Vocational Education Vocational education refers to education for a particular occupation. Industrialized countries have seen a fall in demand for unskilled workers, and an increase in jobs in the professional, technical, commercial, and administrative sector. Vocational education is traditionally associated with trades and crafts: young people were apprentice to employers for a number of years and learned on the job. Today the focus has shifted from the workplace to secondary and higher education institutions, and from employers' to government provision and finance. Trainees in most occupations combine workplace training with study at a technical or academic institution. In the former Soviet Union, school and work were always strongly linked from primary school. Germany provides nine out of ten young people not entering higher education with vocational training, and training is planned from national down to locate level through joint committees of government representatives, employers, and trade unions. In some countries, skills are being grouped and 'job families' created so that individuals can move between jobs with similar technical requirements. In others 'competency-based education' is advocated to equip individuals with 'transferable' as well as specific skills. In developing countries, where it is traditional for children to work from an early age, only a tiny proportion of students follow a formal vocational program, while the long specialist training of professionals such as doctors, lawyers, and engineers is a costly burden. Training places for technicians, nurses, teachers, and the essential workers are often limited. Worldwide, there is a slow but steady increase in the numbers of women training for occupations of influence in science, technology, law, and business. It is also becoming clear that one course of vocational education is not enough for a life time. Retraining, through continuing education is essential. Vocational education refers to education for a usual vocation.