Let’s stop comparing vocational and academic education – they’re not meant to be the same

The following article was originally published by FE Week on Wednesday 9 July 2025.

There’s one unhelpful habit we just can’t seem to break in British education: the constant comparison between academic and vocational pathways.

Most of us could easily name a few GCSE subjects – English, History, RE. The same goes for A Levels. And while degree titles are a little more complex, they still offer a broad sense of what’s involved. Ask any person on the street and most will give you a recognisable summation of said subject.

These qualifications are familiar. The ‘General Qualification’ or, academic journey is, by and large, linear: school, then sixth form or college, then university. It’s a well-trodden route, with a well-known, single door to higher education in the form of UCAS. It’s neat, tidy and widely understood because most people have been through at least part of it.

Now look at that journey through the lens of vocational and technical education. How many occupations are there in the UK? In the NHS alone, there are over 350 – many of which even seasoned professionals might struggle to define. What does a phlebotomist do? A clinical coder?

Multiply that complexity across every sector in the labour market. It’s vast, it’s complex, and even when you think you understand an occupation, it’s likely changed. The labour market is constantly evolving, therefore qualifications must too. If academic qualifications are to evolve at the pace of a gently flowing stream, then vocational and technical qualifications should move like a raging torrent – simply put, because the labour market does too!

Unlike the academic route, the vocational landscape, by its very nature, doesn’t have a single path with a clearly marked entrance. It’s a sprawling network of routes, job roles and specialisms - and for good reason. The modern labour market demands both breadth and depth. It must embrace talent and potential wherever it can be found, therefore there are many paths and doorways to jobs and better jobs.

Some roles are hyper-specialised, requiring individuals to master a single, focused skill set. Others, particularly in SMEs, often demand versatility; from multi-skilling across different technical disciplines to the extremes of the sole trader, who may, for example, need to do some basic accounting and sales and marketing, as well as mastering their chosen profession.

So, when people talk about simplifying vocational education, making it ‘more like academic education’, they’re often missing the point entirely, and more often lack the understanding of a dynamically changing economy and labour market. Edward De Bono said it best, ‘Simplicity before understanding is simplistic; simplicity after understanding is simple’.

The age-old ‘can’t vocational and technical qualifications just be a bit more like GCSE’s and A Levels’, isn’t just a tired trope; it’s deeply flawed and risks undermining the very essence of what vocational and technical education should be.

The labour market isn’t simple. The qualifications that feed into it cannot be boiled down to a handful, if they are to deliver the promise of opportunity and growth, for all. To simply reduce the complexity is to ignore the reality of what employers need and how learners must be equipped.

Simplification alone is not the answer. As a wise boss once told me, ‘One person's simplification, is simply another person's lacking in important detail’. So, ’What should a system that is optimised for coherence and high quality look like?’, is the exam question that we should be asking ourselves. And it is this very coherence that will help learners and employers to navigate the complexity, simply. With ‘high quality’ delivering the requisite trust and confidence.

Skills supply must keep pace with the labour market. When my sons take their GCSEs three years apart, I wouldn’t be overly comfortable if the content changed radically, and for good reason. But if they were both to take the same apprenticeship three years apart, the idea that nothing would have changed is frankly ludicrous. But this is our current reality, and it must change.

I’ve long felt that comparing vocational and academic education is in some ways like comparing my two sons. One a natural sportsman; the other has to work at it. One is naturally academic (i.e. good at remembering information and regurgitating it in written and verbal form), the other needs to study hard and often needs to learn in a few different ways before things really sink in. One follows the rules; the other challenges them without hesitation.

Would I ever say one is better than the other? Absolutely not. They’re different – and that difference is what makes them brilliant in their own way. Do I hold one or the other in higher esteem? No, I love them for their differences, because that is what makes them who they are!

It’s the same with education pathways. Different doesn’t mean unequal.

’Different’ not equating to better or worse is true of assessments, too. Too many still see written exams as the gold standard of assessment. Ironic that we don’t think this for the driving test, yet this glaringly obvious fact has become increasingly obfuscated by our years of ‘simplification’. Written examinations are absolutely right for some disciplines or situations, but they are deeply inadequate for others.

Upon hiring a chef, I’m not sure that many would want to read their written essay on sauce-making or sourcing ingredients. Maybe trying their culinary delights would work best. Practical skills need practical assessments. Isn’t this obvious? It’s hard to see that the push towards this supposed ‘gold standard’ is driven by anything other than academic elitism, not real-world relevance. And all our Skills policy could do with a good seasoning of real-world relevance.

All this said, it is true to say that employers want simplicity, but this does not mean the qualifications themselves. Yes, a good tidy is in order and maybe a greater degree of standardising the labels that we use on the ‘tin’ of the qualifications would help. However, what employers are really calling for is clarity and certainty in policy, funding, eligibility, provision and pathways. A system that makes sense, that’s joined up.

Why don't T Levels fit neatly with Apprenticeships or Higher Technical Qualifications? Why are English and maths seemingly crucial to underpinning competence in an Apprenticeship at 16-18 but, not at 19+? Why do Bootcamps offer huge flexibility, yet other vocational provision is prescribed in fine detail? Could devolution become a ‘post code lottery’ for employers and learners alike?

There are, of course, answers to these questions, but they fall short of describing a coherent system. Without coherence, simplicity is simply a dream - one we’ve had for 20 years, or more. And this is what we need to fix.

So, let’s move away from comparisons and simplification, without full understanding. Instead, let’s work towards a system that’s coherent, high quality, responsive and empowering. One that gives real agency to learners and employers alike.

Our UK vocational and technical education doesn’t need to be more like academic education. It just needs to be properly understood, respected and given the latitude and resources to grow up to be the very best VTQ system in the world! Simple.