- 2016Pilot
- 2017Pilot
- 2018Pilot
- 2019Pilot
- 2020Pilot
- 2021Pilot
- 2022Pilot
- 2023Pilot
- 2024Pilot
Description
Cross-over qualifications combine elements of several qualifications from different domains to create innovative training programmes. The first application period for the experiment (pilot) in cross-over qualifications in MBOs lasted until 15 September 2016. Applications submitted before this date could offer cross-over qualifications in the school year 2017/18.
This initiative offered an alternative route for developing cross-over qualifications. Apart from the regular route where qualifications are drawn up by national sector chambers under the direction of the SBB (Cooperation organisation of VET and the labour market), there is a second experimental cross-over route. In the latter, qualifications are developed by an education institution (MBO school) in cooperation with local industries, based, however, on parts of formal (SBB) qualifications. Part of this initiative is to examine whether the second route can be seen as an additional one, suitable for combining specific qualifications, focussing on innovative, fast growing cross-sectoral occupations.
Regardless of the route, the quality of qualifications has to be reviewed by SBB.
This experiment runs until July 2025. It is related to the Making room for the region initiative; they have similar goals and challenges.
In 2019, 36 cross-over qualifications had already been developed in the pilot project.
The first evaluation report of the experiment showed that in the first three application rounds, a total of 52 applications were approved, 28 of which were in the third round. By mid-March 2020, the fourth application round had had 47 applications approved. The primary motive for participating in the experiment was a changed or new profession and a concrete demand from companies. The number of students in cross-over programmes is increasing. In 2019/20, approximately 3 350 students followed a cross-over course, twice as many as a year earlier.
VET colleges and companies work closely together to develop cross-over qualifications. They sign a mandatory cooperation agreement as part of the application. A side effect of this agreement is that the cooperation remains intensive.
The education ministry stated that the experiment showed that having influence on the content of qualifications increased commitment and ownership of schools and the business community. However, schools are not used to developing qualifications. Developing qualifications requires expertise from the SBB. In a letter to parliament, the Minister for Education announced that a new working method will be designed, in which SBB and the education and business sectors will cooperate in formulating new qualifications.
In December 2021, the education ministry published a newsletter about the follow-up to the 4-year crossovers after the end of the experiment in 2025. In this experiment, VET institutions have developed seven crossovers at level 4 with the regional business community. The crossovers have been established by the education ministry but are not part of the regular qualification structure. At request of the education ministry, SBB has issued an advice on the follow-up of the seven 4-year crossovers. The aim of the advice is to safeguard the valuable components of these crossovers when the experiment ends on 31 July 2025. Registration is no longer possible for four crossovers for the 2022/23 school year. For these crossovers, education and the business community should recommend a suitable solution within the current regular qualification structure. For the other three crossovers, SBB advised education and the business community to ensure substantive follow-up in the regular qualification structure. This concerns the following crossovers: middle management officer smart building, middle management officer smart industry and personal supervisor care farm. The education ministry, the VET council and SBB are calling on VET institutions that do not offer the 4-year level 4 crossovers to use the final (revised) qualification files in 2023/24 in which the crossover qualifications are incorporated. For the other 3 crossovers (middle management officer smart building, middle management officer smart industry and personal supervisor care farm), SBB advised education and the business community to ensure substantive follow-up in the regular qualification structure.
At the request of the Education Ministry, SBB has issued an advice on the follow-up of the 2- and 3-year crossovers that VET institutions developed with the regional business community in the experiment. This follows the advice on the 4-year level-4 crossovers (2021). The advice considers 30 3-year cross-overs and seven 2-year cross-overs.
In the advice there are 3 options:
- 13 3-year and six 2-year cross-overs will not be followed-up. Two reasons are given: Either education and employers (working together in SBB) have concluded that there are enough possibilities within the existing qualification structure for these cross-overs; or there is no labour market relevance at the national level.
- seven 3-year and one 2-year cross-overs will be followed-up by changing an existing qualification, or developing a new optional module (keuzedeel).
- 10 3-year cross-overs will be followed-up in the qualification structure at a later stage. For the time being they will be included in the qualification structure temporarily without modification.
