Work, skills development for employability and education for sustainable development

This article focuses on the radical changes taking place in skills development for work and life, and their implications for the content of education and schooling. It examines skills development for employability and workforce education, with particular reference to technical and vocational education and training (TVET). In turn, it is argued that the impact of these issues upon the world of work will be reflected in those education reform initiatives that will become necessary to keep pace with such institutionalized change. This was a keynote presentation by Rupert Maclean at the APERA Conference and draws heavily on the chapter by Victor Ordonez and Rupert Maclean ‘Seeking a New Education Paradigm for Teaching and Learning to Meet the Changing Needs of Education for All and skills Development for Work and Life‘ in the book ‘Learning and Teaching for the Twenty-first Century: Festschrift for Professor Phillip Hughes’, Rupert Maclean (Editor), Springer Academic Publishers (forthcoming). The authors thank UNESCO-UNVOC consultant Professor David Wilson for his valuable inputs to this paper and to the keynote presentation.