Competencies of technical-vocational teachers of the College of Education : Bases for comprehensive training program

The Bulacan State University evolved from being a school of arts and trades before becoming a state university as it is now. The university charter mandates that the institution shall provide higher technical education primarily to the people of the province of Bulacan and its neighboring provinces. Bulacan State University is known in producing highly skilled graduates in terms of garments technology, food technology, cosmetology, building technology and other technical vocational areas that was because faculty members then where experts of a specialized field. When a paradigm shift in the education system took place, teachers of technical vocational education became jack of all trade because they were mostly graduates of a major known as technology and livelihood education. As a result when referring to specialized set of competency standards set by Technical Skills Development Authority (TESDA) many teachers lack the needed competency. With the retirement of many specialized teachers of Bulacan State University what were left to teach were teachers who where actually graduates of Technology and Livelihood Education. Since TESDA has provided competencies based on the international standard the researcher would like to find out if the level of competencies of the incumbent teachers as regard to the competencies set by Technical Skills Development Authority (TESDA). These competencies were pertaining to those defined by TESDA in each of each test packages being used in assessment for the issuance of National Certification I-IV. The instrument developed made used of the competencies identified by Technical Education Skills Development Authority (TESDA). Research instrument was duly evaluated and validated by experts in the field of technical-vocational education. Respondents of the study were all technical vocational teachers of Bulacan State University from the college of education including laboratory high school. Data gathered were tallied, tabulated using frequency, percentage and weighted mean. Result indicated that majority of the technicalvocational teachers were moderately competent in the various competencies identified by TESDA as indicated by the overall weighted mean of 2.73. Technical – vocational education faculty members of the university is ready for the shift of the Philippine education system but further training is highly suggested. As a result an intervention program in form of training will be the output of this research.


INTRODUCTION
Technical-vocational education is not new in Bulacan State University since its humble beginning was from being a school of arts and trades until becoming a state university.The university then produced highly skilled graduates in technician education because teachers then were graduates of specialized fields like cosmetology, woodworking, electronics, automotive, drafting, welding, plumbing and many others.However, due to the changes in educational system the university's teachers became mostly graduates of technology and livelihood education.
The course does not prepare graduates to become expert in one area but rather students under it has to take various subjects making the graduate jack of all trade instead of concentrating on one area.Due to retirement of many expert teachers, most of the teachers handling technical-vocational educational subjects were no longer expert in one particular area since they had to pass through all areas of technology and livelihood education.With this observation the researcher conducted the study to find out what is the level of competency of technicalvocational teachers of the college of education based on the competencies set by TESDA.
K to 12 curriculum has technical-vocational track and therefore those teachers handling the subjects in said track must be experts or specialist.
In the K to 12 curriculum, the students of grade 7 will have to pass through all four (4) areas of technology and livelihood education but need to concentrate in one area once they reached grade 9. From grade 9 to grade 12 the student will focus on studying only one area of the technical vocational track.Since the students will undergo comprehensive training in one area of technicalvocational track, after graduation they may be given a chance to be recognized as technician or professionals in other country.
The same applies to Bachelor of Technical Teacher Education since they will teaching specialized field it is but ideal that teachers handling their major subjects be experts as well.
In line with this, teachers handling the Bachelor of Technical Teacher Education and technical-vocational subjects in the laboratory high school should gear up to meet international standards.Technical-vocational teachers need to take the national certification program ofTechnical Education Skills and Development Authority (TESDA) for them to be qualified to teach the various technical vocational subjects under the Bachelor of Technical Teacher Education program.

Statement of the problem
The general problem of the study is: How may the competencies Technical-Vocational Education faculty members of the college of education of Bulacan State University be assessed as bases for comprehensive training?
Specifically, the study seeks to answer the following question: 1. How may the faculty members' profile be described in terms of the following: 1.1 educational background and; 1.2 field of specialization?2. How may the competencies of Technical Vocational Education teachers be measured based on the National Certification criteria?
2.1 Agri-Fishery; The result of this study is believed to be beneficial to the following: The results of this research will be beneficial to the technical-vocational faculty members since they will be given an assessment activity that will gauge their level of competencies in the different areas of the technicalvocational tracks.
This will give an idea to the administrators what type of training should be conducted to prepare the faculty members towards the requirements of the National Certifications which is a requirement of the Philippine Qualifications Framework.Result will also be used as basis for budget allocation in the professional development of the faculty members.
Should there be another research to be conducted along technical-vocational education, the researcher suggests that other aspects not included in this study be given attention by future researchers.
Respondents of the study were all seventeen (17) technical-vocational education teachers of the college of education including laboratory high school.

