Live&Learn Issue 24

August 2012

ISSUE // 24

Country focus: Tunisia Helping to boost employability in post-revolution Tunisia

INSIDE THIS ISSUE 04 Multi-level governance 12 Quality moves in Croatia 16 The art of the possible 22 Four new policy briefings

Profile

INSIDE 04

Country Focus Tunisia

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Multilevel governance: real but distant promise

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The Art of the Possible

COMMENT ON OUR BLOG

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ETF deputy director, Shawn Mendes

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Vocational training promotional campaigns

We’d love to know what you think. You can comment on any of our articles online at

www.etfliveandlearn.eu

CONTACT US

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Croatia at the starting blocks

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Quality moves in Croatia

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ETF talks qualifications at global VET congress

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Four new policy briefings

Further information can be found on the ETF website: www.etf.europa.eu For any additional information, please contact: ETF Communication Department European Training Foundation ADDRESS Villa Gualino, Viale Settimio Severo 65, I – 10133 Torino, Italy TELEPHONE +39 011 630 2222 FAX +39 011 630 2200 EMAIL info@etf.europa.eu

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Copenhagen meets the Mediterranean in Turin

The European Training Foundation is the European Union’s centre of expertise supporting vocational and training reforms in the context of the European Union’s external relations programmes. www.etf.europa.eu Cover photograph: ETF/Lindsay Mackenzie - EUP & Images Please recycle this magazine when you finish with it.

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Guest editor

THE ETF IS NOW WORKING WITH LIBYA! In this editorial I hope to provide some understanding about the work we are doing with Libya. First, there is our proven flexibility when taking timely action and providing services of outstanding quality. In fact, the ETF was ready to start work even earlier but lengthy clarifications with European Commission services and contractors on issues such as security measures and visas issued by the Libyan authorities led to delays.

Second, there is the relevance of ETF expertise. While this has been a collective effort, I would like to take this opportunity to highlight the high class work done by our colleagues during the first ever ETF mission in this magnificent country.

ETF Director, Madlen Serban Photo: ETF/Juha Roininen - EUP & Images

The result of the mission is the design of a programme supporting skills development of the young unemployed, as requested

by DG DEVCO, and a number of new institutional partners. Together with all these actors, we will continue the journey towards a democratic society and real vocational education and training reforms in Libya.

What’s next?

Recent changes in the Arab world remind me of seasons, in particular, Vivaldi’s Four Seasons, one of the most popular classical works ever written (I would love to draw a metaphor from the rich world of Arabic music, but unfortunately, my European heritage and the ETF’s location prevent me from doing so). These compositions contain small sections of conjunct notes and larger sections of disjunct notes.

There is also a wide dynamic range, with changes in dynamics usually sudden as opposed to gradual. Vivaldi’s Spring is difficult to listen to without wanting to move to the music, a feeling that maybe was felt by other countries listening to Tunisia’s spring.

But I also think of seasons as being continuous throughout the year. This is what all countries should ensure:

committed continuity to a heavy and demanding social agenda. Spring, like Vivaldi’s Baroque oeuvre, is not equal to the four seasons. Spring alone cannot build the desired future.

In the short term we will continue to build on knowledge sharing by inviting our partners to relevant ETF activities and events like the Amman conference in September where policy learning will focus on youth employability and vocational education and training governance. But right now we are looking forward to the appointment of the new government to see how transition will be shaped. We hope it will be legitimate, and strongly believe Libyans must make it on their own, all year round.

However, the rationale of the Support for Partnership, Reform and Inclusive Growth (SPRING) programme states: “the more a country progresses in its democratic reforms and institutional building, the more support it can expect”. In the case of Libya, it is about expertise rather than money, therefore the ETF is among the key players in terms of EU assistance to the country.

As part of the EU agenda, ETF actions will focus on regional cooperation and enhancing synergies with other similar initiatives. Mutual learning will give Libya the opportunity to share with its neighbours the measures taken for building and fostering human capital in support of a competitive and cohesive society moving towards democracy. ■

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Country Focus  Tunisia

SELF-HELP FOR A REGION - BOOSTING EMPLOYABILITY IN POST-REVOLUTION TUNISIA How a new ETF project aims to contribute to Tunisia’s transition and in the process help revitalise the economy of a region.

The policeman tipped his hat and wished us a good morning as Mourad Boutar swung his bright yellow taxi onto the forecourt of Jerba-Zarzis airport in southern Tunisia early on a Thursday morning in March. “See that?” said the taxi driver “before the revolution that wouldn’t have happened.” He grinned.

These days you can practically feel the change afoot in post-revolution Tunisia.

But the new government of the country that launched the Arab Spring will have to work hard to meet the expectations of a population who are testing the limits of freedom and possibility after 24 years of autocratic rule.

High unemployment and glaring disparities between the regions were major drivers of the revolution. The transition government is now trying to steer a course towards full democratic rule in the midst of economic conditions that have only become worse since the dramatic days of January 2011. The ETF is working with it to tackle the twin issues of jobs and regional inequity with a new project officially launched on 13 March in Jerba.

The project aims to bring together local actors to adapt education and training to better meet the needs of the labour market. This mantra may sound familiar to anyone who knows the work of the ETF. “The question is how can we get them to all communicate better so that the employers can express their needs, so that we can adapt training to meet those needs and so that employment offices can play a useful role to increase employment” said ETF expert Lasaad

Mezghani. What makes this project different is the scale, the approach it will use and how, in its own modest way, it fits so snugly into the historic moment.

It will focus on a single region – Médenine on the border with Libya in the deep south – and will attempt to create the conditions for greater prosperity within and beyond administrative borders.

“WHAT MAKES THIS PROJECT DIFFERENT IS THE SCALE, THE APPROACH IT WILL USE…” Close to reality It is highly participative, starting with project design. Focus groups and individual interviews with representatives of VET schools, trades unions, employers, professional associations and the unemployed have all provided significant input over the past ten months. “This will be much closer to people’s realities because it emanates from local people who know what the difficulties are,” said Mezghani, “people feel it is their project as they have helped develop it.” The project will also place far more emphasis on building people’s capacity than is usually the case. This began the day after the project launch with a two-day workshop in the town of Médenine to start training project participants in project management.

