Agenda
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Cedefop, together with French Presidency of the Council of the EU, is organising the 12th Cedefop Brussels seminars, as a virtual event.

Organised in cooperation with the rotating EU Presidency, these seminars build on Cedefop’s research and analyses to address issues relevant to current European debates on vocational education and training (VET) and employment.

The 12th Brussels seminar will present Cedefop’s research activities related to the theme of microcredentials and their role in supporting labour-market-related and employment-relevant education, training, and learning, including vocational education and training.

Drawing on Cedefop research, participants will learn more about microcredentials and discuss:

  • the characteristics and the potential roles microcredentials may play in supporting labour-market-related and employment-relevant education, training, and learning, including vocational education and training;
  • the methodology and interim findings of Cedefop’s study on microcredentials;
  • their broad uptake and function as they are increasingly regarded as independent building blocks in national and international skills strategies responding to several drivers (fast-changing labour market demands, digitalisation, ageing populations, re-skilling and upskilling needs, etc).

A concept note and agenda is available here.

Take part in the discussion #Microcredentials4LabourMarket

Programme

12th Cedefop Brussels seminar
Microcredentials: are they here to stay?
PROGRAMME
Thursday, 9 June 2022, 10.00-12.30 (CET)
   
9.30-10.00 Accessing the event platform – technical check
   
10.00-10.15 Welcome and introduction to the seminar
 

Moderator: Loukas Zahilas, Head of Department, Cedefop

  • Aline Humbert - Chair of the Education Committee, French Presidency of the Council of the EU
  • Jürgen Siebel – Executive Director, Cedefop
10.15-10.30 Setting the scene: microcredentials and the political context
 
  • Chiara Riondino – Head of Unit B3, DG EMPL – Proposal for a Council Recommendation on a European approach to microcredentials for lifelong learning
10.30-10.45 State of play and negotiations on microcredentials
 
  • Aline Humbert - Chair of the Education Committee, French Presidency of the Council of the EU
10.45-11.00 Q&A session
   
11.00-11.30 Microcredentials for labour market education and training
 
  • Anastasia Pouliou - Expert, Cedefop
  • Q&A
-------- 10-minute break --------
11.40-12.20 Panel discussion with European stakeholders: are microcredentials here to stay?
 

Moderator: Loukas Zahilas, Head of Department, Cedefop

  • Chiara Riondino - Head of Unit B3, DG EMPL
  • Tony Donohoe – Business Europe
  • Agnes Roman – Advisor, European Trade Union Confederation
  • Anastasia Pouliou – Expert, Cedefop
12.20-12.30 Concluding remarks
 
  • Loukas Zahilas – Head of Department, Cedefop
  • Anastasia Pouliou – Expert, Cedefop
-------- End of seminar --------

Speakers

Tony Donohoe

Tony Donohoe is a policy advisor with Ibec, the national representative body of Irish business and employers

He is Deputy Chairperson of the Cedefop Management Board, and Chair of the Irish Government’s skills advisory committee, the Expert Group on Future Skills Needs.

Aline Humbert

Aline Humbert is a senior civil servant at the French Ministry of Higher Education and Research.

After completing a PhD in International and European Law at Strasbourg University, she served as Head of the Research and Development departments in several French universities and took an active part in the implementation of the university autonomy policy in both organisational and financial areas.

Anastasia Pouliou

Anastasia Pouliou is a Cedefop expert. Working in the Department for VET and qualifications, she is responsible for qualifications and synergies between EU tools and learning outcomes.

She is currently leading the research conducted under Cedefop’s project Microcredentials for labour market education and training.

Chiara Riondino

Chiara Riondino is Head of Unit for Vocational Education and Training in the Directorate-General for Employment, Social Affairs and Inclusion of the European Commission.

Chiara previously worked as policy coordinator for employment policies, and as policy assistant to the Director for Employment.

Agnes Roman

Agnes Roman has been a senior policy coordinator of education policy issues at the European Trade Union Committee of Education (ETUCE) since 2010.

She has also acted as advisor to the European Trade Union confederation (ETUC) on lifelong learning and VET policy since 2012.

Jürgen Siebel

Jürgen Siebel joined Cedefop from the private sector in September 2019 as Executive Director.

Out of Thessaloniki, Cedefop supports the development of European vocational education and training (VET) policies, skills policies, and qualifications policies, and contributes to their implementation.

Loukas Zahilas

Loukas Zahilas is Head of the Department for VET and qualifications at Cedefop.

He studied Chemistry and IT and he has a PhD in educational policies.

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Cedefop organised its fourth policy learning forum on learning outcomes on 27 and 28 June 2022.

Building on the three previous events in this series, the June event brought together experts and stakeholders directly involved in the definition, writing and application of learning outcomes at the interface of education and training, and the labour market.

Reflecting the updated (in 2022) European handbook on learning outcomes, the forum paid particular attention to the application of learning outcomes for curriculum development, taking into account results of recent Cedefop studies on comparing VET qualifications and the future of VET.

 

Video recordings of the sessions 

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Cedefop’s CrowdLearn is the first study to examine how EU workers in the online platform economy develop their skills, and how these platforms match skills supply with demand, with a view to drawing lessons for European skills and education policy. Insights into what skills gig workers learn and need to be successful in th...

