Career Colleges and Vocational Schools in Georgia
Tbilisi International School of Hotel Managment
Tbilisi, Georgia
Tbilisi International School of Hotel Managment, is dedicated to the hospitality industry. Students can earn a one-year certificate program in Hospitality Management, as well as culinary arts and others.
Career Colleges and Vocational Schools in Georgia by City:
TbilisiAbout Career Colleges and Vocational Schools in Georgia
As part of the broader education system, vocational schools and career colleges in the Republic of Georgia have seen major changes in recent years. With the end of the post-Soviet regime and the advent of a legitimate democracy in Georgia, the educational system has been the subject of sweeping reforms, including an overhaul of the system of vocational education and training. There are dozens of vocational and technical schools scattered around the country, some attached to colleges and universities, but many free-standing.
For decades, Georgia was an out-of-the-way corner of the massive Soviet Union. Its economy, government, and schools were completely dominated by central authorities in Moscow, and an absence of accountability and oversight led to rampant corruption throughout the society. In 2003, a peaceful popular uprising known as the “Rose Revolution” swept through the country and brought an end to the corrupt regime that had ruled independent Georgia for over a decade. Education and an end to corruption were the first and most salient goals of the new government, and an entirely new system of schools and training centers was founded under their leadership.
For many students in this small republic, vocational training begins at the level of secondary school. In addition to the typical academic high schools, Georgia has a number of vocational and technical schools that are accredited and in some cases administered by the Georgian government. There are also so-called “handicraft schools,” which require a 2-year apprenticeship and focus exclusively on learning a particular trade or skill. These handicraft schools are less common than vocational/technical high schools, but they are a good option for rural students in areas where formal schools are either nonexistent or unresponsive to real-world economic needs.
In addition to the handicraft schools, there are two tracks for vocational secondary education: a 2-year terminal track and a 3-year track that prepares students to go to college or continued vocational training. Students in the 3 year track take academic courses in addition to their professional skills courses, and are eligible upon graduation to take the national college admissions exam and go to any college they can get into. In practice, the majority end up in tertiary vocational schools, 3 year technical colleges that provide students with advanced job skills but do not prepare them for further study at the Master’s and Doctoral levels.
Along with an opening of the nation’s markets to a Western-style system of free enterprise (as against the centralized and heavily regulated economy the Georgia inherited from its time as part of the Soviet Union), Georgia has seen a widespread privatization of job training and vocational education. Increasingly, it is seen as the responsibility of the marketplace to provide institutions that will train people in the skills needed by various industries and sectors of the economy. These private schools are not free from regulation – the corruption of the past motivates the Georgian government to take its accreditation policies very seriously – but it does provide a measure of agility and market-relevance that a government-dominated system of job training cannot match.
For decades, Georgia was an out-of-the-way corner of the massive Soviet Union. Its economy, government, and schools were completely dominated by central authorities in Moscow, and an absence of accountability and oversight led to rampant corruption throughout the society. In 2003, a peaceful popular uprising known as the “Rose Revolution” swept through the country and brought an end to the corrupt regime that had ruled independent Georgia for over a decade. Education and an end to corruption were the first and most salient goals of the new government, and an entirely new system of schools and training centers was founded under their leadership.
For many students in this small republic, vocational training begins at the level of secondary school. In addition to the typical academic high schools, Georgia has a number of vocational and technical schools that are accredited and in some cases administered by the Georgian government. There are also so-called “handicraft schools,” which require a 2-year apprenticeship and focus exclusively on learning a particular trade or skill. These handicraft schools are less common than vocational/technical high schools, but they are a good option for rural students in areas where formal schools are either nonexistent or unresponsive to real-world economic needs.
In addition to the handicraft schools, there are two tracks for vocational secondary education: a 2-year terminal track and a 3-year track that prepares students to go to college or continued vocational training. Students in the 3 year track take academic courses in addition to their professional skills courses, and are eligible upon graduation to take the national college admissions exam and go to any college they can get into. In practice, the majority end up in tertiary vocational schools, 3 year technical colleges that provide students with advanced job skills but do not prepare them for further study at the Master’s and Doctoral levels.
Along with an opening of the nation’s markets to a Western-style system of free enterprise (as against the centralized and heavily regulated economy the Georgia inherited from its time as part of the Soviet Union), Georgia has seen a widespread privatization of job training and vocational education. Increasingly, it is seen as the responsibility of the marketplace to provide institutions that will train people in the skills needed by various industries and sectors of the economy. These private schools are not free from regulation – the corruption of the past motivates the Georgian government to take its accreditation policies very seriously – but it does provide a measure of agility and market-relevance that a government-dominated system of job training cannot match.