“PEOPLE FEEL IT IS THEIR PROJECT AS THEY HAVE HELPED DEVELOP IT”

ETF expert, Lasaad Mezghani, is helping to encourage local actors to communicate better

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The participants have suggested a number of activities for the next two years including setting up mentoring and alumni schemes, inviting local business people to VET schools to tell personal success stories, introducing entrepreneurial learning modules in VET or providing work placements for trainees in the government job creation

scheme, Amal. “We want to do some very precise and innovative activities to check the partnership approach works,” said Marie Dorleans , the ETF’s team leader for the project, “we are focusing on ones we see as most urgent to improve young people’s employability.”

Finally it is acting as a real-life laboratory for government policy.

Getting educators, employers, people from employment offices and regional government to run such schemes together is one good way of putting the new collective way of doing things into practice as well as seeing what works.

But the project also fits into a broader scheme of things. Asking a region to take responsibility for improving its own human resources will act as a test bed for the Tunisian government’s bigger plans for decentralisation.

Taking responsibility Tackling the issue of personal responsibility is essential to the success of the project. In Tunisia decades of autocratic rule have squashed people’s motivation and sense of initiative.

“A decentralised culture does not exist in Tunisia today; until now all decisions were taken by a team at the presidential palace,” said Mondher Merai, director general of Linedata in Tunis, “this project will be up against this culture of nonresponsibility of local authorities but, if it manages to reawaken it, well, that would really be something to show.”

The project must also be inclusive if it is to really represent the new Tunisia, according to Mohammed Knessi, an expert on tourism. “We need to associate all of the civil society

Médenine is ideal for regionalisation as the project can help create conditions for prosperity within and beyond borders Photos: ETF/Lindsay Mackenzie – EUP & Images

organisations which have appeared since the revolution,” he said, “where are the women, the trade unionists and the unemployed?”

Like many Tunisians in the aftermath of the revolution, people involved in the Médenine project are hungry for action and eager to see results. After so many years of forced immobility, the feeling of impatience is palpable everywhere.

“We are in the post revolution but we are still hearing the same language,” said Jalel Bouricha, head of the Tunisian Hotel Federation in the south-east, “the situation in Tunisia has been thoroughly studied, there are always plenty of speeches but now we need to see some action – people need jobs.”

Helping the tourism industry Online reservations managers, events organisers, stewards, buyers, thalasso therapists, golf instructors, greenkeepers – these are just some of the new jobs in tourism identified by the Federation since it started working on a dictionary of 42 jobs and skills last year. “Official tourism training currently offers just 14 courses, the curricula are from 2000 and have not been updated since,” said Fatma Bennour, the FTH’s head of training.

Tourism, the region’s biggest employer, is a dynamic sector but the current emphasis on traditional occupations means VET schools cannot keep

up, employers cannot find the staff they need and unemployment keeps growing. What is known as the educated unemployed, that is the many university graduates who cannot find work, is particularly worrying. Bennour believes that with the right re-training, people could “become operational” in six months. She hopes the project’s participative, decentralised approach may help answer difficult questions too.

“We need more information about the unemployed and the whole question of seasonal jobs,” said Bennour, “what do people do when they are not working in tourism? Do they go elsewhere?” ■ Words: Rebecca Warden, ICE

FIND OUT MORE: Tunisian Hotel Federation http://www.fth.com.tn/

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Country Focus  Tunisia

TUNISIA – CRYING OUT FOR JOBS As part of its focus on Tunisia, Live&Learn looks at what the new transition government is doing to tackle unemployment. How will plans for greater regional autonomy help? What is the private sector doing?

Architecture students in the Médenine region hope for good long-term employment prospects

Jobs are the number one priority in Tunisia where there are believed to be 750,000 unemployed out of a total population of around 10.6 million. Tunisia’s first provisional government was quick to launch what is informally known as the urgent plan for jobs last year. “These are very short term measures including public spending on major infrastructure projects while we wait for private initiatives to take off,” said Fatma Moussa, director general at the Ministry of Vocational Training and Employment (MVTE) in the current transition government elected in November 2011. Other actions include creating new posts in the public sector, encouraging entrepreneurship with the help of specialist advisors, helping companies in difficulty and retraining young people “so that when the economy starts moving again, they will be ready,” said Moussa.

For the longer term, the Tunisian government is organising a series of consultations with representatives of the country’s main economic actors to come up with plans to relaunch the economy in a consensual way. The first of these was held

at the end of April and should result in a national plan for employment for 2013-16 by the end of the year.

Plans to tackle wealth gaps between the regions by giving them more autonomy are being developed in parallel. As part of this, committees for regional development have been set up in each of Tunisia’s governates. “The idea is to break with the old, highly centralised way of working and to promote reconciliation and participation,” said Mongi El Ayeb, director general of human resources at the Tunisian Ministry of Planning, who is following the progress of the ETF’s project with interest. “The choice of Médenine for this pilot project will certainly have a big impact on our plans,” he said.

“THE IDEA IS TO BREAK WITH THE OLD, HIGHLY CENTRALISED WAY OF WORKING” Tunisia’s jobless – what is at stake 13% unemployed in 2010* 30% of people under 30 unemployed 40% of higher education graduates resident in inland regions unemployed

Mondher’s idea is that Tunisia can become a centre for the IT industry in the Mediterranean Photos: ETF/Lindsay Mackenzie – EUP & Images

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(*generally acknowledged to be higher in 2011 & 2012) source: Tunisian Ministry of Regional Development

Impact of regionalisation Project participants are hopeful that decentralisation, known locally as regionalisation, will have a positive impact on employability in the long run. “We have always said we need regional antenna to collect information,” said Salem Mhadhebi, in charge of craftsmanship at teacher training organisation CENAFFIF based in the capital Tunis, “if we can become really capable of prospecting for skill needs, this is the way to boost employment.” Fatma Bennour, head of training at the Tunisian Hotel Federation, agrees. “We can’t talk about retraining paths if we don’t adopt a regional approach; we can’t organise for someone with a Masters in history to become a tourist guide in Jerba from 600km away in Tunis,” she said.

It has come up with a ten-month training course including work placements and providing soft skills as well as technical know-how and leading to a recognised certificate. It is aimed at retraining university graduates who have been unemployed for up to two years. “All trainees do real work as part of their training,” said Merai “and our main criteria for selection is how motivated they are to retrain and to work in the private sector.” ■ Words: Rebecca Warden, ICE

Some Tunisian employers from the private sector have already got involved in retraining. Soon after the revolution Mondher Merai, CEO of Tunisian computing company Linedata, launched a new association together with private universities, MVTE and Tunisian computing association TACT, with the ambitious aim of “turning Tunisia into the Bangalore of the Mediterranean.”

