Receiving one's vocational training or continuing education abroad in a European country and having one's achievements acknowledged at home – this is what the so-called ECVET intends to facilitate and promote.
At present, the European Credit System for Vocational Education and Training is being tested throughout Europe. The German Confederation of Skilled Crafts (ZDH) is likewise involved with a pilot project and dispatches bakers, hairdressers and carpenters to neighbouring European countries.
The European Credit System for Vocational Education and Training (ECVET) is to facilitate the transfer and endorsement of occupational competences between the European member states. For instance, learning periods abroad can be used better, apprentices and master diploma students are to become more mobile. The concept is on trial throughout Europe until 2013. During an expert conference, the ZDH now presented the pilot project SME Master Plus, in which it is involved on behalf of Germany.
In Germany, baker, hairdresser and carpenter have been selected by way of pilot occupations. During the trial phase until February 2012, the ZDH works together with project partners and educational institutes from France, Slovenia, Austria and Norway and 25 other experts, such as master schools and guilds. Together, they developed a so-called tool kit containing, for instance, mobility checklists and printed forms for partnership agreements.
It is worthwhile for educational institutions, such as chambers, that regularly send apprentices or master diploma students to other European countries for at least four weeks, to enter into partnership agreements with the institutions accepting their students. This way, criteria and the basis for a meaningful exchange are pinned down well in advance.
The individual students are given learning agreements stipulating which competences they are to acquire during their stay. Upon conclusion of the sojourn, the dispatching institution is informed by way of a personal performance record, what the student has in fact learned and which goals were achieved.
The ZDH has dispatched eleven master diploma students testing the tool kit in the context of the pilot project. The results are being evaluated at present and the documentation is being revised as necessary. At a later stage, support for other occupations is to be likewise developed. It is planned to train the mobility advisors at the chambers of crafts in such a manner, so as to enable them to provide competent consultation as regards the ECVET.
In Berlin, Dirk Palige, Managing Director of the ZDH, said that the economy and small and medium-sized enterprises in particular were in demand of employees with international know-how. Therefore, the organisation and implementation of learning periods abroad for apprentices and skilled workers had to be facilitated. "Here, ECVET can assume the function of an important supportive instrument for companies providing training, vocational schools and vocational training institutions".