Institute of Technical Education

The Institute of Technical Education (Abbreviation: ITE; Chinese: 工艺教育学院) is a post-secondary institution in Singapore that provides pre-employment training to secondary school leavers and continuing education and training to working adults. Established by Ministry of Education, it was formerly known as Vocational and Industrial Training Board (VITB). ITE has three colleges that offer the National ITE Certificate (NITEC), Higher NITEC, Master NITEC and diploma programmes.

1960s to 1970s: Vocational and Industrial Training Board (VITB)
During the 1960s and 1970s, vocational training was managed by two separate statutory boards, the Adult Education Board (AEB) and the Industrial Training Board (ITB). They merged in 1979 to become the VITB. The VITB was formed to promote and develop vocational training.

1992: Institute of Technical Education (ITE)
The ITE was established as a post-secondary institution to improve the employability of vocational trainees and to restructure the VITB's programmes. The government decided that every student in Singapore had to have at least 10 years of general education, with technically inclined students filtered to the Normal (Technical) stream in secondary schools as preparation. These students would then attend the ITE after they finished secondary school education.

Student Intake
Annually, ITE takes in 25% of an annual school cohort, or an intake of about 13,000 students per year, with an annual enrollment of about 25,000. Full-time students are typically secondary school graduates with the requisite GCE 'N' or 'O' level qualifications.

Colleges
To refine technical education in Singapore, the “One ITE System, Three Colleges” Model of Education and Governance was introduced in 2005 to merge the 10 ITE's into 3 regional colleges. ITE College West (Dover Campus), ITE College West (Balestier Campus), ITE College West (Ang Mo Kio Campus), ITE College West (Bukit Batok Campus) and ITE College West (Clementi Campus) were merged into ITE College West while ITE College Central (Bishan Campus), ITE College Central (Balestier Campus), ITE College Central (MacPherson Campus), ITE College Central (Yishun Campus) and ITE College Central (Tampines Campus) were merged into ITE College Central.

ITE College West
Formerly known ITE West Network.

ITE College Central
New Regional Campus replaces the 5 network campuses in January 2013, with some 10,400 students and the campus is also the new headquarters of ITE

ITE College East
First Regional Campus that was built.

Awards
ITE has won a number of local awards as well as international awards. In 2005, it became the first educational institution to be awarded the Singapore Quality Award by Spring Singapore. This award is awarded to world-class organisations that demonstrate the highest standards of business excellence. ITE has also won the Public Service Distinguished Award, awarded by the Prime Minister’s Office in 2010, as well as the Singapore Innovation Class, awarded by Spring Singapore in 2011.

In 2007, among 30 countries that participated, ITE won the inaugural Harvard-IBM Innovations Award in Transforming Government. This prestigious award was conferred by the Ash Institute for Democratic Governance and Innovation of Harvard University and recognises ITE’s programmes as having a profound impact on the lives of citizens.

Milestones

 * 1992 : Establishment of ITE as Post-Secondary Technical Education Institution.
 * 1994 : Operation of New ITE Bishan Institute.
 * 1995 : Operation of New ITE Headquarters.
 * 1996 : Operation of New ITE Dover Institute.
 * 1998 : Operation of New ITE Balestier Institute, ITE Tampines Institute and ITE Yishun Institute.
 * 2000 : Operation of New ITE Bukit Batok Institute.
 * 2001 : Operation of New ITE MacPherson Institute.
 * 2002 : Launch of eTutor Learning System, eStudent Administration System and new national ITE Certification System (Nitec/Higher Nitec/Master Nitec).
 * 2003 : Launch of ReNEW Initiative for Adult Learners.
 * 2005 : Operation of ITE College East, ITE’s first comprehensive college. Establishment of the Info-Comm Centre of Technology, ITE’s first centre of technology. Winning of Singapore Quality Award for World-Class Business Excellence.
 * 2007 : Winning of global IBM Innovations Award in Transforming Government.
 * 2010 : Operation of ITE College West, ITE’s second comprehensive college.
 * 2013: ITE College Central, third and final regional campus of ITE was fully operational