FIND OUT MORE: Ministry of vocational training and employment, Tunisia http://www.emploi.gov.tn Ministry of Regional Development and Planning http://www.mdci.gov.tn/

MARIE DORLEANS: THINGS MUST REALLY START MOVING IN TUNISIA Being country manager for a country in the midst of a revolution and its aftermath is exciting but worrying at the same time according to the ETF’s Marie Dorleans.

A French education economist with broad experience in child protection, education and consulting in West Africa, Dorleans has been in charge of the Tunisian dossier at the ETF since she started work at the ETF in early 2008.” It is both really exciting and really worrying because you are not in the driving seat,” she says, “you have to be flexible and you can certainly give advice but you are not in charge of anything.”

She describes calling Tunisian colleagues on a daily basis for a blow-by-blow account of events; “I felt that I lived the revolution through them; people were really keen to get the news out and I felt privileged to have such direct access,” she says.

Dorleans was surprised by the speed of events that, in just 29 days, lead to the departure of long-term autocratic ruler Ben Ali on a plane for Saudi Arabia in January 2011. She was not the only one. She recalls a director general of education describing his feelings of

disappointment in his children who seemed only interested in listening to music and fiddling about on the Internet.

“He told me ‘when the revolution started those children of mine were the first out on the streets and mobilising via Facebook and I found that I didn’t really know my children’ ” she says.

for the Tunisian government; “During the first year after a revolution, people can be patient, but when you get to the second year, things really have to start moving,” she says. ■ Words: Rebecca Warden, ICE

Looking back with hindsight, perhaps it was not so surprising that Tunisia should be the country to launch the Arab Spring; “Tunisia has probably the most highly educated people in the region and when you educate people it is good, but as head of state you run the risk that people will start thinking for themselves,” says Dorleans.

She is pleased to be leading the ETF’s project in Médenine. Dorleans calls it “a fabulous adventure for stakeholders in the region. It is a way of creating new habits of cooperation among them and can be really sustainable.” However she recognises the importance of achieving tangible results, both for the ETF and

Marie Dorleans

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Profile

MULTILEVEL GOVERNANCE: REAL BUT DISTANT PROMISE On 31 May and 1 June, the ETF invited people from all of its partner countries to Brussels to discuss one of the most promising models for education policy and strategy development: multilevel governance. While for many this was a new topic, it appeared to be quite easily understood. Putting it into practice may prove to be another matter altogether. There is work to be done.

We have reached the point where no authority, employer or school on its own can accurately predict even the short-term needs of society and the labour market any longer. In response, we have seen the rise of the lifelong learning paradigm and the introduction of a more generalist approach to curricular development in the form of a shift from learning-to-do to learning-to-learn.

While such developments make sense, making sure that innovation is a permanent, integral feature of education and training is not possible unless all of those affected by it can contribute their own perspective to strategy and policy development and do so on an ongoing basis.

Involving all stakeholders at such an early and conceptual stage calls for a model of governance that is radically different from the centralised steering that has characterised education until now. One such model that is becoming increasingly popular in the EU is that of multilevel governance. But in most of the ETF partner countries, this is still a little known concept.

Boosting the relevance of education and training EU reforms that hold development potential elsewhere are a cue for the European Training Foundation to start spreading the word and this was the reason for the Brussels conference: familiarising 31 partner countries (including a visiting Libyan delegation) with how multilevel governance can boost the relevance of education and training.

The benefits are not to be underestimated.

“Moving part of the decision making to lower levels helps national policy making to become more adaptive,” Androulla Vassiliou, European Commissioner for education and culture, told the conference.

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first round of the ETF-led Torino Process in 2011. However it was also recognised that many stakeholders and lower levels of government are not yet ready to take on more responsibility for policy making and that capacity building is needed.

alone involving them in developing policy.

Even when they do, the working groups agreed that responsibility for stakeholders must come with accountability, requiring setups that are not yet in place and may take time to develop. Many legal hurdles will also need addressing.

“MULTILEVEL GOVERNANCE CAN BOOST THE RELEVANCE OF EDUCATION AND TRAINING” The Brussels meeting was the start of this. Working group sessions were held to define actors and explore challenges, responses and next steps.

Improving effectiveness and efficiency

Identifying the actors was the easy bit: basically, everyone who has a stake in education, from all levels of government right down to students, parents and the unemployed.

The discussion of appropriate responses steered well clear of developing into a call for more funding. In fact, part of the beauty of multilevel governance is that it can dramatically improve both the effectiveness and efficiency of education and training and as such can actually save money.

A discussion of the challenges showed that while many agree on the importance of broad involvement, this is far from the reality in most partner countries; governments are generally not very good at asking other stakeholders their opinions, let

Finally, the discussion about next steps was where the ETF can find its cues for new activities for and beyond the next round of the Torino Process. Here the conclusions confirmed the road the ETF is already following; more capacity

Multilevel governance is about involving all stakeholders at the early stages of decision making Photo: ETF/Juha Roinenen – EUP & Images

Scribe: ETF/Scriberia

The governance event was illustrated using ‘scribing’ to highlight the main emergent themes. The results can be seen here.

building and advocacy are needed, the responsibilities of actors at different levels need clarifying and there should be a greater focus on end users and on empowering schools and school managers.

The ETF will be able to measure its work against the new European Charter of multilevel governance announced at the Brussels conference, and must adapt this promising issue to the reality of partner countries – together with the partner countries. ■ Words: Ard Jongsma, ICE ETF Director, Madlen Serban, addresses delegates at the Multilevel Governance in Education and Training event Photos: ETF/Juha Roinenen – EUP & Images

“CONNECTED PROCESSES OF GOVERNANCE CAN INCORPORATE BOTH PUBLIC AND PRIVATE ACTORS” What is multilevel governance?

Governance is often confused with management. But, generally speaking, those involved in governance decide on strategic aims while those involved in management put them into practice.

Governance can have a significant impact on how a vocational education and training system functions and evolves. The kind of governance and the nature of cooperation between stakeholders can determine how innovative a vocational education and training culture will be.

When a broad range of actors participate in governance, coordination becomes a key issue. A particularly successful model for this is the multilevel governance approach.

