Synergy for success: How to better develop vocational and professional education and training in Hong Kong?

Since the introduction of Vocational and Professional Education and Training (VPET) in 2014, new policies and measures have been implemented to provide students with a more diversified articulation pathway for their post-secondary development. However, the effectiveness of VPET still remains vague with some previously reported issues to be solved. Therefore, this paper aims to offer a critical review and evaluation of the development of VPET in Hong Kong, with the support of qualitative data from the in-depth interviews. We found that VPET is still constrained by various social and institutional factors, so more careful planning and adjustment should be done to better address the needs of students. By the end, this paper offers some recommendations in view of the difficulties faced by VPET now. We consider that a better synergy of different VPET components and a connection with Career and Life Planning Education (CLPE) are needed, while streaming of study might be one of the possible future directions for VPET development. Copyright © 2020 Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd.