Sören Nielsen graduated from Copenhagen University and worked from 1981 as a VET expert at the National Institute for the Educational Training of Vocational Teachers in Copenhagen. Since 2001 I have worked for the European Training Foundation (ETF) in Turin as a thematic expert and have been involved in country reform work in most West Balkan countries, the last three years mainly in Turkey.
I have a long experience from working in transition countries, (in particular the Baltic States since 1992) and in recent years I have concentrated on work in South East European pre-accession countries.
I have an extensive experience in project design and project monitoring and have been team leader implementing EU, Nordic Council of Ministers and Danish assistance projects in a number of countries. I have been involved in a number of analytic studies, review teams and evaluations for CEDEFOP, ETF and the European Commission. I have published widely.
I am currently an ETF Lead specialist with a focus on the development of learning processes and the preparation of the teaching profession for VET reform. My work includes research, analysis, development work as well as high-level policy advice to VET and labour market authorities and other stakeholders in partner countries.
Since 2001 I have organised the ETF South East European VET TT Network which establishes a learning platform for pre-accession countries to share experience and acquire knowledge about broader European policy developments.
During the last 4 years I have concentrated on developing a new ETF approach to work in transition countries, based on policy learning, where we try to facilitate policy advice on structural VET reform by using key elements of the new learning paradigm. Experts from the international donor community should in fact become - and act as - ‘good teachers’.