Multilevel governance is applied across two dimensions. The vertical dimension refers to the linkages between higher and lower levels of government. The horizontal dimension refers to cooperation arrangements between authorities and stakeholders in society.

In multilevel governance, connected processes of governance can incorporate both public and private actors. Instead of hierarchies, its structures are set up as ‘stratarchies’ – organisations in which each strata or layer has its own unique responsibilities and is independent of the rest.

Multilevel governance should not dilute political responsibility so long as the individual responsibilities of all actors are clearly defined and do not overlap.

Indeed, if appropriate mechanisms and instruments are applied, it helps to increase joint ownership and implementation.

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Feature

ETF DEPUTY DIRECTOR, SHAWN MENDES

MAKING A DIFFERENCE THROUGH EFFICIENCY, QUALITY AND IMPACT Shawn Mendes has been deputy director of the ETF since February 2012. We asked him about his first impressions, lessons learned and his vision for the ETF. Where can the ETF actually make a difference?

There are a number of concrete examples. To better understand the migration dynamic in countries with a high proportion of workers abroad the ETF recently sponsored a study on migration in Armenia, Georgia and Morocco. More specifically, the ETF is helping several countries to develop qualification frameworks. These are important issues for both the European Union and ETF partner countries that cut across vocational education and training.

I think the ETF could work even more to support vocational training system reform by, for example, helping countries further develop work-based learning to ensure more relevant vocational education and training.

What were your impressions from your first mission abroad?

Shawn Mendes Photo: ETF/Alberto Ramella - EUP & Images

One of the specific areas of your work as deputy director is increasing the efficiency of ETF operations. What does it entail?

I’d like the ETF to focus more on outcomes and the impact of our work.

There has been a drive in the European Union to move the emphasis of agencies from compliance and accounting for inputs, towards efficiency, quality and measuring the impact of what we do.

The ETF has a well-developed system to assess and count corporate outputs, but we still face a challenge, like other agencies, to measure the real difference that we make. I’d like to help us move towards better understanding the impact of our work – and to really have an impact on policy development in ETF partner countries.

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So far, my missions have mainly been to Brussels but I also attended a meeting of the EU Directors General of vocational education and training, which is always organised by the presidency of the EU. This time it was in Copenhagen and there were a lot of discussions about business-vocational training cooperation and how to involve businesses and other social partners, such as trade unions, in vocational education and training to ensure it is well aligned with economic needs. I also attended the third UNESCO TVET congress in Shanghai. Over 800 representatives from 117 countries were present. I was there with two other colleagues and the ETF led a plenary session on qualifications. My first missions to ETF partner countries are planned for this autumn.

The ETF is now working on its 2020 strategy. How do you see the ETF in the long term?

I would like to see the ETF as an organisation that is very much focused

on working on issues that will make the most positive impact on people’s lives in the partner countries. Of course it has to be related to vocational education and training. The ETF should help partner countries reform their vocational education and training systems, develop better qualifications systems, increase the quality of vocational training and develop work-based learning that both meets the needs of the labour market and the needs of individuals. I’d also like the ETF to be an organisation that is able to show what difference it makes. To this end, we must measure the quality and impact of the work we do.

“I’D ALSO LIKE THE ETF TO BE AN ORGANISATION THAT IS ABLE TO SHOW WHAT DIFFERENCE IT MAKES” You said it as if our partner countries were our main clients, whereas we work for the European Commission?

We are an agency of the European Union and we report to our Governing Board chaired by the Directorate General for Education and Culture. But in this regard, what is good for the partner countries is good for the EU. If we help our partner countries with human capital development and economic and employment growth, this creates peace and prosperity around Europe. It also helps in Europe’s trading relations and contributes to more positive migration flows between the countries of the European Union and the partner countries. So, everyone benefits. ■ Interview: Marcin Monko, ETF

Feature

CROATIA AT THE STARTING BLOCKS

Author of the Croatia HRD review, Simona Rinaldi believes it can help decide where investments are made in the country Photo: ETF

Croatia will become the newest member of the European Union on 1 July 2013 and its path ahead has been lit by a change of mood in the country.

The ETF has provided advice on how the changes in Croatia should be handled in education, training and employment with its review of Croatia’s human resources development.

The report was requested by the European Commission’s Directorate General for Employment, Social Affairs and Inclusion to help pinpoint Croatia’s key challenges for human resources development in the context of Education and Training 2020 - the EU’s strategic framework for cooperation in the field.

“It was warmly welcomed when it was presented in Zagreb on 22-23 May,” says Simona Rinaldi, country manager for Croatia and lead author of the report. “It was important to recognise what was being done well, but also to focus on things that could be improved. The report both confirmed Croatia’s previous priorities and proposed some new solutions and these were very well received by the conference.”

Rinaldi believes that the report’s mixed approach of field and desk research and personal consultations has been both comprehensive and innovative. It certainly sounds exhaustive; Rinaldi and her team talked to people from ministries, social partners, professional chambers and NGOs, to name but a few.

“We interviewed at least two people from each – and sometimes up to 10 – in order to get a representative view,” she says.

Competitive edge Croatia’s economy is stronger than that of other Western Balkan countries, but it still faces the challenge of how to encourage growth in the midst of a global economic crisis. So as to maintain its competitive edge and boost opportunities, the review’s authors focused on how the country could best invest to produce skilled workers and ensure greater economic returns.

The report found that education and training has suffered from a lack of strategic direction; this will hopefully be addressed by the government’s active involvement in the launch of a new national qualification framework. Improving teacher training is another top priority.

On the Croatian labour market, “there has been an alarming increase in youth unemployment from 22% in 2008 to 32% in 2010, and this highlights the need to create jobs and restructure companies in strategic sectors,” says Rinaldi. “Privatising the shipbuilding industry has been delayed but most now agree that this is a top priority,” she adds.

In terms of social inclusion, refugees, Roma, disabled children and war veterans all find themselves at the bottom of the heap in both education and the job market and poverty is widespread, especially in rural areas. “Croatia needs to increase the participation of these vulnerable groups in high quality vocational education and training and employment,” says Rinaldi.

Regional disparities, made deeper by the lack of language skills, are another problem. “Most EU application forms are in English,” says Rinaldi, “in Zagreb this is not a problem, but few people in town halls speak fluent English.”

