Abstract
In a sun-filled lecture hall at a technical college on the east coast of China, a recruiter from a local pharmaceutical company showed a slide to biology students about how to get a job. In bold letters the slide explained what ElectroCo (a pseudonym) was looking for: a plain and simple resume, good manners, confident speaking, and diverse competencies. The recruiter emphasized the importance of interpersonal skills such as communication and teamwork, because “a fancy suit or makeup won’t cover up these shortcomings.” This recruiting event, which the first author observed during fieldwork at Eastern Chinese Technical College (ECTC, a pseudonym), illustrates one of the predominant concerns facing community and technical colleges 1 worldwide: student employability (Tomlinson, 2012). While broad-access higher education has long focused on ensuring students are prepared for the workplace, since the Great Recession of 2008, technical colleges have become widely seen in the United States and China as a primary venue for developing a skilled workforce and social mobility in an increasingly urbanized and competitive economy (Carnevale, Smith, & Strohl, 2013; Qiang & Zhigang, 2016).
The focus on technical colleges as a solution to a nation’s workforce problems is based in part on claims that millions of jobs requiring some postsecondary education but not necessarily a bachelor’s degree (i.e., middle-skill jobs) regularly go unfilled because employers cannot find skilled applicants (Holzer & Lerman, 2007; Molnar, Wang, & Gao, 2015), while many graduates from 4-year universities are underemployed in the years immediately following graduation (Abel, Deitz, & Su, 2014; S. Li, Whalley, & Xing, 2014; Mok & Wu, 2016). Consequently, some observers have concluded that policy makers should steer students toward vocational programs in hot fields such as computer programming and nursing, and away from 4-year institutions in general and less marketable arts and humanities majors in particular (Molnar et al., 2015). This recent focus on the value of and need for vocational education has led to significant efforts in both the United States and China to increase students’ acquisition of sub-baccalaureate credentials, and to provide students with a seamless pathway or pipeline toward completing academic programs and transitioning into the labor market (Cleary, Kerrigan, & Van Noy, 2017; Qiang & Zhigang, 2016). Indeed, the focus on human capital development and fixing college-to-work pipelines has achieved the status of a frame or policy narrative in conversations about workforce development and higher education, as ideas that diagnose situations, prescribe solutions, and ultimately impact policy and practice (Benford & Snow, 2000).
The notion of college as a pipeline, as one of the links in a talent supply chain, is not without its critics. This view is informed in part by human capital theory, which conceptualizes a job seeker’s resources in terms of years of schooling or cognitive skills (e.g., literacy or numeracy aptitudes as measured by standardized tests) that subsequently explain variations in a person’s employment outcomes (Becker, 1964). However, the view of education as a pipeline to labor markets has been critiqued as inadequately accounting for other resources or characteristics held by individuals, such as social and cultural capital, that impact a person’s employability and social position (Bourdieu, 1986; Cleary et al., 2017). In addition, the notion that schools and postsecondary institutions exist primarily to supply workers to meet labor market demands contradicts views of education as a venue for intellectual growth, the preparation of engaged citizens, and social liberation (Dewey, 1916/2004; Freire, 1970/1994; Grubb & Lazerson, 2005). Finally, the human capital approach has been critiqued for overlooking the role that noncognitive 2 skills (e.g., teamwork, conscientiousness) play in students’ academic and labor market outcomes (Farkas, 2003; Heckman, 2000), the role that curriculum and instruction play in cultivating (or not) these competencies and dispositions (Hora, Benbow, & Oleson, 2016), and how hiring may be less a matter of objectively screening credentials and more a subjective process of cultural matching (Rivera, 2012). These critiques collectively underscore the idea that student employability in general, and the acquisition of skills, knowledge, and abilities, in particular, may not solely be a technical matter to be solved by better pipelines and pathways.
Consequently, the field of higher education would benefit from insights into the roles that other forms of capital play in technical college student transitions to the workforce. While the role of the opportunities and contacts afforded by social capital has been studied in both U.S. (e.g., Granovetter, 1995) and Chinese contexts (e.g., Bian, 1997), less research exists on how various forms of cultural capital influence students’ college–work pathways. In this article, we report findings from an exploratory case study that investigated how a group of educators and employers in an eastern Chinese city conceptualized and utilized embodied forms of cultural capital in their teaching, hiring, and training activities. China is the world’s second largest economy and an increasingly influential player in global higher education; the country is also in the midst of debates about skills gaps and talent pipelines, not unlike the United States (Johnston et al., 2016; H. Li, Loyalka, Rozelle, & Wu, 2017; Qiang & Zhigang, 2016), making findings potentially salient and applicable to U.S. technical colleges. In so doing, we aim to generate a cultural account of college–workforce relations by focusing on how cultural capital is cultivated via pedagogic processes in college classrooms and employed as part of screening procedures by firms when students strive to gain entry into the workplace (Bourdieu, 1986; Lareau & Weininger, 2003; Winkle-Wagner, 2010). Consequently, the research questions guiding the study are as follows: (a) What forms of cultural capital are valued by educators and employers for workplace success? (b) How are these forms of cultural capital being cultivated in the college classroom? (c) How, if at all, do considerations of cultural capital influence hiring and training in the workplace? and (c) What contextual factors influence the valuation, reproduction, and rewarding of cultural capital?
Background: Factors Shaping Student Labor Market Outcomes
The relationship between educational attainment and labor market outcomes has long been a topic of interest to sociologists, labor economists, and education researchers. Debates about these dynamics have centered on different forms of resources of capital (human, social, and cultural) that job applicants utilize—whether consciously or not—when seeking position, privilege, and power. One of the most influential theories in both research and skills-related policy is that of human capital, as measured by years of schooling or test performance of cognitive skills such as numeracy or literacy, which posits that investments in education and these skills pay dividends in the labor market via increased productivity and personal incomes (Becker, 1964). This perspective is often supported by references to the wage premium enjoyed by those with increased education (Goldin & Katz, 2007) and how schooling and cognitive skills predict both productivity and wage growth (H. Li et al., 2017). Consequently, economic development and social mobility can be seen as dependent upon investments in human capital, and the purpose of education viewed primarily as a driver of earnings potential and workforce development (Cleary et al., 2017; Livingstone, 2009).
