My Journey: How One Major Education Reform Helped Maltese Students Focus Their Career Paths Based On Their Syllabus
The My Journey project was set up to help students aged 13-16 focus more on vocational subjects alongside their educational path. We spoke to the Head of Verdala’s Cospicua campus to find out more about the school’s involvement in the project.
Joseph Ellul, Head of School at Verdala, notes that the facility was one of the first in Malta to adopt a BTEC syllabus back in 2010.
Though this has now evolved even further into what we now know as the VET, their main focus was hospitality.
But as of this scholastic year, students have been given the chance to choose from a wider range of subjects including, but not restricted to, hairdressing and beauty, fashion and textiles, retail and media studies.
These subjects have all been added to their expansive list of available subjects that cover IT, engineering, hospitality, agribusiness and health and social care. The My Journey project allows students three options when it comes their education: the academic path which leads students into an SEC graduation at levels 2 or 3, the vocational path that leads students to SEC certification at levels 1, 2 or 3 and the vocational applied route which provides students with an applied SEC certification at levels 1, 2 and 3.
As this was a national initiative aimed at all secondary state schools, together with all senior secondary schools in the ten colleges Verdala started implementing the program in September this year.
“The main objective of My Journey is to provide our students with as many avenues of opportunities as possible,” Ellul tells us, “as we try to fulfill their aspirations and desires.”
The resources and the equipment already present help the students achieve such goals, however Ellul thinks that this alone is not enough.
“The program requires a combination of initiatives from teachers and students alike, to maximise as much as possible such opportunities that address the particular needs of our students.”
Ellul’s personal aims as the Head of School is to lead students through different paths and support them as much as possible, in order to help them succeed in life.
“As a school, we are also providing more ‘on-the-job’ opportunities, through partnerships with particular University faculties and also within the industries themselves,” evident in the case of VET subjects where students are able to visit and experience first-hand procedures of their chosen vocation.
The project also allows Verdala to offer joint programs with the AI department in the University of Malta for computing students, job shadowing programs in hotels, industrial engineering facilities and Health Centres. These programs assist students in consolidating what is being taught in classrooms and labs, ultimately leading to the application of their work within the necessary fields.