However with a major injection of European Social Fund financing soon to arrive, this would seem a good moment for an independent review of human resources development in Croatia. “Definitely,” says Rinaldi, “it is useful for the European Commission to identify areas for improvement and for Croatia to help fine tune their strategy and decide where funds should go. The signing of the new accession treaty and the referendum showing clear support for EU membership have shown the country is ready for change.” ■ Words: Paul Rigg, ICE

“THE COUNTRY IS READY FOR CHANGE”

“EDUCATION AND TRAINING HAS SUFFERED FROM A LACK OF STRATEGIC DIRECTION”

FIND OUT MORE: Croatia – Review of Human Resources Development http://bit.ly/LSMQ27 August 2012

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Feature

QUALITY MOVES IN CROATIA Croatia recently embarked on a new approach to quality assurance in vocational training Photo: ETF/A. Martin

In 2010 Croatia started work on a new approach to quality assurance in vocational education and training, based on the principle that vocational schools should take the lead by assessing themselves.

Two years down the line, Jelena Letica and Nino Buić of the Agency for Vocational Education and Training and Adult Education (AVETAE) take Live&Learn on a guided tour of the results so far.

The agency set itself three tasks to start off with. First, encouraging all the interested parties of Croatian vocational education and training to take part in the debate on what should be the country’s strategy for assuring quality in vocational education and training. A second priority was to set up an eminently practical system of self-assessment for vocational schools. Finally, the agency wished to develop an online tool to help schools to assess themselves and reflect on the results as well as providing an accurate picture of Croatian vocational education and training to all.

In parallel, the AVETAE team began developing a Croatian quality assurance framework to provide the theoretical underpinning for this work. This breaks the work of schools down into six areas for assessment: planning and programming of work; teaching and support to learning; learning outcomes; physical and human resources including professional development of staff; cooperation 12

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both within the vocational school and with other stakeholders; and finally administration and management. Each is broken down further into individual criteria based on Cedefop’s European Guide to Self-Assessment.

The guiding principle throughout is “that quality assurance is learner-centred and competence-based,” says Jelena Letica, assistant director for vocational education and training development and international cooperation at AVETAE. While the emphasis is very much on helping vocational training centres to take a good look at themselves, this is backed up by visits Jelena Letica by external Photo: AVETAE Croatia evaluators.

The new system was put to the test during 2010-11 when 24 schools representing the whole range of Croatian vocational education and training – large, small, urban, rural, catering for adults, special needs students or a more mainstream intake – took part in a pilot.

They set up dedicated quality teams of up to 14 members to lead the assessment process. Teachers worked in groups according to curricula or priority areas.

By the end of the school year in July 2011 each institution produced a selfassessment report and detailed plans on how to improve.

Staff at the AVETAE were impressed by the way people in schools grasped and applied the new self-assessment process as part of their daily work. But the benefits did not stop there. The participatory method used meant that the quality debate was not confined to a small group of people but reached a large proportion of school staff. “School staff started numerous discussions and were led to

Nino Buić Photo: AVETAE Croatia

“QUALITY ASSURANCE IS LEARNERCENTRED AND COMPETENCE-BASED”

reflect on how things could be improved,” said Nino Buić, head of the project implementation unit at AVETAE, “they realised that this is not about pointing the finger at anyone for doing things wrong, but an effort to stimulate new processes in the school, to inspire teachers to talk about their work, to learn what they are good at and where their mistakes lie and find their own way to correct them.”

community. However it was noticed that the process was easier to accomplish, and the benefits correspondingly greater, in institutions which already had a good working atmosphere.

This process also made pilot schools more aware of the importance of building links with stakeholders in the wider community and receiving feedback both from them and from students. Schools conducted numerous surveys in the form of questionnaires, observations and focus groups and external evaluators visited companies and interviewed local councillors and parents as well as a large number of students. Learners were pleased to be able to participate in the process by giving their opinion on their institutions’ performance and suggesting improvements. In some schools, “learners noticed improvements in the teaching process as a direct result of the selfassessment process,” said Buić.

“THIS IS NOT ABOUT POINTING THE FINGER AT ANYONE FOR DOING THINGS WRONG”

Participating in the pilot helped create a better atmosphere and more communication within VET schools as well as strengthening links with the

To help schools, AVETAE developed a manual and an online tool called E-kvaliteta (http://e-kvaliteta.asoo.hr) for schools to use for inputting their self-assessment data. During the process, it allows schools to measure their performance against qualitative indicators and generate reports. Once complete, schools can compare their results with those of other schools and use the tool to show which areas need to be improved.

As the quality assurance process involves more schools, this tool is expected to become a vital way of monitoring performance of the whole system of vocational training. AVETAE will spend the coming year training more schools on how to use E-kvaliteta. It “will give the agency, and for the first time the entire education system, an up-to-date view of the situation in vocational schools, and allow us to propose better, evidence-based education policies and offer support to schools in a quality way,” said Letica. ■ Words: Rebecca Warden, ICE

Why quality assurance?

The Croatian push for improving quality in vocational education and training is driven by two factors. The Croatian authorities are firm believers that only a flexible, highly educated workforce can react to rapid changes in the economy, especially in today’s tough conditions. Quality assurance based largely on self-assessment, one of the country’s five priorities in Croatia’s 2008-13 vocational education and training system development strategy, is seen as the best way of promoting improvement from within while at the same time creating trust in the outputs of the system.

On 1 July next year Croatia will become the newest member of the European Union. Working with organisations such as the ETF, Croatia has many years’ experience of learning about and participating in EU initiatives and tools in the field of vocational education and training such as the European Qualifications Framework. This familiarity with EU innovations in education and the desire to be in step with other European countries has led it to base its new quality assurance system on the European Quality Assurance Reference Framework, adopted by the European Commission in May 2010.

FIND OUT MORE: AVETAE - http://bit.ly/OFFqvp E-kvaliteta – http://e-kvaliteta.asoo.hr

Screen shot of the e-kvaliteta online tool for school self-assessment August 2012

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COPENHAGEN MEETS THE M While the country whose capital lent its name to the largest ever international harmonisation in vocational education recently held the EU Presidency, Danish Ambassador Birger Riis Jørgensen visited the ETF to discuss youth employability in the southern Mediterranean.