Many critiques of the human capital approach exist. For instance, some theorists posit that hiring is akin to a “lottery” or an “investment decision” insofar as employers are never certain about an applicant’s real competency levels (Spence, 1973, p. 356). Signaling theorists consequently emphasize how employers determine wages based on distinct signals that applicants display to hiring managers along with considerations of anticipated productivity (Spence, 1973). Another form of capital that some argue better explains the relationship between education and employment is that of social capital, or the opportunities and resources inherent within one’s social networks and contacts (Lin, 1999). In a seminal study on how a group of Bostonians acquired their jobs, Granovetter (1995) documented how networks of friends, relatives, and business associates provided applicants with important information about job openings and firm characteristics. In the Chinese context, researchers have studied the influential role of guanxi, or interpersonal relations that facilitate exchanges of favors or information, and its impact on employee retention (Hom & Xiao, 2011) and job acquisition (Bian, 1997).
Another form of capital that may explain how education impacts employability and social mobility is that of cultural capital, which has been extensively studied in both K-12 and postsecondary settings (Lareau & Weininger, 2003; Winkle-Wagner, 2010). While cultural capital is often defined as elite or high-brow tastes (e.g., knowledge of fine art) or personal dispositions and interpersonal competencies, some argue for a more multifaceted conception of how culture may function to purchase one’s prestige or position within society. For instance, Bourdieu (1986) argued that cultural capital took three distinct forms: objectified (e.g., paintings or other elite artifacts), institutionalized (e.g., credentials), and embodied forms that include dispositions, knowledge, and habits that a person acquires over time via family, their social environment, and formal education. Lareau and Weininger (2003) further contend that cultural capital encompasses technical knowledge and skills, and not solely those aptitudes related to elite tastes or noncognitive competencies. Viewing cultural capital as the knowledge required to navigate complex bureaucracies and curricular pathways within community colleges, Deil-Amen and Rosenbaum (2003) found that low-income students often lack such knowledge and that more career-oriented colleges do a better job in facilitating students’ college careers than public community colleges. With respect to entry into the labor market, Rivera (2012) documented how job applicants’ cultural capital, particularly their personalities and hobbies, are closely scrutinized by hiring managers to ascertain whether they fit corporate cultures, thus making job acquisition more a process of cultural matching than one of employers solely seeking technical skills and particular credentials.
While the different forms of capital utilized by researchers of education–workforce relations are not necessarily mutually exclusive, in practice they are most often used as singular explanations for student or job applicant outcomes. However, some scholars emphasize how these various forms of capital cannot be adequately understood without considering the political context and social structures in which they are cultivated, reproduced, and rewarded. For example, Bourdieu’s (1986) theoretical framework requires attention to the field or sociopolitical contexts in which individuals make decisions and capital is assigned differential values. In addition, critical perspectives of education–workforce relations also emphasize the broader political, historical, and social contexts in which students, teachers, and employers live, study, and work (Bills, 2003; Tomlinson, 2012); the potential for employer discrimination and racism in hiring processes (Rivera & Tilcsik, 2016); and the prospect that only particular perspectives and interests (e.g., employers) are shaping debates about skills gaps and technical colleges (Cleary et al., 2017). Essentially, a critical lens problematizes discussions about college, skills, and jobs in ways that are uncommon in current debates, which tend to frame these issues in terms of market-driven needs and structural–technical reforms.
The Role of Technical Colleges in Debates About College-to-Work in China
One of the defining characteristics of the postrecession era in China, as with many other industrialized countries, was a widespread embrace of technical colleges as the linchpin to the nation’s economic problems, as millions of jobs went unfilled (Molnar et al., 2015). For some analysts, boosting the economy and providing students with job opportunities for social mobility, particularly youth from rural parts of China where the economy has grown much more slowly than in Eastern urban centers, is largely a matter of funneling more students into vocationally oriented postsecondary programs (Qiang & Zhigang, 2016). Given evidence that Chinese graduates from 4-year universities are experiencing underemployment, or employment in positions that do not require their level of education (e.g., S. Li et al., 2014), some observers (Q. Wang, 2013) and even the Chinese government (17th National Congress of the Communist Party of China, 2010) have argued for increased investments in postsecondary vocational education. Before describing the current landscape of Chinese vocational higher education, we first briefly review the history of Chinese higher education and the historical, cultural and political contexts in which current vocational and technical colleges operate.
The origins of Chinese higher education can be traced back to the Han dynasty (206 B.C. to A.D. 220) with formal education limited to those who could pass competitive examinations that ultimately dictated access to prestigious civil service positions (Zhao, 2014). This imperial examination system, known as the keju, lasted for 300 years and contributed to a pedagogical tradition that prioritized memorization and focused on learners’ knowledge of Confucian classics, while also inculcating a cultural predilection for the elite, educated classes and a corresponding disdain for manual labor (Schmidtke & Chen, 2012; Zhao, 2014). The next stages of China’s postsecondary education system were characterized by a period of influence from foreign countries, starting with Western language and missionary-led colleges in the early 20th century (Yeh, 2004). By 1912, there was one university, 94 professional colleges, and 12 normal colleges in China (M. Li & Yang, 2014), and during this time reformers began to champion vocational education as a way to supplant the dominant, classical educational system to modernize the nation and prepare a workforce skilled in industrial technologies (Bai, 2006; Schmidtke & Chen, 2012). However, these vocational schools faced an uphill battle of a continuing stigma against skilled and manual labor and playing “second fiddle to character education and social requirements,” which led to a paucity in workers skilled in modern technologies through the middle of the 20th century (Schmidtke & Chen, 2012, p. 436). This long-standing preference for academic training over manual labor serves as an important historical backdrop to contemporary discussions about vocational education in China.
In the 1950s, another influx of foreign ideas influenced vocational education through the adoption of the Soviet model, where institutions became highly specialized and were guided by ideals that sought to combine formal education with vocational education to “produce a cultured, Socialist-minded worker” (M. Li & Yang, 2014; V. C. Wang & Torrisi-Steele, 2016, p. 149). In the late 1970s and 1980s, a series of reforms followed which centered on forming large, more diversified universities and recovering from the deleterious effects of the Cultural Revolution (Agelasto & Adamson, 1998; Xiong, 2010). In 1979, the government sent a fact-finding mission to Germany, the United States, and the United Kingdom to study these nations’ vocational education systems. Thus, the current vocational education system in China—which includes specialized vocational preparation in middle school, high schools, and at the postsecondary level—has strong roots in the German model (L. Wang & Jiang, 2013).
At the tertiary level, vocational and technical education in China encompasses four distinct types of institutions: vocational technical colleges, specialized junior colleges, technician colleges, and adult higher education institutions (Stewart, 2015; L. Wang & Jiang, 2013). Collectively, these 1,297 institutions enroll 48.6% of China’s approximately 10 million college students (Zhou, 2016). The institution profiled in this article, ECTC, is a technical college, which offers 3-year degrees and includes a curriculum that is not unlike a U.S. community college where specialized technical coursework is required alongside general education courses in history, Chinese culture, and English. The growth of institutions such as ECTC throughout China was part of significant investments by the central government in higher education, begun in the mid-1990s to improve the international prestige of its top-tier higher education institutions (Michael & Gu, 2016), while also massifying postsecondary education by providing 15% of the nation’s youth with access to college (Bai, 2006).
