in solution. The master’s degree in teacher training effectively excludes professionals who might want to teach after years on the front lines, people who have been on the job site and would teach what they know. One of the demands appearing in the thread is simple: no one should be able to teach vocational training without accrediting five years of experience in the sector. The SEPE already requires a minimum of five years demonstrated with a contract and category.

The exam rewards something else: memorizing the Constitution, the Statute, and the civil service law, with syllabi in some courses that have not been touched for two decades. And from time to time, it produces results difficult to explain, such as a programming module covered by a Fine Arts graduate, according to the account of a teacher in that course.

The numbers: 172 school days and 27% of public employment

The educational administration is the largest public employer in the country. Non-university teaching and university combined account for 27.27% of the staff serving the administrations; health, 19%; town councils, another 19%; justice, security, and defense, 14%, and the rest of administrative staff, 20%. In universities, one in three staff members is administrative and services personnel: there is one PAS for every two professors.

In the calendar, the course adds 172 school days per year, with months like July and August at zero. These figures are crossed in the discussion when someone asks what the faculty is complaining about exactly, and when it is remembered that there are more non-university teachers than all healthcare staff combined.

The primary school teaching exam was failed by 86% of applicants and included questions that a twelve-year-old student could solve. In this same system, it is debated whether there are too many graduates or too few teachers with trade skills. And the disconcerting figure is not any of these: there are offers asking for the same from a senior course, an engineer, and a doctor, or IT graduates who, according to one participant, exceed €30,000. The degree no longer orders the labor market. Sometimes, neither does the training.