Competency
(mistakenly popularly known as Competence) is a standardized requirement for an individual to perform a specific job properly.According to Wikipedia (2016), competence encompasses a combination of knowledge, skills, and behavior utilized to improve performance.More generally, competency is the state or quality of being adequately or well-qualified, having the abilityto perform a specific role.
For instance, management competency includes the traits of systems thinking and emotional intelligence, and skills in influence and negotiation.A person possesses a competency as long as the skills, abilities and knowledge that constitute that competency is a part of that person, enabling the person to perform effective action within a certain workplace environment.Therefore, one might not lose knowledge, a skill, or an ability, but still lose a competency if what is needed to do a job well changes.
According to Wikipedia (2016), competency is also used to work with more general descriptions of the requirements of human beings in organizations and communities.Examples are education and other organizations that want to have a general language to tell what a graduate of an education must be able to do in order to graduate or what a member of an organization is required to be able to do in order to be considered competent.An important detail of this approach is that all competencies have to be action competencies, which means that a person shows in action that that person is competent.In the military, the training system for this kind of competency is called artificial experience, which is the basis for all simulators.
Furthermore, Wikipedia (2016) cited that competency is shown in action in a situation and context that might be different the next time a person has to act.In emergency contexts, competent people will react to the situation following behaviors they have previously found to succeed, hopefully to good effect.To be competent, a person needs to be able to interpret the situation in the context and to have a repertoire of possible actions to take and have trained in the possible actions in the repertoire, if this is relevant.Regardless of training, competency grows through experience and the extent of an individual to learn and adapt.
However, there has been much discussion among academics about the issue of definitions.The concept of competency has different meanings, and continues to remain one of the most diffused terms in the management development sector, and the organizational and occupational literature.
Competencies have been prepared in order to determine real working conditions which may have different degrees of complexity, variety, and autonomy.Such degrees represent the different levels of competency required for the performance of a job.
Within the competency standardization and certification system of the United Kingdom, levels have been structured after the analysis of productive functions.The objective was to define a reference framework which could be broad enough to maintain the sense of flexibility and keep individuals' possibilities of transferring their competencies to new labour contexts.
The definition of levels of competency is considered within the structure of standardized systems of labour competency certification.By using this structure, it is feasible to view the possibilities of promotion and transfer among different qualifications.Boahin (2018) the term 'competence' and 'competency' are confused in the literature and defined from several viewpoints from different researchers.Most of these definitions are centred around "descriptions of work tasks", that is; what a person has to do in a job and "description of behaviour" i.e; how a person does their Villanueva 205 job.Furthermore he cited that competence is the ability based on work task' and competency(ies) as ability based on behaviour (Whiddett and Hollyforde, 2003).Meanwhile, he further cited the statement of Armstrong ( 2005) that argues that while competency is a personrelated concept, competence is a work-related concept.Supporting the argument, Kouwenhoven (2003) said that 'Competency' is the capability to apply an integrated combination of knowledge, skills and attitudes to perform a task in a given context whilst competence connotes the capacity to accomplish 'up to standard' the key occupational tasks that characterise a profession.Simply put, competences are usually role or job-specific while competencies can cover a wide range of different jobs ((Whiddett and Hollyforde, 2003).It can deduced from the foregoing that competency defines the necessary knowledge, skills, experience and attributes to carry out specific function effectively whilst competence connotes the capability to effectively perform a given task at both individual and organisational levels using required skills, traits, characteristics and behaviours.Furthermore Boahin emphasized that in recent times, the economy of every nation needs adaptable and flexible workers, supervisor, trainers, bureaucrats and managers.Therefore, the need for routine, technical task skills is declining and that economic aims of every nations are becoming more strategically focused with holistic work approach.Many progressive employers are recognising that the narrow specific approaches to job training are far from adequate to meet their future strategic needs.Competence therefore should be described in general terms as being able to perform whole work roles rather than just specific skills and tasks to the standards expected in employment in real working environments.It must be emphasized that acquiring and developing competences is more than learning a set of skills (Kouwenhoven, 2009).
Meanwhile Wahha (retrieved 9/20/2018) discussed in his article that competency is defined as the individual's ability to use, apply and demonstrate a group of related awareness, knowledge, skills and attitudes in order to perform tasks and duties successfully and which can be measured against well-accepted standards (levels) required in employment as well as assessed against provided evidences at work location.The competency affects both individual's job responsibility and performance on the job and usually fall into two categories, namely technical and behavioral.According to him, the key aspects of the definition of competency are: (1) any job / occupation can be effectively and sufficiently described in terms of the tasks that successful workers in that occupation perform, (2) all tasks have direct implications for the awareness, knowledge, skills, and attitudes, (3) competencies that workers / trainees must acquire in order to perform the tasks correctly, (4) assessment is made on how the individual is actually performing work, (5) an individual is incompetent no matter how much knowledge he has, as long as he can't apply his knowledge and skills appropriately at work location, (6) the assessment must be objective by conducting it against defined Competency Standards (Levels).
The definition of competency implies a more formal, objective process of assessing performance by clearly knowing what is being assessed and how it is assessed.This approach is quite different than most of the past performance assessment practices utilized in the industry.
Wahha further reiterated that one of the most important and significant developments in the Technical Vocation Education and Training (TVET), was the development of Competence Based Standards to support the design of training programmes and curricula.According to Wahha the instrument developed to enable this change is the concept of an occupational or educational 'standard (level)'.The standard elaborates the level of competence required to perform successfully in an occupation and that description is used, in turn, to develop a closely aligned curriculum.