As China’s economy and higher education systems grew at a startling pace in the early 21st century, several problems emerged with respect to its labor market. Despite the demand for a more highly skilled workforce in fields such as manufacturing, the government has had to actively address the negative perceptions of vocational education and the skilled trades (Chan, Goh, & Prest, 2015; Q. Wang, 2013). Some analysts are concerned that because of this over-emphasis on 4-year colleges, China is in the midst of a skills gap, or a situation that millions of jobs exist and go unfilled due to the lack of appropriately skilled workers (Molnar et al., 2015). In fact, a recent study found that Chinese employers felt that applicants lacked competencies in areas of leadership, communication, and self-motivation (Chan et al., 2015). A national survey of college graduates found that students themselves considered their education to have inadequately provided them with skills such as programming, negotiation, and analytical thinking (Molnar et al., 2015). While such data do not necessarily prove the skills gap thesis, they do suggest that the Chinese educational system is not adequately providing its students with the skills required to succeed in the labor market.
This argument is also advanced by some observers of the Chinese economy who attribute the fact that Western countries (and not China) lead the world in scientific and industrial innovations to its highly structured, test-driven educational system, and especially the national preoccupation with student success in the gaokao, the infamous college entrance exam. As Zhao (2014) argues, “Chinese schools exist for test prep,” (p. 132) and much of the K-12 experience for students is rote memorization, endless competition with peers, and enduring interminable lectures. Indeed, Chan et al. (2015) argue that the gaokao is a “soft skills killer” (p. 12) which has deleterious implications for students in a labor market where skills such as communication and teamwork are highly valued. The idea that a focus on standardized tests and lecture-based teaching has inhibited national competitiveness has caught the attention of the Chinese government, as the recent 10-year national plan includes reforms to the gaokao and also advocates for teaching to be “heuristic, exploratory, discussion-based, and participatory” (17th National Congress of the Communist Party of China, 2010, p. 25). These observations highlight the fact that conversations regarding student employability in the context of Chinese technical colleges must invariably account for the role of pedagogy in the acquisition of a variety of skills.
In this article, we use a cultural capital framework to investigate how skills are conceptualized, cultivated, and rewarded within and across the educational and workplace fields in a large Eastern Chinese city. In adopting a cultural focus, we are not suggesting that human capital or a focus on structural reforms and college completion are unimportant, but instead that closer attention should be paid to the cultural and pedagogic aspects of students’ skills and the relationship between higher education and the labor market. In particular, our approach is grounded in the view that relations between higher education and the workforce are not a linear supply chain but instead are best viewed as a cultural transaction where valued forms of capital are acquired in home and school and then rewarded (or not) in the workplace (Lareau & Weininger, 2003). We also place particular emphasis on the problem of skill acquisition via the teaching and learning process in formal educational settings, and how cultural capital can act as a form of currency in the social world via companies’ hiring procedures (Rivera, 2012). Finally, our investigation is based on the notion that these phenomena are situated within the specific social, historical, economic, and political context of the time (Spring 2015) and place (a large, rapidly industrializing Eastern Chinese city) where the study was conducted.
Method
This study utilizes an exploratory qualitative case study design, where a variety of data (i.e., in-depth interviews, classroom observations, and field notes) were collected to study what we call local occupational pathways. These pathways include one or more academic programs and employers in the same field, such as advanced manufacturing or biotechnology, where the program’s disciplinary training is closely aligned with occupations in particular firms. In this way, the unit of analysis or the case is not a single academic department, institution, or company, but multiple organizations linked by disciplinary similarities, or as Stake (1995, p. 2) said, as “ a complex, functioning thing.” In addition, we adopt Merriam’s (1998) view of case study research as the holistic and descriptive analysis of a particular situation or phenomenon, and Bartlett and Vavrus’ (2017) focus on the political and historic contexts in which selected cases are situated.
Study Locations
The educational institution
Set against a rocky mountain range in an area that as recently as 20 years ago was predominantly farmland, the campus of ECTC is now blocks away from high-rise apartments, skyscrapers with dazzling light shows emblazoned on their sides, and a new subway system under construction in a city of approximately 9 million. According to institutional documents, ECTC had roughly 700 full-time and 80 part-time instructors and 9,200 full-time and 2,400 part-time students at the time of data collection. Respondents noted that most students came from the city and surrounding suburbs near the campus. The college also had 31 academic programs and over 230 partnerships with local and regional businesses. The motto of the school emphasizes both practical, real-world skills, and the value of a moral education.
The two companies
The two companies included in this study—PharmaCo and ElectroCo (pseudonyms)—were selected by administrators at ECTC based on their regular recruitment of students. Founded in the early 1950s and later acquired by a national pharmaceutical company, PharmaCo manufactures and distributes drugs and supplements based on traditional Chinese medicine, employing over 40,000 people nationwide. ElectroCo, a joint Chinese–European venture that manufactures components for electrical generation facilities, is rapidly expanding into international sales with over 2,000 employees at a large industrial site outside the city.
Sampling
The ECTC international relations office identified all study participants, including educators and employers, resulting in a nonrandom, purposive procedure. This method of participant selection was not ideal given the potential for bias to enter into the process, but given that the field researcher did not speak Mandarin Chinese and also lacked access to local educators and employers, this mode of sampling was necessary. A total of eight educators, which included two administrators and six faculty, participated in interviews. In addition, classroom observations with three instructors were conducted. Five teachers of English were selected to accompany the first author and provide translation services during the visit. To identify employers, ECTC contacted local businesses that agreed to participate and arranged an interview with a senior human resources manager and factory tours. Thus, a total of eight educators and two employers were included in this exploratory study (n = 10).
Data Collection and Analysis
The data collected for this study included structured interviews, classroom observations, institutional documents, and detailed field notes. Interview protocols were translated in the United States by a native speaker of Mandarin Chinese. While local translators were available, given restrictions associated with human subjects protocols at the authors’ home institution, these translators were unable to be present during the actual interviews. Instead, local translators spoke with all respondents in Mandarin Chinese prior to the interview and went over the protocol, ensuring that all questions were clearly understood. Then, translators left the room and respondents answered the interview questions (in their native language) in the presence of the first author, who tape-recorded each interview. For classroom observations and factory tours, translators provided a running commentary in English on class activities and tour highlights.