Danish Ambassador to Italy, Birger Riis Jørgensen, visited the ETF to discuss opportunities and challenges resulting from the Arab Spring Photo: ETF/A. Ramella – EUP Images

With him he brought the consuls of Milan and Turin and key ministry staff from Copenhagen. ETF staff briefed the delegation on the agency’s response to the new opportunities and challenges that have come and continue to come in the wake of the Arab Spring and how it uses the tools at its disposal to promote fresh views on education and training.

migration, through how to invest in job creation, to topics that have been receiving special attention in the Scandinavian countries for a long time.

One of these was entrepreneurship - the topic of a conference in Copenhagen in June to which the Danes invited a number of southern Mediterranean countries.

Riis Jørgensen said that he found the results of the Torino Process fascinating, not least because of their links to transparency and benchmarking, but at the same time he wondered how feasible it would be to make progress in countries such as Egypt where, he had just learned, no fewer than 20 ministries share responsibility for vocational education and training.

Asked about the benefits of a meeting such as this, Riis Jørgensen did not hesitate to admit that the greatest benefit for him was to learn about “the important work of an agency that I was not so aware of”.

“The region is perhaps more important than ever,” he said, “also from an EU perspective, because here we can really support what we want to support: democracy and economic progress.”

“We may be a small country that is almost as far away from the Mediterranean as one can be in the EU, but this work is incredibly relevant for us. We can no longer think of ourselves in isolation.

These are countries that are neighbours of Europe and this affects us in many ways.

Take for example the influx of refugees, many of whom have Italy as their first port of call, but who are as much a concern to us as they are to Italy.”

“WE CAN REALLY SUPPORT WHAT WE WANT TO SUPPORT: DEMOCRACY AND ECONOMIC PROGRESS” Torben Rasmussen, director of the International Department of the Ministry of Education in Denmark said about the Torino Process: “It is very interesting to see for us how the work we launched in Copenhagen during our previous presidency is having such an impact beyond the EU too.”

The informal meeting touched on a multitude of topics: from basic concepts such as multilevel governance and

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“Of course we have an interest in promoting stability in this region. We can only achieve this stability if there is democratic and economic development and vocational education and training can play a much more important part in this than is often assumed.”

Riis Jørgensen not only believes that the southern and eastern Mediterranean partner countries are relevant to Denmark but also that Denmark and

E MEDITERRANEAN IN TURIN

“OF COURSE WE HAVE AN INTEREST IN PROMOTING STABILITY IN THIS REGION” Danish experience can be relevant to them.

“Denmark has a lot to offer,” he said, “we have one of the best functioning VET systems in Europe and we believe that this is directly related to the fact that we also have one of the lowest youth unemployment rates. This is the result of the intensive social partnership that sits at the heart of our system. In addition to this, we have a strong culture of lifelong learning which means that the flexible labour market and social security system we have in Denmark can actually function.”

During the meetings, one of the issues Riis Jørgensen drew particular attention to was gender. This was no coincidence.

Gender equality is a big issue in Denmark and it is highly relevant in many of the Mediterranean partner countries where female potential constitutes a massive and largely untapped resource.

“It is part and parcel of Danish politics to constantly remind ourselves that female participation in work, politics and society as a whole is an absolute condition for economic growth. The higher the female participation in sectors that require education and skills, the better it is for society as a whole.”

As mentioned in the introduction to this story, the Danish capital lent its name to the largest ever international harmonisation effort in vocational education: the Copenhagen Process.

Asked whether this is a source of particular pride to be reminded of this

throughout a day at the ETF in Turin, Riis Jørgensen replied: “Well, it is a good habit in the EU to call important developments after the place where they saw the light of day and we have a couple of them that we are proud to have lent our name to.

The ‘Copenhagen criteria’ [that define whether a country is eligible to join the European Union] is another example that has been relevant in the ETF’s work. But yes, the Copenhagen Process is definitely a feather in our cap. These names do indicate some form of prioritisation and the Copenhagen Process is not called that just by coincidence: in Denmark vocational education and training are fully recognised for their importance to economic development. And this may well be the best practice Denmark has to offer some of the ETF’s partner countries.” ■ Words: Ard Jongsma, ICE

Following Denmark’s example, Riis Jørgensen would like to see better use of female potential in southern Mediterranean countries Photo: ETF/M. Monko

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THE ART OF THE POSSIBLE

Improving career guidance for Palestinian refugees in Lebanon.

“I have no plans, it’s only the present.”

Mohammad Aabed, a 27 year-old graduate of accounting from the Arts, Sciences and Technology University in Lebanon didn’t hesitate to give an answer when asked what his career plans were.

Like many young Palestinian refugees, Mr Aabed finished a private school, for which he had to pay, but he had little use for whatever he had learnt there.

To be an accountant in Lebanon you need citizenship. Any citizenship. And Mr Aabed, a third generation refugee, has none. He works casually, helping with paperwork at a local NGO.

Palestinian Refugees in Lebanon The presence of Palestinian refugees in Lebanon dates back to 1948. In that year, during the Arab-Israeli war, some 100,000 Palestinians fled their homeland. They eventually settled in a number of camps and gatherings throughout the country, mainly near the big towns of Beirut, Tripoli, Saida, Tyre and the Bekaa valley.

Since 1950, the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) has been providing health, education and emergency relief services for the displaced in Lebanon. There are currently between 260,000 and 280,000 Palestinians residing in Lebanon, and more in other countries.

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“It’s bad when you finish your studies and then you are not allowed to work.”

Without a country to return to or a family abroad to join, Shatila refugee camp in Beirut is the place where he is likely to stay for a long time.

A survey, published by the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) in December 2010, revealed that two-thirds of Palestinian refugees live in poverty.

“TWO OF PALESTINIAN REFUGEES LIVE IN POVERTY” Early school leaving and low levels of qualifications, coupled with restrictions on work - 56% of refugees are jobless put many families in a state of persistent economic insecurity. Some 50,000 Palestinian refugees who have jobs must make do with low-paid, low-status casual employment.

Shatila refugee camp, in Lebanon, is where Palestinian refugees are likely to stay for a long time

Mr Jaouani. “They are often closed in the camps, with very limited access to schools and jobs too. It’s tough”.

The word ‘camp’ is somewhat misleading here. It evokes the images of tents fields and implies a temporary character.

But Shatila, where Mr Aabed lives, and many other camps in Lebanon are well within city boundaries. They are made of hundreds of low quality, but by no means temporary, buildings that often house four generations of refugees.

