vocationaladj.n.
/və(ʊ)ˈkeɪʃn̩(ə)l/, /və(ʊ)ˈkeɪʃən(ə)l/, U.S. /voʊˈkeɪʃ(ə)nəl/ A. adj.
1. Of or relating to a religious vocation or other calling.
ΘΚΠ
society > faith > worship > sacrament > order > vocation > [adjective]
called1538
vocational1652
society > occupation and work > [adjective] > relating to vocation
vocationala1732
1652 J. Gaule Πυς-μαντια 204 It [sc. prophecy] was a gift or grace, not so much personal, as vocational: pertaining not to ordinary duty so much, as extraordinary occasion.
a1732 T. Boston Sovereignty & Wisdom of God (1737) 14 It may fall in the Vocational Part. Whatever is Mens Calling or Station in the World, be it Sacred or Civil, the Crook in their Lot may take its Place therein.
1755 D. McGregore Christian Soldier 18 They expect that a Minister should perform the whole of his vocational Labours with the utmost Exactness.
1815 Relig. Remembrancer 17 June 166/2 The same apostle, conscious of ministerial fidelity, yet not insensible to his vocational deficiencies.
1958 B. M. Cross Horace Bushnell x. 158 Now, separated from his church, he sought his vocational call in immediate revelations.
1970 J. M. Gustafson Sixties 42/1 Roman Catholic underground churches were rumored, and the vocational crisis of Roman Catholic clergy came to public attention.
2013 M. Sabine Veiled Desires iii. 126 Actual nuns have certainly testified to the influence that loving mothers and fathers had in their vocational calling.
2.
a. Of or relating to a trade or profession; concerning or involved in a person's (choice of) occupation.
ΘΚΠ
society > occupation and work > [adjective] > of occupational or professional matters
vocational1665
shoppy1840
1665 E. Waterhouse Gentlemans Monitor viii. 71 The present Greatness and Wealth of England owes much to Vocational Improvements.
1846 Huron Reflector (Norwalk, Ohio) 28 July The object of the writer is to trace the influence of the great laws of nature on..agriculture, commerce, the mechanic arts, and other vocational pursuits.
1865 Athenæum 27 May 715/3 With these appear the Tilewrights, a vocational name of Saxon Origin, and the Mayers.
1875 W. D. Whitney Life & Growth Lang. ix. 159 The classes, whether social, vocational, or educational.
1927 W. E. Collinson Contemp. Eng. 106 The enlistment of the psychologist's help for vocational guidance.
1989 M. Beattie Beyond Codependency iii. x. 110 I was driving to an appointment I had at a local college with a vocational counselor.
2006 Austral. Financial Rev. (Nexis) 6 Mar. 5 Measures are likely to be announced to improve vocational advice in schools.
b. spec. Of education or training: focused on preparing students for a particular (esp. manual or technical) occupation and teaching them the necessary skills. Hence also of institutions, students, etc., involved in education or training of this type. Frequently contrasted with academic.
ΚΠ
1902 Boston Globe 8 Aug. 7/3 ‘Vocational Training’ was the topic of Supt of Schools Louis P Nash of Holyoke.
1909 Pearson's Mag. Jan. 18/2 Hard-pressed parents will make an effort to keep their children in training longer for the sake of the higher wages and greater opportunities for promotion ensured by vocational education.
1917 Hist. Teacher's Mag. Mar. 98/1 I believe it much better to keep the continuity and richness of the four years' course intact, and let the vocational student take what he can of it.
1920 Radcliffe News (Cambridge, Mass.) 15 Oct. 6/2 Radcliffe College is not a vocational college.
1958 Life 14 Apr. 121/2 Comprehensive high schools are large and offer a wide range of academic and vocational subjects to their students.
1977 New Statesman 2 Sept. 294/3 The IBA is attracted to the..Open College concept—courses in numeracy and literacy, vocational training for school-leavers, and other forms of further education.
2003 Daily Tel. 13 Nov. 9/2 Students either attend sixth-form colleges dedicated to A-levels, or further education colleges that offer academic exams alongside vocational qualifications.
c. Sociology. Designating a category of university and college students who view their studies primarily as a means to obtain a desirable job or enter a particular profession (see sense B. 3); (of a student) belonging to this category.This use originated with the sociologists Burton Clark and Martin Trow, who in their paper Determinants of College Student Subculture (1960) analysed university and college students in terms of four subcultures: the vocational, the collegiate, the academic, and the nonconformist (see quot. 1960). Other writers have subsequently used vocational in this way in discussions or applications of Clark and Trow's analysis.
ΚΠ
1960 B. R. Clark & M. Trow Determinants of College Student Subculture (California State Univ.: Gerth Arch. & Special Coll.) 13 The sober..demands of the Cold War..are having the effect of strengthening the academic and especially the vocational cultures, while reducing the prestige and appeal of the collegiate.
1963 School Rev. 71 276 Upper-class students will tend to be found in the academic or collegiate subcultures, with few in the vocational.
1978 R. Anderson Students as Real People 1979 vi. 88 ‘Vocational’ students see college as a specialized training ground for a specific future occupation.
2004 J. J. Arnett Emerging Adulthood vi. 135 Students in the vocational subculture have a practical view of their college education.
B. n.
1. With the. Education or training which is focused on preparing students for a particular (esp. manual or technical) occupation and teaching them the necessary skills. Cf. sense A. 2b.