The interview protocol included 10 questions that touched upon topics including, skills considered essential for workplace success, instructional goals and methods used in academic programs and workplace training; hiring procedures, existing education–employer partnerships, and views on educational reform in China. The interviews lasted approximately 30 minutes and were digitally recorded. For the classroom observations, a variation of a structured protocol called the Teaching Dimensions Observation Protocol (TDOP) was utilized that entails documenting teacher and student behaviors in 2-minute intervals (Hora, 2016; Hora & Ferrare, 2014), along with extensive notes regarding classroom activities. Factory tours notes were taken at the time of the tour. At the end of each of the 5 days of fieldwork, detailed field notes were written that included analyst impressions, and information from documents provided on-site.
To analyze the data, we used an analytic approach that involved an inductive, systematic, step-wise process of deriving themes and patterns from the data (Creswell, 2014; Miles, Huberman, & Saldana, 2013). The first step of the analysis involved an open-coding process undertaken by the two authors independently, where in-vivo codes (e.g., primacy of work ethic) were created based on recurrent ideas, terms or events evident in the data (Ryan & Bernard, 2003). The preliminary codes were deliberately kept as close to the raw data as possible without moving up analytic levels. As new instances of a code were encountered, the original code and its definition was revisited and altered or redefined if necessary (i.e., the constant comparative method). After independently creating code lists, the two authors met, compared notes and collectively refined the code list, whereupon the first author applied the code list to the entire data set.
Next, the open codes were analyzed as part of an axial coding process, where relationships and patterns between and among codes were explored. This procedure involved a close examination of the codes and the raw text to which they were linked, and consideration of higher-level or more abstracted categories, as well as relationships such as typologies, cause-effect, and temporal relations. After identifying new categories and the presence of a temporal structure in the data, a new model was derived that graphically described the results (Miles et al., 2013). At this late stage of analysis, the conceptual framework guiding the study (i.e., cultural capital) was explicitly considered and used to refine the findings. The reliability of study findings was ensured by triangulating results across data sources, conducting member checks with respondents where summaries of study results were sent to ECTC representatives, and regular meetings between analysts to compare results of independent analyses.
Limitations
Several limitations to the study reported in this article should be considered when interpreting study results. First, the use of different translators during protocol translation, the interviews themselves, and transcription introduced the likelihood of translation error. Second, the sampling and recruitment procedures were controlled by the host institution (ECTC) which results in a nonrandom sample and the prospect that respondents were selected to present institutionally desirable perspectives. Third, while the small sample size was intentional, given the goal of documenting cultural phenomenon in specific instances (Bartlett & Vavrus, 2017), the results should not be used to draw conclusions for larger populations of technical colleges, faculty, or businesses in a single Eastern Chinese city or elsewhere in the country. However, it should be noted that in case study and qualitative research, especially where the goal is particularistic and phenomenological analysis, large sample sizes are not necessary and saturation of themes can occur with as few as six respondents (Guest, Bunce, & Johnson, 2006). Finally, given the rapid rate of change in the Chinese economy and postsecondary sector, it is possible that the results reported here may be outdated in a relatively short amount of time.
Results
Analyses of the data resulted in four categories that capture the role that cultural capital plays in the transition from college to work experienced by Chinese technical college students. These categories represent a temporal sequence of how specific forms of cultural capital are (a) conceptualized and valued, (b) cultivated in formal educational settings, (c) utilized in workplace hiring and training, and (d) situated in specific cultural, economic, and historical contexts. We report findings for each of these categories, with the primary results depicted in Table 1.
Four Key Categories and Recurrent Themes Derived From Data.
Forms of Cultural Capital Considered Valuable for Workplace Success
When asked about the types of skills, knowledge, and abilities that college students need to be successful in the workplace, respondents concurred on the necessity for young people to acquire a diverse range of both cognitive and noncognitive competencies. In addition, the importance of a strong work ethic and the responsibility of various parties to cultivate students’ skills throughout their lives and careers were also reported.
The need for both cognitive and noncognitive competencies
Both cognitive and noncognitive competencies were cited as important for workplace success. In terms of cognitive competencies, respondents discussed the importance of both declarative knowledge (understanding “about” a topic) and procedural knowledge (knowing how to “apply” knowledge in practice) related to a specific field. Another aspect of cognitive skills is that of an individual’s ability to think critically, reason, and problem solve. For example, a representative of ElectroCo emphasized the importance of problem-solving, stating that his company needed people who could identify and diagnose problems in the field that were often ill-defined and emergent.
Furthermore, respondents were unequivocal in stating that proficiency in technical aspects of a field alone was insufficient, as distinct types of noncognitive competencies were considered invaluable for success. Educators and employers alike spoke about how interpersonal skills such as communication and teamwork were essential, as well as intrapersonal skills like attitude and lifelong learning. The representative from ElectroCo stated that communication was the most important skill he seeks out in job applicants, along with people who “have a more outgoing personality” and can “communicate well with people from other fields and classes.” Regarding the relative importance of technical and nontechnical competencies, one educator stated that communication is more important because “technical competencies take very little training” compared to the challenge of developing attitude and communication skills. Another educator observed that he first “trains techniques and skills to lay a solid foundation,” upon which other aptitudes (e.g., innovation, reasoning) could be built.
One educator underscored the importance of an agreeable personality, arguing that, “If a person’s character is not good, then none of the other skills matter.” Some respondents also highlighted that the capacity to learn as particularly important, given the rapid changes in science and technology shaping both disciplines. These results are consistent with prior research in China (Molnar et al., 2015) and the United States (Pellegrino & Hilton, 2012) about the importance of noncognitive competencies—and not solely technical acumen in a given field—for student success in the workplace.
Work ethic
An intrapersonal competency that is frequently cited in U.S. research on employers’ skill needs—that of work ethic—is commonly discussed in terms of motivation and willingness to work long hours (Hora et al., 2016), which is a similar interpretation taken by scholars studying the so-called “Chinese work ethic” (Harrell, 1985). In this study, however, respondents discussed work ethic in slightly different terms. One educator stated that while her interpretation of work ethic included the desire to work hard and show up to work on time, it also involved compliance with professional standards and a commitment to a profession. For instance, one employer discussed work ethic as the need for students to develop a “moral constraint” that individuals must follow to guide their behavior in society and the workplace. Educators described work ethic as a belief system that kept people from “not going against traditional values” in terms of one’s approach to work. Respondents also discussed work ethic as a commitment to a job or profession including “complying with professional standards” and having “a professional attitude to the enterprise.” According to this view, work ethic entails adhering to the expectations and norms of a profession, which one educator noted will “determine the direction and future development of a student in an industry.”