RESEARCH METHODS
This study employs the descriptive survey method of research.It is the most popular method of gathering data or information through the use of questionnaires, unstructured interview and observations.
Research questionnaire was the main tool used in data gathering for this study.A research questionnaire was prepared and used in gathering information from the respondents.One set of questionnaire was answered by the technical-vocational teacher-respondents.Research instruments were taken from the competencies identified by Technical Education Skills and Development Authority (TESDA).After the research instrument was drafted, the instrument was validated by five (5) experts technicalvocational and an expert in statistics and research writing to make the instrument more credible.
The questionnaire for technical-vocational teachers had two (2) parts.
Part I covered the profile of the faculty respondents, such as age, gender, length of teaching experience, relevant trainings and seminars and field of specialization.
Part II covered the technical-vocational teachers' level of competencies in the various areas like animal production, horticulture, garments technology, beauty care (nail care), bread and pastry production, consumer electronics servicing, drafting technology, woodworking, auto servicing and bookkeeping.
Respondents were all seventeen (17) technicalvocational teachers of the college of education including laboratory high school.
In taking initial data like the population of technical-Afr Educ Res J 206 vocational teachers the data from the office of the Dean was used.Permission to conduct the study was sourced from the college Dean.Once approved, the questionnaires were distributed personally to all seventeen (17) teacher respondents.
For the profile of the technical-vocational teachers' respondents the frequency and percentage were used to describe the data.In gauging the level of competencies of technical-vocational education teachers the weighted mean was used.
The scale in Table 1 served as guide in identifying the level of competencies of the technical-vocational education teachers.

