Vocational education is as important as traditional education. With the rising population and rapidly growing unemployment problems in the country, it has become essential to impart vocational education from school itself. It will cater to the future needs of skilled manpower requirements of the technological advanced society. Moreover, it is the need of the hour to shift traditional educational system to diversified education system. The state of Himachal Pradesh has emerged as a leader in the field of literacyandvocationaldevelopmentinrecenttimes. Thefarmandnon-farmeconomic activities have shown excellent growth in this hilly state. In this study, efforts have been made to find out the gender dimensions of vocational interests amongst school children of tribal Kinnaur district of Himachal Pradesh. The investigation showed significant values for the vocational interests of tribal boys and girls for agriculture, executive and household activities. The gender dimensions were observed to play an important role in the vocational interests. There is a strong need to provide vocational guidance at school level by introducing vocational education in the schools itself. It is of specific importance to the tribal areas which have already shown potential for inclusive developmental modules at household level.
GENDER DIMENSIONS OF VOCATIONAL INTEREST AMONGST SCHOOL CHILDREN IN TRIBAL AREAS: A STUDY OF KINNAUR DISTRICT OF HIMACHAL PRADESH