Multiple parties share responsibility for skills development
Respondents generally agreed that family, K-12 and higher education, employers, society at large, and students themselves all play a role in cultivating students’ competencies. As one educator said, all bear responsibility, but “each has a different mission.” Several respondents felt that parents played a key role in skills development, especially during early childhood, which is consistent with theorists of cultural capital who emphasize the importance of domestic transmission (Bourdieu, 1986). One educator also stated that parents should be teaching children “social competence and integrity,” while an employer felt that family “shapes personality” and inculcates traditional values. Some educators also felt that the family was primarily responsible for interpersonal competencies such as communication and teamwork.
Several respondents also indicated that formal education is required to further develop students’ skills, especially teaching “professional skills” unique to a discipline or profession at the postsecondary level. The employer representative at PharmaCo said that education was “irreplaceable” for student success throughout life. Finally, the business community via training and society itself were also described as an important venue for skills development. For example, one respondent considered “society” responsible for developing students’ skills, where young people form ideas from their peers and the broader culture.
Curriculum, Instruction, and Students’ Acquisition of Cultural Capital
The second set of findings pertains to the educational processes that provide students with valuable forms of cultural capital, especially via formal curriculum and instruction.
Tension between theory and practice
Several respondents reported a view that theoretical knowledge alone was insufficient for the world of work. This perspective was discussed by both employers in the context of broader critiques of 4-year colleges, and the perception that graduates of 4-year colleges had a limited ability to “work with their hands,” an absence of practical skills, and too much theoretical knowledge. In addition, the ElectroCo respondent referred to a Chinese saying to describe university graduates, as being “eyes high, hands low” or having expectations that are not aligned with reality.
Consequently, because his firm viewed colleges like ECTC as providing a robust technical training in their field and technical college students as being more grounded and realistic, he looked to technical colleges for new hires for management and professional positions, to “promote these exceptional talents.” Notably, this tension between theoretical and practical knowledge is not new in debates about education, and the issue is becoming increasingly salient in public debates about Chinese higher education (Q. Wang, 2013).
Role (value) of general education
At ECTC, the curriculum includes a combination of foundational, technical courses in a discipline, and required electives in fields such as English and the arts and humanities. The rationale for a general education (tongshi jioayu) curriculum was explained by an upper-level administrator as being essential for “personal development” and students’ long-term productivity and as part of a renewed national emphasis on multidisciplinary education (Cao, 2016). Exposure to these subjects, one respondent claimed, would also provide students with the “right attitude” for life and a perspective that would provide them with a “human quality” necessary for success in society and the workplace.
At the heart of this argument was the view that one of the purposes of education was to prepare students for a life of commitment to advancing societal interests, which can be traced back to Confucian ideas on the purpose of education (Schmidtke & Chen, 2012). One instructor argued that “vocational education should first be an education” as preparation for life and secondarily as preparation for a specific job. Another educator stated that, “We place a high priority on general education because we understand that it can produce the right attitude, which we know is one of the key factors that makes a student successful.”
During follow-up questions regarding precisely how and why courses in topics such as Chinese art or history would cultivate the “right attitude,” this educator argued that these courses capture “moral and theoretical” essence of Chinese culture and a humanistic perspective, which collectively create in a person the “right” attitude. However, another instructor felt that arts and humanities courses were not relevant to students’ majors and could be reduced. Thus, while several respondents argued for a general education and a focus on the intellectual, moral, and social benefits of a general education, this view was not embraced by the entire study sample.
Teaching methods
Respondents also spoke about teaching methods used in the classroom, which is one of the primary venues where students acquire particular forms of cultural capital, especially technical knowledge, reasoning skills, and noncognitive competencies. Participants referred to traditional Chinese modes of instruction (i.e., lecturing) and discussed efforts to introduce active learning methods. Classroom observations of three instructors also contribute insights into the ways some ECTC educators approach teaching and learning.
Several respondents spoke about the prevalence of didactic lecturing throughout all levels of the Chinese educational system. One educator described typical Chinese pedagogy simply as “chalk and cramming.” This teaching approach involves the teacher speaking at students for an entire class period, where one respondent observed that the “students passively accept the teaching content.” One instructor felt that this teaching style, beginning in elementary school, prepares students to be passive actors in the classroom and that in college “they don’t want to actively participate” in the class. While respondents did not suggest that this mode of teaching was completely ineffective, most argued that lecturing alone failed to cultivate noncognitive skills such as teamwork or communication.
Despite a tradition of lecturing, several respondents reported using techniques described as “student-centered” in their classrooms. This was based in part on encouragement from college administration, but also because some educators recognized that lecturing alone led to students “passively accepting what the teacher says, and not allowing them to put forth their own viewpoints.” In response, one instructor stated that she regularly utilized “group cooperation and teamwork” to develop collaborative skills in her students, and another educator used “project or task-oriented methods” to emphasize how workplace tasks were often ill-structured and required cooperation with others. In this case, the instructor let “students divide research and material gathering work among themselves while performing a task,” resembling methods such as problem-based learning (Hmelo-Silver, 2004). For one educator, the purchase of new equipment for the classroom (i.e., programmable robotic arms) allowed for “student learning through projects and student-led teaching.” For this educator, given the hands-on-nature of active learning exercises, this form of teaching was contingent on the quality and quantity of equipment available in the classroom.
Next, we report data from observations of three classrooms: a biology course, an engineering course on computer numerical control (CNC) programming, and an engineering course on programmable logic controllers (PLC; see Table 2).
TDOP Classroom Observation Data.
Note. Figures indicate the proportion of 2-minute intervals in which a particular behavior was observed throughout the entire lesson. TDOP = Teaching Dimensions Observation Protocol; CNC = computer numerical control; PLC = programmable logic controllers; PP = PowerPoint.
The observed biology course took place in a small classroom with several rows of desks facing a chalkboard. On the day of the observation, 41 students sat in the warm, light-filled room for a lesson that was dominated by lecturing with PowerPoint slides (50% of the observed 2-minute intervals) and intermittent instructor questions and student responses (27%). The lesson was highly structured and followed a pattern of instructor lecturing about DNA and the life cycle of micro-organisms and question-and-answer (Q&A) episodes. These Q&A episodes varied between the instructor calling on a student by their number, whereupon the student would stand and recite an answer, or an open-ended question to be answered by the entire class.
The CNC course was held in a small computer lab, with seven rows of computers lined up in a dark room adjoining a large space filled with large drilling and cutting machines. The instructor began the class with a brief lecture (with no visuals) about the simulation the students would work on that day, explaining order of operations and quirks about the software. Then, the students spent the remainder of the class period in groups of two or three, working on the simulation which required them to write, de-bug, and then run code (41%), while the instructor walked from group to group answering questions.