The Galilee Secondary School, a UNRWA-run school for Palestinians, is near the Sabra and Shatila camps in Beirut. Iyad Owayyed works there as a registrar. A Palestinian refugee from Saida, 40 kilometres south of the capital, Mr Owayyed is also the school’s career counsellor.

“We try to help students make the right decisions when they are choosing their studies, so that they choose majors which provide them with a higher level of employability,” said Mr Owayyed. “We help them not to study something that will bring them difficulties in the future.”

At the end of 2011, the European Commission asked the ETF to help design an EU assistance project to improve career guidance, employment services and access to vocational education and training for Palestinian refugees in Lebanon.

Mr Owayyed was one of the Palestinian counsellors who took part in an ETF training course in November 2011. The training introduced them to modern methods for career guidance and made them more self-confident in their work.

Abdelaziz Jaouani, an ETF expert in charge of relations with the Lebanese authorities, said this is the first time the agency has worked for the refugees.

The counsellors organise orientation sessions, where 15 to 18 year-olds learn about professions and how to choose one. They provide individual advice in nine secondary schools and 12 vocational schools. There are also visits to vocational training centres to show what a profession looks like in practice and how it can be learnt.

”I had been aware of their situation, but when you visit the camps and discuss with the people involved, you realise the reality and depth of their distress” said

The camps often house generations of Palestinian refuges

Khaled Dgheim, a career guidance officer at the Beirut office of UNRWA, who has been in charge of the programme since the beginning in 2010, said that the new EU-funded project will provide more training for the counsellors and support the production of job leaflets and other material. It will help build an information system on further training and job market needs, and make sharing experience with other countries possible.

ETF expert, Abdelaziz Jaouani, outside the UNRWA offices Photos: ETF/M. Monko

“Most young Palestinian people don’t know what vocation to choose,â€? said Mr Dgheim. â€?If a young man tells me ’I’d like to be an aircraft engineer’, I ask him ’Do you know that the Palestinians are not allowed to practice this job?’. But in the end, through career guidance, we can improve their chances of employment.â€? â–

“MOST YOUNG PALESTINIAN PEOPLE DON’T KNOW WHAT VOCATION TO CHOOSE�

Words: Marcin Monko, ETF

The ETF and the Palestinian refugees in Lebanon The European Commission asked the ETF to help prepare a five-year EU assistance project: Empowerment of Palestine refugees through technical and vocational education and training (TVET) and job creation in Lebanon The ETF worked with the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) to design a project to improve career guidance, employment services and access to vocational education and training.

The general objective of the project that will be implemented by UNRWA is to enhance the employment chances for Palestinian refugees living in Lebanon.

FIND OUT MORE:

The overall budget of the programme will be â‚Ź3.4 million The project is due to start at the end of 2012

UNRWA - http://www.unrwa.org/

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VOCATIONAL TRAINING PROMOTIONAL CAMPAIGNS PR campaigns have made vocational training cool in Georgia Photo: ETF/A. Jongsma

GEORGIA PUMPS UP THE VOLUME FOR PROFESSIONAL TRAINING There’s nothing cooler than training for a profession – that is, if you’re a Georgian teenager.

When the small Caucasian state decided it was time to ditch the poor reputation vocational education and training had been saddled with, leading education officials turned to showbiz to get their message across.

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And who better to pump up the volume for professional training than hit singer, actor and producer Duta Skhirtladze?

Skhirtladze, whose talents include doing a turn as a rap singer on a popular peak time Georgian TV chat show, became the most famous face to front a campaign that the Ministry of Education and Science claimed saw a three-fold increase in vocational training uptake following the year-long promotion.

The Learn, Work and Become a Professional campaign of 2010-11 was prompted by a growing need to develop a knowledge and skills-based economy in Georgia.

It was designed to persuade young people – and their parents – that higher education was not the only path to success in life, but that an equally cool choice was “professional education as an alternative to academic qualifications”. PR activities were coordinated across a range of media aimed at carefully selected target audiences.

Jointly run by the national Ministry of Education and Science and lead policy development body, the National Centre for Educational Quality Enhancement, the campaign used billboards, leaflets, flyers, television commercials and

In the final part of our focus on promoting vocational education and training, Live&Learn takes a closer look at the efforts of Georgia and Jordan JORDAN - URGING MORE YOUNG PEOPLE TO CHOOSE VET Jordan has become the first Arab country to launch a national campaign to promote its vocational education and training system. The campaign, on behalf of Jordan’s Ministry of Labour, is to run for four years starting this year. Communications agency Prisma, specialists in social marketing, is in charge of both the design and operational side of things.

Part of a broader reform of Jordanian vocational education and training, the campaign has two aims; raising its profile and encouraging more young Jordanians to consider working in vocational jobs. What lies behind this is the determination of the Jordanian government to increase the overall labour market participation rate. At around 40% - some 66% for men and just 14% for women, it is one of the lowest in the region. Skills mismatch is also an issue. “We have a lot of university graduates but the labour market need is for intermediate and skilled people and we have high youth unemployment. Many job opportunities in the Jordanian economy tend to go to foreign labour because Jordanians are not willing to take these jobs,” says Nadera Al-Bakheet, director of the E-TVET Council Secretariat.

Prisma is using social marketing techniques to bring about the desired change in attitudes; young people are the main target group, with young women a significant sub-group, followed by parents, teachers, career counsellors and employers. The approach involves identifying the current behaviour of target groups and looking at the barriers that are stopping them from changing this. “For instance what is preventing youth from taking up the opportunities of technical vocational education and training? How may parents be discouraging students from doing this?” says Hala Darwazeh, co-ordinator of the campaign at Prisma.

The initiative is using a mix of traditional and social media to reach its audience.

The campaign team are aware that engineering social change will not happen overnight but can be done slowly but surely. “Something that 20 years ago was socially acceptable such as smoking no longer is today. When anti-smoking campaigns started they faced some resistance but now it is the social norm that smoking is not cool,” says Saad Darwazeh, managing director of Prisma, “the question of job stereotyping for women is exactly the same.” ■ Words: Rebecca Warden, ICE

FIND OUT MORE: E-TVET Council Jordan http://bit.ly/NmuxSg programmes, the websites of the Ministry and a professional education webpage as well as social networking sites such as Facebook, to get the message across.

Radio, print, open days at training colleges and jobs fairs all played their part.

