Mentoring Impact Evaluation on Educational Preferences and Career Choices in Bhutan

The youth unemployment rate in Bhutan became quite high during the COVID-19 pandemic. Bhutan needs skilled workforce, but the youth do not fully understand the value of learning science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM), or technical, vocational education and training (TVET) skills.

To address this issue, ADB supported a mentoring program for grade 12 students to promote skills development by engaging TVET students as mentors. In 2021, ADB also engaged grade 10 students to pursue science stream by engaging university students who were studying STEM. This mentoring program incorporated a randomized controlled trial design to understand the effectiveness of this intervention.

The study finds improvement in student preferences for STEM and TVET courses. This support, however, was not strong enough to make a differences in students’ final applications and enrollment in the science courses or public training centers. This is likely because the preparation time was not sufficient to improve the score on high stakes examination. The frequency of the mentor meeting could be increased in the future. 

Transcript

During the COVID-19 pandemic, youth unemployment rate in Bhutan reached 28.6% in 2021. Bhutan needs skilled workforce for economic diversification through private sector development. However, Bhutanese youth do not fully understand the value of learning science, engineering, technology and maths (STEM) or vocational skills. For example, women aged 28 to 34 who graduated from Technical Training Institute (TTI) or Institute of Zorig Chusum (IZC), earned similar wages to women of the same age with a bachelors degree in Arts, Humanities, and Social Sciences.

Sonomi Tanaka
Country Director, Bhutan Resident Mission
Asian Development Bank

To address this issue, the Asian Development Bank supported mentoring programs for grade 12 students to promote skills development by engaging TTI and IZC students as mentors. ADB also engaged grade 10 students to pursue science stream by engaging university students studying science, engineering, technology and math in 2021. This mentoring program incorporated a randomized controlled trial design to understand the effectiveness of this intervention.

Cheku Dorji
Lead Consultant
Kuenden Statistical Services

We conducted a baseline and endline survey to see the impact of mentoring program for grade 10 and 12 students.

Sangay Dorji
Officiating Director
Department of Workforce Planning and Skills Development
Ministry of Education and Skills Development
Royal Government of Bhutan

Among 12th graders, mentor students are more likely to select public training institutes such as technical training institutes and institute of zorig chusum among their top three educational choices.

Chendra Norbu
Project Officer
Department of School Education
Ministry of Education and Skills Development
Royal Government of Bhutan

Similarly, among 10th graders, mentored students were more than 16 percentage points more likely than non-mentored students to choose science as their first education preferences.

Mentored students are more likely to believe that science makes the world better. The effectiveness of mentoring support was also stronger when the male mentors met with the male student mentees.

Tashi Wangmo
Teacher/Mentor
Jigme Namgyel Lower Secondary School
Ministry of Education and Skills Development
Royal Government of Bhutan

There is also this positive spillover effect for students who have not been able to receive mentoring, but were studying in the same school.

Hyuncheol Bryant Kim
Associate Professor
Department of Economics
Hong Kong University of Science and Technology

While this study finds improvement in student preferences for STEM and TVET education, this mentoring support was not strong enough to make the differences in students’ final applications and enrollment in science stream or public training centers. This is likely because the preparation time was not sufficient to improve the score on high-stakes Bhutan Certificates of Secondary Education Examination. The frequency of the mentor meeting maybe need to be increased in the future.

Sonomi Tanaka
Country Director, Bhutan Resident Mission
Asian Development Bank

However, this is an important step in developing pathways for emerging skills and jobs, and ADB will continue to support these evidence based efforts.