Finally, the PLC class was held in a long, narrow classroom with several Y-shaped tables, each of which had three computer terminals and a large flat space for writing or working. Students sat in groups of two to four at each of these terminals, and proceeded to listen to an introductory lecture (with no visuals) about the task for the day—to write a program that would move a mechanical arm. After the brief lecture and demonstration of the machinery, students spent the class working in groups (27%) while the instructor walked around and provided assistance. The instructor interrupted the group work once for a mini-lecture regarding a common problem students were encountering, and after another period of group work the class concluded with a brief lecture about the correct solution and mistakes made by the students.
While these observational data support some aspects of the prevalence of lecturing or chalk and cramming as a dominant pedagogical mode in Chinese classrooms, they also reveal that more active learning techniques and student–teacher interactions are also not uncommon.
Business Practices: Hiring and Training
Next, we turn to findings regarding the next field into which graduates of ECTC enter—that of the labor market and specific places of employment such as PharmaCo and ElectroCo. The data reported here illustrate two ways in which cultural capital functions at this vital juncture: the significance of corporate culture to employers and its impact on hiring and training policies.
Corporate culture
Respondents in this study spoke extensively of corporate culture and its importance in how they approached hiring, training, and other company operations. In the recruiting presentation observed at ECTC, the PharmaCo representative emphasized the importance of corporate culture to the students, stating that “Getting to know a company is like getting to know a person—as time goes on, you get to know the culture better. If a student doesn’t agree with or adapt to the culture, then they won’t last.” Descriptions of the culture at PharmaCo included references to values such as “embrace of entrepreneurial spirit” and “dedication, teamwork, and innovation,” as well as an espoused commitment to upholding the reputation and spirit of traditional Chinese medicine. Thus, culture in this company is conceptualized as a combination of the corporate story, managerial values and aspirations, and workplace norms developed over time.
At ElectroCo, the corporate culture was described with less detail, with references to it being “people-oriented” and how the company pays close, even “meticulous” attention to cultivating and maintaining its culture. This issue of cultural maintenance was discussed in terms of a “corporate culture agreement” for employees, such that continued employment was contingent upon strong performance, a good work ethic, and an enthusiastic “buying into the culture.” For these two companies, culture was not an abstract idea but captured essential elements of their corporation’s identity as well as expectations for how staff should conduct themselves and approach their jobs. Further conceptions of corporate culture also play an important role in determining who gets hired and how they are trained.
The respondent at ElectroCo spoke extensively about how considerations of culture impact hiring and screening. She stated unambiguously that “corporate culture and core values form the most important segment when we recruit new workers.” The recruitment process begins with screening applicants via in-person interviews to assess if they “match the culture requirement.” This assessment includes interviews where the focus is not only on work experience or educational credentials, but looking closely at an “applicants’ reaction, his expression, and his overall quality” to make a judgment about their personality in general, and especially any indications about their willingness to learn. These qualities are specifically elicited by asking about interests “outside of work” including hobbies such as music and movies. In fact, the interviewers deliberately “broaden the topic to see how he learns through and around films.” This focus on noncognitive skills, hobbies, and personality traits is not dissimilar from the PharmaCo recruiter’s message to ECTC students; interpersonal skills and personality traits are of considerable import to these two Chinese employers. The notion of hiring as a process of cultural matching found in U.S. contexts (Rivera, 2012) appears to also be evident in Chinese companies.
As with classroom teaching, workplace training is another venue where cultural capital can be cultivated. At ElectroCo, all new hires undergo an extensive 6-month training program that includes department-specific training in both technical aspects of the job as well as desirable nontechnical skills. At PharmaCo the training program is similar, where an extensive “Rainbow Training Plan” covers the first 2 to 3 years of employment. This training first involves a focus on “corporate culture cultivation,” followed by occupation- and department-specific training on professional skills and technical matters. Thus, at both companies there is a focus on reproducing and developing two distinct forms of cultural capital in new hires via workplace training: aspects of the corporate culture and the development of task- and job-specific skills.
Salient Contextual Aspects of the Educational and Employment Fields
Finally, we report contextual factors related to higher education and the labor market that respondents identified as salient to students’ career pathways. This focus on context is important because how people conceptualize, cultivate, and reward different forms of cultural capital depend largely on the contexts or fields in which they are positioned (Bourdieu, 1986).
Several respondents discussed what they perceived as a societal bias against both blue-collar work and technical colleges. As one educator stated, “the Chinese neglect of vocational education is a rather obvious and serious problem.” The cultural norms in China that favor a 4-year university over a technical college education and white-collar jobs over those requiring manual labor trace back to Confucian views about the need for an education in the classics to become a “superior man,” and a historic class structure that clearly delineates between the peasantry and the elite (Xiong, 2010; Zhao, 2014). For respondents, these norms are strongly held and hard to change.
The next contextual factor cited by respondents was the structure of the Chinese labor market, which was generally viewed as promising for technical college graduates despite a recent economic downturn. Respondents felt a shortage of skilled workers existed but did not focus exclusively on a failed postsecondary system. Instead, respondents cited probable causes as low wages, rapid growth of many industries, issues with work–life balance, and the societal preference for white-collar work. For companies that were growing rapidly, turnover was problematic given the need for a consistent labor supply. To remedy this, ElectroCo employees were offered regular opportunities for advancement and raises. Bonuses were even offered to families of employees that stayed at ElectroCo for long periods.
At the time of data collection there were three major reform efforts at the national level discussed by respondents. First, the government had recently announced the goal to transform over 600 comprehensive universities into “applied science” institutions, which would resemble in mission and curricular offerings a technical college such as ECTC (Chan et al., 2015). Second, as previously noted, the Chinese government had proposed transforming the lecture- or teacher-centered tradition of instruction to one that was more student-centered. Third, the government had long been advocating for both Chinese educators and companies to become more innovative and creative, which was a response to the paucity of patents and scientific discoveries in China compared to the Western world. This desire for more innovative thinkers was one of the primary drivers of pedagogical reform in Chinese higher education (Zhao, 2009).
