Policies, practices and the future of technical and vocational education and training for communities in the margins – a special issue commentary and introduction

Prior to embarking on this special issue, we had begun working on our own technical and vocational education and training (TVET) research project studying women’s upskilling in India. The Indian government demarcated women’s upskilling as an important initiative in their 12th five-year plan (an economic plan strategizing development and growth), which particularly remarked about the criticality of improving access while also notating the challenges and equity points that need to be worked on including economic empowerment and engagement in governance (Planning Commission, 2013). We then realized there was a need for studies on the ground to gauge whether this endeavor/initiative was desired and to begin working on policy development from the bottom up to connect with the Plan’s overall goals. Hence, through our participatory action research work at an upskilling program, we studied women’s access to and interest in participating in TVET programs because we wanted to know how and if they desired to engage in these programs (Iyengar & Witenstein, 2019; Witenstein & Iyengar, 2021). As the 12th five-year plan suggested, we took a holistic approach in working together in critiquing societal equity issues and the bridge between life at home with social and economic considerations at the work shed (where the upskilling program took place) to begin devising new conceptions and ideas of how this group of women may actively engaging in Indian society, their communities and families. As we considered policy recommendations (local, regionally and nationally) based upon the women’s interests and experiences, we realized it would be helpful not only to our collective work with women in India but for communities, researchers, policymakers, non-governmental organizations, and governments globally, to know more about current TVET ongoings, tensions, challenges, and directions. That is when we decided a special issue would be helpful to all stakeholders globally, and then the COVID−19 pandemic happened! Over the course of the pandemic, millions lost their jobs and livelihoods, and it is highly likely that when the world resumes in full capacity (or some adapted variation of that), many jobs may be obsolete, have been reconfigured to some degree, or require upskilling. Hence, this special issue may be even more critical than originally conceived of when taking our broader interests mentioned above together with the challenges and needs that have been unearthed through COVID−19. Therefore, in this era of uncertainty, Technical and Vocational Education and Training (TVET) can and most likely will play a critical role in bringing financial stability to families and communities, and for that matter, nations and its youth among other stakeholders (Ugwoegbulem, 2022).