KRIVET President: "Responding to Industrial Transformation and Demographic Changes... We Will Develop New Technology-Based Evaluation Standards" [Interview]

KRIVET Marks 10th Anniversary
Expands Support Role Through Consulting
Certification Deferral Rate Drops from Over 50% to 6%
Increased Weighting for Middle-Aged Trainee Outcomes

The Korea Research Institute for Vocational Education and Training (KRIVET) is celebrating its 10th anniversary. Over the past decade, KRIVET has enhanced its assessment and evaluation processes by applying new technologies such as artificial intelligence (AI) and big data, thereby increasing efficiency. By expanding its consulting business, the institute has broadened its role from merely acting as a regulatory body to providing support as well. Looking ahead, KRIVET plans to develop vocational training evaluation standards centered on new technologies and introduce digital evaluation methods to respond to future industrial transformation and demographic changes.

Lee Janghee, President of the Korea Research Institute for Vocational Education and Training, is being interviewed by Asia Economy on the 18th at his office in Toegye-ro, Seoul.

Asia Economy met with Lee Janghee, President of KRIVET, at the institute’s office in Jung-gu, Seoul on the 18th to discuss the achievements and challenges of the past decade, as well as future goals. Since July of last year, Lee has been leading KRIVET and is also a professor in the Department of Industrial Management at Korea University of Technology and Education, to which KRIVET is affiliated. Previously, he worked for 10 years in the semiconductor division at Samsung Electronics, gaining extensive field experience. Since 2002, he has been dedicated to nurturing practical talent at Korea University of Technology and Education.

―Could you introduce KRIVET?

▲KRIVET is an institute that conducts assessments and evaluations to ensure the quality of vocational competency development training for the public. Since its establishment in April 2015, it has been committed to enhancing training quality and protecting trainees through rigorous and fair evaluations, thereby contributing to the development of national human resources. Training institutions and programs that pass KRIVET’s assessments are able to offer high-quality vocational training opportunities through various channels, including the Ministry of Employment and Labor’s “Tomorrow Learning Card.”

―This year marks the 10th anniversary of the institute. How has it changed over the years?

▲Through quality-focused assessments, the proportion of institutions with deferred certification, which once exceeded 50%, has been reduced to the 6% range. The proportion of excellent institutions has increased from 6.7% to 13%. The adoption of cutting-edge technologies such as AI and big data has further improved quality and operational efficiency. With a big data-based fraud pattern analysis and supervision system, the rate of irregularities in training dropped sharply from 2.44% in 2015 to 0.46% last year. Last year, KRIVET’s budget was one-fourth that of its Australian counterpart, the Australian Skills Quality Authority (ASQA), yet the number of assessments conducted per staff member was 2.7 times higher.

―KRIVET has recently placed emphasis on consulting in addition to its core function of evaluating training institutions. What prompted this shift?

▲After the COVID-19 pandemic, changes in training methods led us to begin consulting to support blended online and offline training. As we developed our consulting framework, we launched the “Training Institution Advancement Consulting” program in 2023 to support overall operations and management. The results have been positive. Assessments of participating institutions before and after consulting last year showed that the scores of new institutions rose from 3.68 to 4.40. The consulting business plays a vital role in driving substantial growth and innovation in training institutions, going beyond simple support.

Lee Janghee, President of the Korea Research Institute for Vocational Education and Training, is being interviewed by Asia Economy on the 18th at his office in Toegye-ro, Seoul.

―What types of vocational training are seeing increased demand recently? Are there differences in preferences by age group?

▲As the need to strengthen digital competencies grows, demand for K-Digital Training and K-Digital Basic Competency Training has surged. K-Digital Training is a customized, hands-on program designed and operated directly by companies. Interest among young people is particularly high, with 80% of all trainees in their 20s. K-Digital Basic Competency Training is in high demand across all age groups, with especially rapid growth among those aged 50 and older. Each year, about 40,000 middle-aged and older adults benefit from this training to help with reemployment.

―Amid the aging trend, it is said that many middle-aged workers retire before the official retirement age. Supporting their reemployment seems important.

▲We provide higher weighted scores for the reemployment outcomes of trainees aged 40 and above to encourage training institutions to actively participate. Notably, starting this year, the weighting for each middle-aged trainee who finds employment after completing training has been raised from 1.2 to 1.3. Through the aforementioned K-Digital Basic Competency Training, we are also supporting improvements in digital literacy among middle-aged and older adults.

―What are KRIVET’s future plans?

▲We plan to further advance our assessment and evaluation models in line with government policies and strengthen industry-academia-research collaboration systems. In addition, we aim to streamline and optimize our assessment processes using robotic process automation (RPA) and cloud technologies. To respond to future industrial transformation and demographic changes, we will develop vocational training evaluation standards focused on new technologies such as AI and introduce digital evaluation methods.

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.