Similar to most countries in the world, Germany is also facing a serious and ever-increasing skills shortage. In particular, the craft and healthcare sectors are concerned with a lack of qualified workers. To give an example, the number of registered nurses that are needed to face the demographic change, is prognosed to increase about 40% within the next 15 years (German Economic Institute, 2018, p. 34). Recently, different strategies to reduce skill shortages have been developed. Some of these strategies aim at changing vocational education and training itself. For Germany, three strategies can be described: (1) increasing the permeability between vocational and higher education (see Schmees & Grunau 2019), (2) attracting young people for appropriate education and training (career orientation) or (3) recruiting qualified staff from other sectors (“lateral entry”) and/or from abroad (by migration schemes, or by recruiting refugees).

Our paper briefly introduces exemplary cases for each of the mentioned strategies (1) raising the attractiveness of vocational education and training by promoting the transferability between vocational and higher education within Lower Saxony (“Offene Hochschule Niedersachsen”), (2) validation of prior learning for unskilled workers in geriatric nursing (“Validierungsverfahren und Nachqualifizierung in der Altenpflege in Nordrhein-Westfalen – Valinda”), and (3) vocational orientation for migrants (“Berufliche Orientierung für Zugewanderte”).

With reference to Coleman’s bathtub model (Coleman 2000), we analyse these three cases individually to address the question of whether the strategies employed there can contribute to covering the skills shortage in a short, medium, and long term perspective. The three cases were selected from diverse fields and represent a convenience sample. Subsequently to the meta-analysis of each case, we compare them horizontally.

A consensus finding in all the three case studies is that the microlevel – the (future) skilled worker’s requirements and perceptions – is not considered adequately. Consequently, the individual reaction on the micro level often contradicts the idea to reduce skill shortage by these strategies. Finally, we will discuss the consequences of our results for education policy by addressing three main aspects: (1) in order to deal with problems within societies, education policies should first be designed from a micro level perspective and focus on the development of individuals’ potential. (2) Societal needs need to be considered as a second step in order to balance the individual and the societal perspective. (3) Societal problems cannot be solved by reforms of the education system alone (see e.g. Gruschka 2000) but have to be encompassed by other reforms in order to address the problem comprehensively. In our case first and foremost, labour market policy, e.g. wages, working hours, working conditions, reputation and so on, need to be considered.

Coleman, J. S. (2000). Foundations of social theory (3. Aufledition.). Cambridge, MA: The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press. German Economic Institute (2018). Fachkräfteengpass in der Altenpflege. Written by Erstellt von R. Flake, S. Kochskämper, P. Risius & S. Seyda. In: IW-Trends 3/2018. Köln. https://www.iwkoeln.de/fileadmin/user_upload/Studien/IW-Trends/PDF/2018/IW-Trends_2018-03-02_Pflegefallzahlen.pdf (12.10.2020) Gruschka, A. (2000). Vom Nutzen Allgemeiner Pädagogik. Antrittsvorlesung an der Gesamthochschule-Universität-Essen am 1.6.1995. In: Gruschka, A. (Ed.): Essener Ansprachen. 1995-2000. Essen. Schmees, J. K., & Grunau, J. (2020). Von der Ausbildung ins Studium: Trägt Durchlässigkeit zur Attraktivitätssteigerung beruflicher Bildung bei? Berufsbildung. Zeitschrift Für Theorie-Praxis-Dialog, 74(183), pp. 17–19.