ΚΠ
1909 Science 12 Mar. 410/2 This introduction of the vocational into the liberal is being made possible..because the vocational is being itself permeated and transformed by the liberal.
1932 Africa 5 470 Such a syllabus is naturally a compromise, being half cultural and half vocational, putting agriculture on a higher and more cultural basis than is wont, and at the same time providing much of the vocational to make the students as practical as possible when they leave school.
1995 Brit. Jrnl. Educ. Stud. 43 172 The separation of the vocational from the educational.
2. Originally and chiefly U.S.
a. A person undergoing or receiving vocational education or training; a student on a vocational course.
ΚΠ
1916 Carlisle (Pa.) Arrow (Carlisle Indian School) 3 Mar. 3/2 The even division of the third-year vocationals have finished their final test on ‘Health and Sanitation’.
1922 O. A. C. Alumnus (Oregon State Agric. Coll. Alumni Assoc.) Jan. 6/1 The O. A. C. enrollment to date totals 3767 for the second term registration. Of this number 1110 are freshmen, 768 are sophomores, 712 are juniors, 416 are seniors, 311 are vocationals, [etc.].
1980 Phi Delta Kappan 61 579/1 When the students in shared-time centers return to their home school each day for their other course work, scheduling constraints result in many of them being virtually segregated from other students... Hence they become tracked and labeled as ‘vocationals’.
b. An institution offering or specializing in vocational education or training; a vocational school, college, etc. Also: a vocational course, qualification, etc.
ΚΠ
1932 Washington Post 16 Jan. 20/1 (heading) Junior high classification is sought for vocationals; would fill places.
1941 Catal. Spanish-Amer. Normal School 32 Any of the six vocationals may be taken by adults as full-time courses.
1960 Phi Delta Kappan 42 99/2 The report calls for minimum academic standards, on top of which can be built any pattern of electives, extracurriculars, and vocationals.
2003 N. Evans Making Sense of Lifelong Learning iii. 28 The vocational's reign was relatively undisturbed until the beginnings of ambivalence crept into the renamed Department for Education and Employment from about 1998.
3. Sociology. A member of a category of university and college students who view their studies primarily as a means to obtain a desirable job or enter a particular profession, and hence typically focus on performing well in examinations, avoid engaging with their subject beyond the requirements of the course, and rarely participate in social activities, sports, etc. Cf. sense A. 2c.This use originated with the sociologists Burton Clark and Martin Trow, who in their paper Determinants of College Student Subculture (1960) analysed university and college students in terms of four subcultures: the vocationals, the collegiates, the academics, and the nonconformists (see quot. 1960). Other writers have subsequently used vocational in this way in discussions or applications of Clark and Trow's analysis.
ΚΠ
1960 B. R. Clark & M. Trow Determinants of College Student Subculture (California State Univ.: Gerth Arch. & Special Coll.) 35 The vocationals are not interested, the collegiates care only that their social life not be too greatly hampered; academics and nonconformists, interested in ideas, may or may not be interested in student government.
1963 School Rev. 71 276 Vocationals perceive school as a means to an end that may or may not be intellectual in nature.
1979 Res. in Higher Educ. 11 245 In this study of students from Syracuse University, it appears that the dominant group is the collegiates, while the academics, vocationals, and nonconformists constitute a group which is more likely to interact with each other than with collegiates.
2004 J. J. Arnett Emerging Adulthood vi. 135 Vocationals have neither the time nor the money for the frivolous fun of the collegiate subculture.
Derivatives
voˈcationalism n. training for a particular occupation; educational emphasis on this; cf. vocationism n. at vocation n. Derivatives.
ΘΚΠ
society > education > [noun] > systematic education > systems of
university extension1839
Philanthropinism1842
Arnoldismc1845
co-education1852
Pestalozzianism1859
kindergartenism1872
secularism1872
community education1873
Froebelism1879
co-ed1886
extramuralism1892
vocationalism1901
heurism1909
sandwich1913
Montessori1917
Montessorianism1917
Juku system1931
polytechnization1932
day release1936
essentialism1939
comprehensivization1958
multitracking1989
1901 Regents Bull. (Univ. State N.Y.) 55 361 In my judgment vocationalism has no place in public secondary schools.
1924 Glasgow Herald 1 May 8/6 The primary function of education is wider than mere vocationalism.
1981 R. E. Peterson in A. W. Chickering Mod. Amer. College xiv. 321 As a basic curricular orientation, the new vocationalism of the 1970s appears to be largely a response to students' demands for marketable skills.
2005 N.Y. Rev. Bks. 12 May 32/3 Curriculums that reduce liberal arts study to grade-grubbing vocationalism.
voˈcationally adv.
ΘΚΠ
society > occupation and work > [adverb] > vocationally
vocationally1828
1828 Relig. Intelligencer (New-Haven, Conn.) 24 May 824/2 The feelings of a few, of whom he is vocationally the spiritual guide, induce them to strive by the allurements of compassion to lead to the heavenly Shepherd their little charge associated in a Sabbath School.
1890 W. C. Russell Nelson xvi. 229 The seamanship of those days, the strategies, the devices,..are no longer of the least value vocationally.
1975 Times 5 Apr. 3/3 Teachers try to capture the interests of these pupils with vocationally oriented, out-ward-looking courses.
2011 Independent 4 July (Viewspaper section) 6/5 Are we not simply producing too many so-called graduates..and too few vocationally trained young people with realistic aspirations?
This entry has been updated (OED Third Edition, September 2018; most recently modified version published online June 2022).
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adj.n.1652