Involving actor Duta Skhirtladze in the campaign helped give it a popular touch that also added a dash of colour and verve to an area not always associated with razzamatazz. ■ Words: Nick Holdsworth, ICE

Promotional campaigns encourage Jordanian women to take up vocational training Photo: ETF/Salah Malkawi August 2012

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ETF TALKS QUALIFICATIONS AT GLOBAL VET CONGRESS The Oriental Pearl Tower, Shanghai, by night

Building Skills for Work and Life was the theme of the 3rd international congress on technical and vocational education and training (TVET).

The event was held by Unesco in Shanghai, China, on 14-16 May.

One of the five plenary sessions was convened by the ETF. The session, entitled “Qualifications That Matter�, explored, among other issues, international actions to improve the effectiveness of qualifications systems. ‘The idea is that people should be able to do more with their qualifications,’ said Arjen Deij, the ETF expert who prepared the session and played the role of discussant. “This reflects the purpose of the reforms of qualifications that take place in many countries today.�

According to Deij there are three global trends in qualifications: Emphasis on learning outcomes: modern qualifications describe students’ competences, not inputs; they are certified by competent bodies, which weigh the acquired competences against the set standards.

Comparing and linking through frameworks: Qualifications frameworks as tools to compare and link TVET qualifications are being developed in 141 countries. One of the reasons for this is the increase in labour migration.

Supporting lifelong learning: TVET qualifications are now more diverse in content, level and ways of provision.

Vocational education and training is no longer only about training young people for industry in centrally-managed schools.

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Arjen Deij, centre, at the ETF hosted session ‘Qualifications that Matter’ Photos: ETF

How to improve TVET qualifications?

The Shanghai congress discussed two broad recommendations: Focus on individual benefits: develop career guidance systems; unlock deadends and ensure that TVET leads to further and higher learning; promote transfer, recognition and accumulation of individuals’ learning. Facilitate international understanding of TVET qualifications: set world reference levels to facilitate the comparison of TVET qualifications and qualifications systems across the globe; draft international guidelines on quality assurance for the recognition of qualifications, based on learning outcomes.

“THE IDEA IS THAT PEOPLE SHOULD BE ABLE TO DO MORE WITH THEIR QUALIFICATIONS�

The congress, which is held once a decade, is the main global event devoted to vocational education and training.

The Shanghai event was organised in collaboration with the key international organisations active in the field such as the ILO, OECD, World Bank and the ETF. Some 800 participants from all over the world attended the sessions. â– Words: M. Monko, ETF

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FOUR NEW POLICY BRIEFINGS The newest ETF policy briefing - “Learning for a green future” presents the vision of vocational education and training in the context of sustainable development and green growth.

Vocational education and training can make an important contribution to help individuals and economies benefit from green growth. It is instrumental in moderating the changes in labour markets and in the skills profiles that come with the green transformation of our economies.

This is the main message of a new ETF policy briefing, whose publication coincided with Rio+20 United Nations Conference on Sustainable Development in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, on 20-22 June 2012.

The document explains what the green growth potential of ETF partner countries is; how vocational education and training can help mitigate and adapt to climate change and support green growth; and what the ETF does to help partner countries meet the demands of sustainable development.

“Learning for a green future” is the latest of a series of ETF policy briefings, called INFORM. Since the beginning of 2012, the ETF has published three other INFORMs:

All INFORM policy briefings can be downloaded from the ETF website:

www.etf.europa.eu

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Vocational school self-assessment: Turning schools into learning organisations This briefing looks at the process of building school staff awareness of challenges and opportunities, and identifying possibilities for change to enhance school performance. Vocational school self-assessment puts a firm emphasis on the change that comes from within a school, rather than through external projects or regulations.

Adult basic skills training The briefing draws attention to often neglected structures and policies for education and training of older people in the Western Balkans and Turkey, especially low-skilled workers and the unemployed.

Optimising activation policies to integrate unemployed people into the labour market The issue in focus this briefing is how to improve activation approaches to integrate unemployed people into the labour market.

It explores current practices applied by public employment services, analyses interrelated factors at play in the Western Balkans and Turkey and concludes with recommended approaches for more coherent activation policies. ■ Words: M. Monko, ETF

Coming up

IN THE NEXT ISSUE… NEW CHALLENGES FOR SKILLS DEVELOPMENT IN ARAB STATES OF THE MEDITERRANEAN REGION

Photo: ETF/M. Monko

Following the Arab Spring, policy makers in the Arab States of the Mediterranean region need to develop a new vision for the role of skills development which could respond to the economic, social and individual needs of citizens, especially young people.

To help facilitate this, a high-level forum, including ministers from the region and policy leaders from EU institutions and EU Member States, has been organised.

It will provide a platform for policy leaders from the fields of education, training and employment to network and exchange views on the challenges of and responses to the Arab Spring in the field of skills development. The forum will take place in Amman, Jordan on 25 September 2012 and represents the key moment in the broader ETF regional conference on skills development in the Arab Region 25-27 September.

Live&Learn will bring readers in-depth coverage of the event.

UNION FOR THE MEDITERRANEAN REGIONAL EMPLOYABILITY REVIEW To accompany the process of structured Euro-Mediterranean policy dialogue on employment, the ETF has provided input to the third Union for the Mediterranean Employability Review. This report, due for publication in September, covers 14 countries which have privileged relations with the EU and which face similar challenges.

The report focuses on the problems of employability, and more specifically on youth and female employment and employability. A draft was presented to the Euro-Med Employment and Labour High-Level Working Group Meeting in Brussels on 14 February 2012.

The next issue of Live&Learn will discuss the report with its authors.

COUNTRY FOCUS: ARMENIA

Photo: ETF/M. Monko

With activities such as the recent migration survey and the ongoing Torino Process, it is high time to focus on the landlocked and mountainous Armenia. In 2010, the country began negotiations with the EU on an Association Agreement with a view to deepening Armenia’s political association and economic integration with the EU. ETF country manager for Armenia, Milena Corradini, will be presented in the focus, along with high level stakeholders and policy makers within the country. ■

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For information on our activities, job and tendering possibilities please visit our website: www.etf.europa.eu For other enquiries please contact: ETF Communication Department European Training Foundation Villa Gualino Viale Settimio Severo, 65 I – 10133 Torino T +39 011 630 2222 F +39 011 630 2200 E info@etf.europa.eu

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