Cedefop’s CrowdLearn is the first study to examine how EU workers in the online platform economy develop their skills, and how these platforms match skills supply with demand, with a view to drawing lessons for European skills and education policy. Insights into what skills gig workers learn and need to be successful in the online gig economy can provide lessons for how to make vocational education and training more relevant to trends in the future of work, such as increasing reliance on self-employment, multiple jobs, contingent work, virtual remote work and algorithmic management.

Cedefop’s webinar 2030 on the horizon: skills in the online platform economy presented recent research and analysis findings based on Cedefop’s unique Crowdlearn project and reflected on their implications for European skills and education policy. In the context of the growth, sustainability and resilience ambitions of the European Skills Agenda and European Digital Strategy, Cedefop’s Crowdlearn findings can inform evidence-based policies on the future of work.

The webinar:

  • showcased the main results of Cedefop’s Crowdlearn studies to policy analysts, researchers, platform economy stakeholders and social partners.
  • presented recent research and analysis using the Crowdlearn dataset(s), focused on the determinants of workplace learning among platform workers, factors determining who is successful in remote platform work and why, relationship of platform work with self-employment and entrepreneurship potential and inter-generational barriers to learning.
  • featured a panel discussion with policy makers and social partners to explore how to improve skill development and matching policies for platform work.
  • disseminated the Crowdlearn dataset and stimulated further research and analysis.

The event was live streamed, click here to watch the video. 

 

Speakers

Anoush Margaryan

Anoush Margaryan is a Chaired Professor of Learning Sciences in the Department of Digitalization at Copenhagen Business School. She studies how people learn in digitally mediated workplaces.

She has researched workplace learning for 20+ years in a range of organisational domains, including in the energy, finance and higher education sectors and the platform economy.

Vili Lehdonvirta

Vili Lehdonvirta is Professor of Economic Sociology and Digital Social Research at the Oxford Internet Institute, University of Oxford.

He is a former member of the European Commission’s Expert Group on the Online Platform Economy and the High-Level Expert Group on Digital Transformation and EU Labour Markets.

Konstantinos Pouliakas

Konstantinos Pouliakas is an Expert on Skills and Labour Markets at the European Centre for the Development of Vocational Training (Cedefop). He is coordinator of Cedefop’s Skills and Work team and leads Cedefop’s projects on Digitalisation, AI and the Future of Work and Anticipating and Matching skills.

photo Nicholas MartindaleNicholas Martindale

Nick Martindale is a Postdoctoral Prize Research Fellow in Sociology at Nuffield College, University of Oxford, and Postdoctoral Researcher at Copenhagen Business School.

photo Jelena Sapic resizedJelena Sapic

Jelena Sapic works as a project manager of the Reshaping Work Dialogue. The Dialogue represents a collaborative effort with an aim to create a permanent knowledge interlocutor where parties with the stake in the debate on the future of work can engage in a constructive dialogue, exchange views, negotiate positions, and propose new solutions.

Iwona Ganko

Iwona Ganko is a Human Capital Development and Labour Market Expert at the European Training Foundation in Turin. She focuses on socio-economic and employment trends, new skills demand and skills dimension of active labour market policies.

photo Annarosa PesoleAnnarosa Pesole

Annarosa Pesole is the economic and technology adviser of the Italian Minister of Labour and Social Policies and a former scientific officer at the Joint Research Centre (JRC) of the European Commission. Her main research interests cover innovation and technology and their impact on labour market and society at large.

Julian Albert

Julian is a fourth-year doctoral student at the Oxford Internet Institute interested in the sociology of markets, in particular the classification of labour on online freelancing platforms. His research is supervised by Prof Vili Lehdonvirta as well as Prof Marc Ventresca.

Antonio Ranieri

Antonio Ranieri is Head of Department for VET and Skills at Cedefop. He manages a team of European experts investigating skills trends and changes in the worlds of work and support the development and implementation of the Union policy in the field of vocational education and training. The Department work encompasses a wide range of research and policy analysis in two Cedefop strategic areas of operation, namely skills and labour market and learning and employability.

Jasper Van Loo

Dr. Jasper van Loo is coordinator of Cedefop’s department for VET and Skills. He currently coordinates the labour market and skills analysis work of the agency. He is also part of the team investigating EU skills trends using online job vacancies.

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The Slovenian Ministry of Labour, Family, Social Affairs and Equal Opportunities has reached out to Cedefop to seek expert advice with regards to setting up a Skills Forecasting system and to improve the governance of skills anticipation and matching in the country.

A first workshop was organised early 2021 where technical advice was given on how best to proceed with setting up a national system while particular emphasis was placed on the challenges of organising and implementing skills forecasts in a small country. A second meeting was organised towards the end of the year which mainly addressed two main themes. First was about managing expectations; what can be expected from long term skills forecasts and where are their limitations? How to see skills forecasts in the context of other tools? The second was about the governance of skills anticipation and matching; how to ensure trust? what is the role of partners and stakeholders? how to ensure results feed into policy making? The third workshop, which concluded the support to Slovenia took place on July 4th. The main focus was to engage in discussions on how to best integrate skills anticipation into the labour market platform currently in development and strengthen skills governance.

Working with us
Reference
AO/DRS/KZIOG/HeatingOil/002/22
Closing date
07/06/2022
Reference
AO/DVS/JBRANKA-SCHATZI/Skills-Intelligence/004/22
Closing date
25/08/2022