Determination of professional Qualifications of high school graduates working in the knitting industry and a program model based on the qualifications

This research aims to prepare an education program model for knitting section at the level of vocational high schools. The medium of the research is formed by the thirty-two middle- and large- scale knitting factories, which are registered to the chambers of industry, and are located in the city centers of Ankara and Istanbul. Before samples are selected, all of these factories are included. The research is prepared based on the opinions of the specialists. In the formation of knitting education program model, job analysis was applied to the specialists to determine function groups (i.e. job titles) for knitting field. To rank importance grades of the qualifications of those function groups that were determined at the end of the analysis, and for job descriptions, a questionnaire was applied to the specialists of the subject at the factories. The collected data were analyzed by using the SPSS package program. Frequency, percentage, and mean values were calculated and tabulated. The results show that majority of the professional qualifications related to the six function groups were considered "very required". The general framework of knitting education program was built according to the obtained results. Expertness education for each function branch was taken as a basis during designing the program framework; and another function branch is chosen as secondary branch. This knitting education program may be considered a certificate program to make elementary school graduates acquire job as well. It is thought that employment of the students who graduate from knitting section will be easier and they will be more successful and productive.