Yet, these initiatives were met with some skepticism by study respondents. Some felt a campaign to develop innovative capacity was a far more complex problem than many realized, and that it easily could become “empty words without fruition.” What was required, some argued, was to recognize that a combination of technical, foundational knowledge, and creativity was required, and that teaching and training these capabilities took time. Furthermore, while instructors at ECTC felt that the shift toward student-centered teaching was underway, some observed that challenges existed, including a lack of equipment required to do project-based learning, the resistance of some faculty to “break the tradition” of lecturing, and the perception by some that too much pressure was being placed on teachers to address complex problems such as student employability. An administrator observed that such reforms were “a thankless thing.” Ultimately, these insights demonstrate that Chinese technical colleges such as ECTC are in the midst of a reformist agenda not unlike their U.S. counterparts, and that some curricular and personnel-related challenges are common across international borders.
Discussion
During an interview with the hiring manager at ElectroCo, in a spare boardroom above a cavernous and bustling manufacturing facility filled with teams of young workers using sophisticated robotics to assemble electronic substation components, he echoed a sentiment that his colleague had expressed during the recruiting session at ECTC. Instead of seeking out graduates from colleges like ECTC who were only skilled technicians, what he wanted was someone who “has a very strong ability to self-learn, to understand the responsibility of their work, and expressing what you know to others.” In fact, this hiring manager clearly stated that, “Our recruitment condition is that the applicant must have the ability to communicate with others.” Viewing these diverse skills and competencies—which are grounded in specific disciplinary contexts and are acquired through careful mentoring and teaching and rewarded via job offers—as cultural capital highlights how both cognitive and noncognitive competencies act as a form of social currency that conveys position and privilege to those possessing these critical resources (Bourdieu, 1986; Lareau & Weininger, 2003). In the remainder of this article, we offer insights that a cultural capital framework on these issues from a Chinese context adds to debates about the role of technical colleges in society and the labor market, and subsequent implications for faculty, administrators, and researchers both in the United States and China.
College Student Employability as a Cultural Transaction Between Fields
The dominant policy narrative in the United States and China regarding college student employability is informed by human capital theory, with a focus on students’ acquiring the right credential to get a good job. The data reported in this article reinforce the limitations of this approach. Instead, we argue that students’ transition between technical college and the labor market is best thought of as a cultural transaction between distinct fields, where the skills, knowledge, and abilities acquired in domestic and educational settings are purchased by employers, who themselves have strong cultural norms that act as gatekeeping mechanisms during the hiring process. Furthermore, these transactions are embedded in specific disciplinary, professional, institutional, political, and historic contexts (see Figure 1).
Framework outlining processes of cultural capital acquisition and utilization in higher education and the labor market.
In the context of ECTC and its local occupational pathways, we argue that the implications of a cultural capital framework for educational practice are twofold. First, it raises questions about how valued ways of thinking and acting should be cultivated in the classroom and workplace training. Second, it forces scholars and policy makers to recognize the limitations of policy narratives that single out higher education as the sole cause of the skills gap, and to acknowledge the need to develop more holistic and comprehensive policy solutions that include parents, education, employers, and society as equal parties responsible for cultivating students’ competencies. Instead of addressing the question of whether a skills gap exists in China, we problematize the very notion and raise questions about the assumptions underpinning the idea of structural and ideational breakdowns between the educational and industrial sectors when it comes to student employability.
The Importance of Cognitive and Noncognitive Competencies in the Chinese Labor Market
One of the principal issues facing the field—both in theoretical and practical terms—is determining which competencies students should acquire that facilitate their entry into the labor market. This conversation is often more about occupations considered in-demand (e.g., nurse, computer programmer), rather than specific competencies (e.g., diagnostic skills, analytic thinking), which leads to a focus on cognitive and technical skills related to specific occupations. The literature indicates that graduates of Chinese technical colleges feel that certain noncognitive skills such as quality control analysis, persuasion, negotiation, and communication are highly valued in the workplace but inadequately provided by the postsecondary sector (Molnar et al., 2015), and the data reported in this article reinforce this contention.
In particular, the noncognitive competency of “work ethic” was emphasized by respondents, but in ways that slightly differ from Western views of work ethic which center on the ability to work long, hard hours (Hora et al., 2016; Miller, Woehr, & Hudspeth, 2002). Instead, in this study work ethic was discussed in terms of an allegiance to the craft or profession, as well as a dedication to society itself. Given the importance of the construct for student success in the workplace, future research on this topic should build upon comparative analyses of work ethic in East Asian countries (Woehr, Arciniega, & Lim, 2007) to scrutinize aspects of work ethic beliefs in China that may implicate culturally specific views on the role of kinship and professional ties, loyalty to one’s family and profession, and Confucian (and political) allegiance to social harmony (e.g., Harrell, 1985).
Ultimately, it is clear that the forms of cultural capital Chinese technical college students should acquire to ensure success in the labor market include both cognitive and noncognitive competencies, an argument increasingly advanced by U.S. educators and employer-based research in the United States (Hora et al., 2016) and in China (Molnar et al., 2015). The data reported in this article raise a question that should be at the center of any discussion about student employability, but is almost entirely absent from policy makers’ and researchers’ debates of these issues—namely, how do we cultivate these diverse competencies in academic programs?
The Centrality of Curriculum and Instruction: Kicking the “Chalk and Cramming” Habit
Chinese technical colleges face considerable challenges with respect to how to actually cultivate cognitive and noncognitive competencies in the classroom, which is a situation not unlike the United States (see Freeman et al., 2014). A particular issue in China is the predominance of the testing and lecturing culture, which arguably is more deeply ingrained—via the impact of the gaokao—in Chinese classrooms than in the United States (Zhao, 2014). Likewise, study respondents spoke about the dominant pedagogical method of “chalk and cramming,” and how students are socialized to expect lecturing that is focused on the memorization of facts to the extent that more hands-on experiential learning was sometimes resisted or even rejected by students. As respondents in this study and the research literature suggest (e.g., Hmelo-Silver, 2004), experiential and active learning methods are strongly associated with students’ acquisition of both content knowledge as well as reasoning abilities and noncognitive skills, and the fact that lecturing and rote memorization appears to be embedded in Chinese educational culture represents a considerable challenge.
Nonetheless, it is important to resist easy caricatures of the classrooms of an entire nation, and the data reported in this article indicate that Chinese technical college students are not subjected exclusively to 50-minute-long lectures. While our observation data revealed some periods of lecturing, it was also moderated by extensive Q&A and small group work, and research on the teaching philosophies of Chinese technical educators suggest that this population of educators embraces both humanistic philosophies of learning and experiential teaching methods (V. C. Wang & Torrisi-Steele, 2016). Additional research is required to document precisely how Chinese teachers and students conceptualize learning itself, which is a line of inquiry with a much stronger history in countries such as England, Canada, and Australia (e.g., Hativa & Goodyear, 2002) than in China. In addition, educational leaders and policy makers in China must recognize, that notwithstanding government decrees that all college classrooms must adopt active learning techniques (17th National Congress of the Communist Party of China, 2010), pedagogical reform in educational organizations is notoriously difficult and will be especially hard in a system where teachers have little training and instructional autonomy. Furthermore, pedagogical reform is difficult, as it is not a simple matter of leaders dictating new practices but a variety of factors such as teacher beliefs and training, workload, routinized practices, and assessment and accreditation pressures, which all shape teachers’ decision making and thus make introducing or mandating new teaching methods not a simple matter (Darling-Hammond & McLaughlin, 1995).
