This first international meeting of partners involved in initiatives on Vocational excellence included panel discussions and parallel sessions on some of the most pressing issues going from smart specialisation to social inclusion.
The Commission adopted an updated Recommendation on occupational diseases, where stresses the importance of supporting workers infected by COVID-19 and families who have lost members because of work exposure to the disease.
The European Social Fund (ESF) supports the ‘Step to Work’ project in Prague, that aims at helpingformer offenders in overcoming their criminal history and making a fresh start.
The Forum focused on how to achieve a fair and inclusive green transition for all while celebrating the 5th anniversary of the European Pillar of Social Rights.
On 25 November, Commissioner Schmit visited a project funded by the European Social Found in the city of Košice (Slovakia) that has an innovative way to combat family homelessness.
The Swedish city of Skellefteå received the 2023 Access City Award in recognition of its long-term commitment and innovative approach to enhancing accessibility for persons with disabilities.
Champion 3
13 – 14/12 2022 EQAVET Peer Review, hosted by Bulgaria 16 – 18/01 2023 EQAVET Peer Review, hosted by Slovenia 24 – 25/01 2023 EQAVET Peer Review, hosted by Lithuania 15 – 17/03 2023 EQAVET Peer Review, hosted by Austria 23 – 24/03 2023 EQAVET Peer Review, hosted by Belgium-Fr 28 – 29/03 2023 EQAVET Peer Review, hosted by Hungary 30 – 31/03 2023 EQAVET Peer Review, hosted by Belgium-Fl 15 – 16/06 2023 EQAVET Annual Network Meeting, Stockholm, Sweden
Autumn has been especially fruitful for the EQAVET National Reference Points (NRPs), with many interesting events taking place all Europe. The activities have included the first Irish review of its Education and Training Boards, as well as the announcement of the French annual conference on quality assurance, together with Slovakia’s focus on the involvement of national stakeholders in quality assurance peer learning. In addition, Romania is collaborating with the digital AGRIEdu platform in order to improve its agricultural education offer, and the Czech HR community has focused its events towards fostering cooperation among VET schools and companies. Regarding meetings, Turkey has finalised the Sustainability in Quality Practices and EQAVET meeting and is currently organising self-assessment training sessions. Finally, Malta has published the winning artwork of their second Digital Art Competition amongst secondary schools and the Netherlands has published a digital game which aims at improving quality in educational teams.
MICRO-CREDENTIALS FOR LABOUR MARKET EDUCATION AND TRAINING (CEDEFOP)
Two new case studies have been published on the virtual library. Find out more about the recent research the Italian National Reference Point has completed looking at how quality cycles and the EQAVET Recommendation is implemented in the Italian Regions and how Greece has recently completed work on a new law to introduce quality assurance systems in initial vocational education providers.
A new manual is available to help EQAVET National Reference Points to design and implement Peer Reviews in their respective contexts. The manual outlines the main principles of EQAVET Peer Reviews on VET system level and provides concrete guidance for National Reference Points to become more familiar with the phases of a Peer Review and practical tools to help them to prepare their Peer Reviews. Click ‘Main URL’ to find out more about the manual.
An online Peer Learning Activity brought together over 60 EQAVET Network representatives and neighbouring countries to discuss quality assurance of micro-credentials, on 8 – 9 November. The event was virtually hosted by Ireland. Participants learned more about the recent Council Recommendation on micro-credentials, a Cedefop project on micro-credentials for VET and the labour market, and how Ireland are using micro-credentials. Examples were also shared from Estonia, Spain and Sweden. Click ‘read more’ to find out more about the Peer Learning Activity.
On October 12 to 14, the Ministry of Education, Children, and Youth of Luxembourg hosted the fourth EQAVET Peer Review, which gathered members from Belgium, Croatia, Finland, and the Netherlands. The focus of the event was developing and designing an IT-based system, which could bring together existing administrative data on initial VET learners. Click ‘find out more’ to learn more about the Peer Review.
On September 21 to 22, the third EQAVET Peer Review was hosted by the Latvian State Education Quality Service in Riga, Latvia. The event brought together EQAVET Network members from Belgium (Wallonia), Bulgaria, Lithuania, and Luxembourg. During the Peer Review, feedback was gathered concerning the quality system and the ability to externally evaluate the effectiveness of the proposed system using the current performance indicators and criteria. Click ‘read more’ to find out more.
The proposal for the Joint Employment Report (JER) - which is part of the 2023 European Semester cycle of economic policy coordination - confirms that the EU labour market has fully recovered from the COVID-19 pandemic, showing a strong performance and surpassing pre-pandemic employment levels since the third quarter of 2021.
