In many countries vocational education is the second or third choice career path, as parents usually do their utmost to send their children to university. However, the economy needs well-qualified skilled workers too. The basic idea of the Programme Reform of TVET in Vietnam is to bring vocational education out of the shade, make it attractive and give young people a closer understanding of vocational education.

Photography exhibitions have been used to initiate discussions on the quality of vocational education among teaching staff, school management, policy makers and parents. The Vietnamese government has set itself a major target: to increase the number of skilled workers from 32.2 per cent to 55 per cent by 2020. After all, highly qualified workers are essential if the country is to achieve its ambition of becoming a modern industrialised nation by 2020. Our Vietnamese-German vocational education programme is exploring further culture-specific approaches to attain the requisite improvements in the quality and image of vocational training.