This paper reports on a research project undertaken by researchers at Oxford University and the University of Paderborn, Germany. The project is concerned with innovation in college-based VET and has collected data in two institutional contexts: German vocational colleges (Berufsschulen) and English FE Colleges. The project is funded by the ESRC Centre on Skills, Knowledge and Occupational Performance (SKOPE). From an international point of view, reforms in vocational education and training (VET) seem to be a wide-spread and ongoing phenomenon in most European countries (Maastricht Consortium, 2004). The dynamics of change are considered as the only constant features of the information and technology driven societies. VET systems are directly affected by these dynamics and policy-makers in most European countries have reacted with reform initiatives. The envisaged improvements of VET as a result of reforms of the framework for training has become a topic in the academic discourse in a number of countries (cf. Green et al., 1999). This is to a certain degree also true for the impact of reforms on the work of teachers and lecturers in the system; and research in this area has shown the difficulties ambitious reform agendas can have for teachers and lecturers. Dubs, for instance, observed that the ‘preparedness of teaching staff to initiate innovation has significantly reduced (“not yet again something new to deal with”)’ (Dubs 2003, p. 3). This finding is particularly worrying considering the fact that reforms often require teachers and lecturers to engage in, or develop, innovative practice which transfers the aims and objectives of reforms from the political to the classroom level. Against this background, an exploratory study in Germany and England conducted by the authors aims at developing an understanding of what innovation means for lecturers at vocational colleges in practice, whether developing innovative practice is part of their professional identity and how the necessary ‘innovation competence’ can be achieved (Ertl & Kremer, 2003). In this sense, the study aims to conceptualise the field of innovation in college-based VET contexts and to open it up for further research. The paper proposed here outlines the conceptual framework of our study and discusses some of the preliminary findings in a comparative perspective. The results show, inter alia, that teachers stress the importance of innovative activities for their work. However, this importance does not seem to have been met with a corresponding level of support; in many cases teachers feel left alone with innovative tasks. They also argue that they often cannot work on innovations adequately due to time and other restrictions. However, it seems evident from our data that the way in which lecturers talk about innovation is very different in the two countries. Whereas the German lecturers are clearly used to discuss innovation and use the concept of innovation competence frequently, English lecturers emphasise more than their German counterparts the limitations for innovative practice, mainly due to time constraints, the pressures of the competitive environment FE Colleges find themselves in, and due to the ever-changing qualification programmes offered by Colleges. The more stable situation at German vocational colleges seems to allow lecturers to reflect more freely on innovative practice in general. Surprisingly similar seems to be that in both systems lecturers tend to focus their attention on subject-specific innovation rather than innovation regarding teaching and learning approaches. The study identified a range of favourable conditions for developing and implementing innovations at schools. However, a structure for the systematic development of innovative competence of teachers at vocational schools seems to be an important area for future research.

The research this paper reports on started in the German context where the researchers conducted an exploratory study into innovative competence of teachers at vocational colleges. On the basis of the experiences in and findings of this study, a comparative framework for examining similar issues in the English context was conceived. In this way, the project produces comparative data in two national contexts in order to determine in how far innovative practice is determined by the regulatory framework of national VET systems and in how far innovative processes in college-based VET contexts are generic and can be found in a similar way in different systems. The main sources of data are semi-structured interviews with teachers, lecturers and experts in the two countries. The group of experts includes teacher trainers, representatives of federal states’ education institutes, and managers of training providers. Interviews are analysed using a hermeneutically-oriented approach developed by Lamnek (1995). The interpretation of interview data is framed by the analysis of primary and secondary documents/literature.

The findings of study presented above contribute to the conceptual understanding of what represents ‘innovation’ in college-based VET contexts. The lack of a comprehensive and theorised terminological framework was one of the starting points of this research, which was partly confirmed in the literature and documentary analysis. The project makes a contribution to the conceptualization of ‘innovative competence’ as an area of professionalism of teaching staff in college-based VET. At a more practice-relevant level, the findings can contribute to a more effective inclusion of innovative work in the organizational context of vocational schools and colleges. Building on the identification of obstacles to, as well as the potential for, innovation processes in organisational structures, initial approaches to systematic ‘innovation management’ have been developed.