Hiring and Cultural Fit in a Chinese Company
In many discussions of college–work transitions and skills gaps, the issue of hiring and how employers make hiring decisions is rarely broached. This aspect of college–workforce dynamics is too important to ignore, as both our data and that of others (e.g., Rivera, 2012) reveal the cultural and subjective underpinnings of the hiring process. While prior work suggests technical skills and work experience are a primary criterion for personnel selection in China (Huo, Huang, & Napier, 2002), our data show a different picture. The ability of a student to obtain a job is not simply a matter of having a degree or superior cognitive skills; instead, personality, communication skills, and fit with a company also influence hiring decisions. While ensuring fit is a reasonable approach given links to increased retention and productivity, hiring as cultural matching introduces a subjective and potentially discriminatory element into the process, which is not unproblematic in China in regard to gender discrimination and the presence of numerous ethnic minority groups (Hasmath & Ho, 2015).
What does this mean for colleges like ECTC? We suggest that an increased focus on noncognitive skills in the curriculum and instruction of Chinese higher education is warranted. A focus on these competencies would enhance not only student learning of course material, but also expectations and habits of mind unique to a discipline or profession, which may increase the prospect that they would fit company and industrial cultures in terms of professional norms and practices. In addition, given the prospect that general and interdisciplinary education is uniquely well suited to cultivating these diverse competencies (e.g., Cao, 2016), colleges should carefully consider the implications of curricular changes on the types of skills students are developing. Finally, career services should provide students with the opportunity to participate in mock-interviews and analyses of corporate cultures, in preparation for the likelihood that they will soon undergo a process of cultural screening as they apply for jobs upon graduation.
Of course, it is important to recognize that diverse competencies or cultural fit considerations cannot explain job acquisition alone, as factors such as social ties and network connections that are particularly influential in Chinese contexts (i.e., guanxi) must also be taken into account (Bian, 1997). Instead, a more expansive conception of student employability that eschews a myopic focus on credentials alone is warranted, where social and cultural forces are recognized.
The Broader Context of Chinese Technical Education
The data we report in this article should be considered in light of the unique context of China—not as a discussion of occupational pathways as if they unfold in a cultural, economic, and political vacuum—but as one occurring in a time of intense cultural and socioeconomic ferment. For instance, ECTC is a college in an urban area that did not exist 20 years ago, home to multinational companies whose factories stand where small vegetable farms existed as recently as the 1990s. As China evolves from a centralized, controlled economy to a market-based system and its higher education sector continues to undergo considerable investments and change, the role of technical colleges in Chinese society and the labor market is continually evolving. Here we consider two contextual factors that need to be included in discussions about the employability of students in Chinese technical colleges.
The first issue that we highlight is that of inequality, as broad-access technical colleges are widely viewed as playing an important role in social mobility. This is salient here because China is experiencing rising income inequality, with only 1% of Chinese households owning a third of the nation’s wealth (Wildau & Mitchell, 2016). Thus, a central question facing policy makers and technical college educators in China is what role do technical colleges play in contributing to social mobility and inequality? This question must be asked because education is not always beneficial to student prospects, as many graduate with debt and no credentials, thereby worsening their prospects and potentially exacerbating inequality (Schudde & Goldrick-Rab, 2015). Future study should expand upon the sizable research on cost and accessibility in U.S. technical colleges to investigate these issues in the Chinese context.
Another important issue is the long-standing cultural bias in China favoring white- over blue-collar work. This societal preference raises questions about the role of cultural norms and expectations in young people’s career decision making. Given the possibility that China is experiencing a glut of 4-year graduates in an economy no longer creating high-skill and high-wage jobs at a rapid rate (Hancock, 2017), it is not unlikely that the Chinese version of the College for All movement is increasingly at odds with the realities of the labor market. These issues raise questions about the relationship between industrial and postsecondary policy, and the prospect that students’ career trajectories are shaped by a combination of rational considerations of the labor market as well as deeply held cultural norms about the nature of work.
Ultimately, we argue that while a focus on systemic reforms in how community and technical colleges are structured with respect to students’ academic and career pathways is necessary (Bailey, Jaggars, & Jenkins, 2015), initiatives and research programs that are focused on curricular and programmatic pathways alone overlook the social, cultural, economic, and political forces inherent in the complex phenomena of student employability. In particular, what is often missing from debates about guided pathways and structural reform, in both the United States and China, is the recognition of classroom pedagogy as a critical venue where students acquire noncognitive skills and of the role that employers play in shaping students’ labor market outcomes. Placing the onus for student employability solely on postsecondary institutions, which is based on the long-standing and misguided notion that education is both the cause and the solution to economic and social problems (Grubb & Lazerson, 2005), is an exceedingly short-sighted approach (Tomlinson, 2012). This state of affairs is due in part to the privileging of employer and labor market needs in dominant narratives or frames about the purposes of higher education, and we call for a shift in emphasis and voice that takes a broader view while also considering the needs of students, educators, and society itself.
Finally, in considering the complex issues facing national postsecondary systems and labor markets, we also argue that framing the problem as a competition between nations, a zero-sum game where either the United States or China is the winner is counterproductive. While we do not naively overlook the inherently competitive nature of science and industry in the global marketplace, there exist points of common interest where a spirit of collaboration (at least among communities of educators) is warranted. Consider the global need for students to not only be competitive in the 21st century labor market, but also critical thinkers and civic-minded individuals who can pursue truth, knowledge, and equity for all citizens. Toward this end, educational innovators in both nations are seeking ways to instill active learning throughout the curriculum and to integrate the liberal arts tradition with training in technical skills. The narrowing of the curriculum via a focus only on jobs and cognitive skills is thus not only inimical for students’ prospects in the labor market, but also for societies where civic engagement and critical thinking are sorely needed.
Footnotes
Acknowledgements
The authors would like to thank the administration, faculty, and students at ECTC for being such gracious hosts and for making this research possible.
Declaration of Conflicting Interests
The authors declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.
Funding
The authors disclosed receipt of the following financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article: Funding for this project was provided by the Graduate School of the University of Wisconsin–Madison.