RESULTS AND DISCUSSION
In terms of the educational qualification most the respondents were masters degree holder as indicated in the frequency of 9 or 52.94% while the bachelor's degree and doctoral degree both posted a frequency of 4 or 23.52% and most of the respondents were of various majors like garments technology with frequency of 2 or 11.76%, food technology 3 or 17.64%, drafting technology with 4 or 23.52%, electronics/electrical with 2 or 11.76%, work education with 2 or 11.76%, technology and livelihood education with 3 or 17.64 and cosmetology with 1 or 5.8% (Table 2).In animal production, the item that registered the lowest is item number 12 which asked about competency in selection and management of goats and sheep with a weighted mean of 2.35 moderately competent while the highest is competency in the selection and use of farm tools with a weighted mean of 2.76 also moderately competent which resulted to the grand mean of 2.59 interpreted as moderately competent (Table 3).The result opposes the competency stated in the Arkansas Teaching Standard for Teachers of Agriculture for grades 7-12 which stated that teachers of agriculture should have the ability to classify, evaluate, and select animals based on anatomical and physiological characteristics.Though the standard cited was not on the Philippine context it is believed that teachers competencies in agriculture be at par with other countries.
In the area of horticulture, the lowest mean were recorded to the competencies in performing preventive For garments technology, the teachers perceived that their competency with the highest weighted mean were identifying tools and equipment and obtaining measurements both got 3.53 with a verbal interpretation of competent and the competency they perceived to be  5).
In the area of nail care, the competency with the lowest mean was creating basic nail design as shown in the mean of 3.29 equivalent to moderately competent and the competency with the highest mean were the competencies in terms of using and storing of nail care tools both registered a mean of 3.53 equivalent to competent (Table 6).The grand mean of 3.43 which is moderately competent.
For bread and pastry production the competency was the practice safe and hygienic handling, storage and disposal of food, beverage and materials with a mean of 3.24 and the competency with the lowest mean was on producing accurate and complete data according to the requirements as registered in the mean of 2.59 interpreted to be moderately complete.Moderately competent was the grand mean as shown in the mean of 2.94 (Table 7).
For the area of consumer electronics servicing, the area with the lowest registered mean was competency in interpreting technical drawing with a weighted mean of 2.06 and the competency with the highest mean was preparing hand tools as indicated in the mean of 2.47 with the verbal interpretation of moderately competent and with a grand mean of 2.3 (Table 8).The result supports the study of Chedi (2015) that there are difficulties faced by both learner and teacher of technical drawing and especially in the teaching and learning situation.Furthermore he cited that there is problem in visualization in the teaching of technical drawing.
In the field of drafting technology, the competency with highest mean was carrying out measurements and calculations as revealed in the mean of 3.0 equivalent to moderately competent and the lowest competency was ability to interpret drawings and plans with a mean of 2.71.The grand mean was recorded to be 2.84 moderately competent (Table 9).Garmendia (2007) in his paper titled "First-year engineering students' difficulties in visualization and drawing tasks cited in one of his findings that visualizing parts, meaning interpreting the views of an object which has been represented in a drawing", is a fundamental skill in engineering.He further stated, learning deficiencies and difficulties have been observed among engineering undergraduates, and there is a high failure rate in drawing courses.
For woodworking area (Table 10), a weighted mean of 2.94 moderately competent was registered at the  machines, materials and layout finishes and finishing, furniture structure, introductory furniture design production estimation, shop layout and management, and mold engineering the cabinet making/interior.In terms of auto servicing, the area with the highest mean were competencies on disposing waste and used materials and reporting of damaged tools and equipment both registered a mean of 2.41 on the other hand the competencies with the lowest means were maintaining measuring instruments, identify/ access manuals and interpret data and specification and apply information accessed in manual all registered a mean of 2.12 equivalent to slightly competent (Table 11).The grand mean for this area is 2.24 Slightly Competent.
Meanwhile for Table 12, area of bookkeeping, the competency that recorded the highest mean was maintain quality of own performance with a rating of 2.41 interpreted as slightly competent and the competency

Table 2 .
Profile of the respondents.

Table 3 .
Weighted mean for competency in Agriculture.

Table 4 .
Weighted mean as competency in horticulture.

Table 5 .
Weighted mean as competency in garments technology.

Table 6 .
Weighted mean as to competency in nail care.

Table 7 .
Weighted mean as to competency in bread and pastry.
competency pertaining to identifying materials and tools applicable to a specific job meanwhile the lowest mean was posted in the competency on identifying access, and interpret specification and manuals with a mean of 2.59 equivalent to moderately competent.The grand mean was 2.81 moderately competent.Such finding supports the study of Shih (1993) titled "A comparison of competencies required by the woodworking industry and those taught in industrial vocational senior high schools, as perceived by former students and teachers of woodworking in Taiwan, Republic of China" revealed that woodworking skills should include engineering drawing, woodworking drafting, and computer applications; and woodworking knowledge, viz., woodworking tools and

Table 11 .
Weighted mean as to competency in auto-servicing.

Table 12 .
Weighted mean as to competency in entrepreneurship.