Quality in Swedish and Austrian VET and VET teacher education. A comparative study

The paper provides an overview of VET for youngsters in Sweden and Austria, two countries that differ in institutional structures and the development of VET. In Sweden, VET has been integrated in upper secondary school since the 1970s. The Austrian system, on the other hand, provides a strong upper secondary VET school sector, and has retained in parallel a strong separate apprenticeship sector also, with a completely separate governance structure from the state-led school sector. Quality is not a word with a single meaning but a contested concept, used in different ways, by different actors, national bodies, etc. and for different purposes. Yet, the interest of comparison has been on “quality” in VET and measures taken for “quality improvement” in the two countries. Some descriptive data are presented but the main focus in the article is on current policy discourses and reform agendas. Four themes are addressed and structure the comparison: competencies, procedures, teachers and supervisors. The conclusion brings forth how the notion of “quality” and steps for “quality improvement” differ in these two countries, but also how it, due to the elusiveness of the concept, is difficult to use for a comparison of different VET systems.