There is no additional information available on the status of the pilots since 2023.
There is no additional information available on the status of the pilots since 2023.
Bodies responsible
- Ministry of Education, Culture and Science
- Council for upper secondary VET schools (MBO Raad)
- Cooperation organisation for VET and the labour market (SBB)
Target groups
Learners
- Learners in upper secondary, including apprentices
Thematic categories
Governance of VET and lifelong learning
This thematic category looks at existing legal frameworks providing for strategic, operational – including quality assurance – and financing arrangements for VET and lifelong learning (LLL). It examines how VET and LLL-related policies are placed in broad national socioeconomic contexts and coordinate with other strategies and policies, such as economic, social and employment, growth and innovation, recovery and resilience.
This thematic category covers partnerships and collaboration networks of VET stakeholders – especially the social partners – to shape and implement VET in a country, including looking at how their roles and responsibilities for VET at national, regional and local levels are shared and distributed, ensuring an appropriate degree of autonomy for VET providers to adapt their offer.
The thematic category also includes efforts to create national, regional and sectoral skills intelligence systems (skills anticipation and graduate tracking) and using skills intelligence for making decisions about VET and LLL on quality, inclusiveness and flexibility.
This thematic sub-category refers both to formal mechanisms of stakeholder engagement in VET governance and to informal cooperation among stakeholders, which motivate shared responsibility for quality VET. Formal engagement is usually based on legally established institutional procedures that clearly define the role and responsibilities for relevant stakeholders in designing, implementing and improving VET. It also refers to establishing and increasing the degree of autonomy of VET providers for agile and flexible VET provision.
In terms of informal cooperation, the sub-category covers targeted actions by different stakeholders to promote or implement VET. This cooperation often leads to creating sustainable partnerships and making commitments for targeted actions, in line with the national context and regulation, e.g. national alliances for apprenticeships, pacts for youth or partnerships between schools and employers. It can also include initiatives and projects run by the social partners or sectoral organisations or networks of voluntary experts and executives, retired or on sabbatical, to support their peers in the fields of VET and apprenticeships, as part of the EAfA.
Modernising VET offer and delivery
This thematic category looks at what and how individuals learn, how learning content and learning outcomes in initial and continuing VET are defined, adapted and updated. First and foremost, it examines how VET standards, curricula, programmes and training courses are updated and modernised or new ones created. Updated and renewed VET content ensures that learners acquire a balanced mix of competences that address modern demands, and are more closely aligned with the realities of the labour market, including key competences, digital competences and skills for green transition and sustainability, both sector-specific and across sectors. Using learning outcomes as a basis is important to facilitate this modernisation, including modularisation of VET programmes. Updating and developing teaching and learning materials to support the above is also part of the category.
The thematic category continues to focus on strengthening high-quality and inclusive apprenticeships and work-based learning in real-life work environments and in line with the European framework for quality and effective apprenticeships. It looks at expanding apprenticeship to continuing vocational training and at developing VET programmes at EQF levels 5-8 for better permeability and lifelong learning and to support the need for higher vocational skills.
This thematic category also focuses on VET delivery through a mix of open, digital and participative learning environments, including workplaces conducive to learning, which are flexible, more adaptable to the ways individuals learn, and provide more access and outreach to various groups of learners, diversifying modes of learning and exploiting the potential of digital learning solutions and blended learning to complement face-to-face learning.
Centres of vocational excellence that connect VET to innovation and skill ecosystems and facilitate stronger cooperation with business and research also fall into this category.
VET standards and curricula define the content and outcomes of learning, most often at national or sectoral levels. VET programmes are based on standards and curricula and refer to specific vocations/occupations. They all need to be regularly reviewed, updated and aligned with the needs of the labour market and society. They need to include a balanced mix of vocational and technical skills corresponding to economic cycles, evolving jobs and working methods, and key competences, providing for resilience, lifelong learning, employability, social inclusion, active citizenship, sustainable awareness and personal development (Council of the European Union, 2020). The thematic sub-category also refers to establishing new VET programmes, reducing their number or discontinuing some. It also includes design of CVET programmes and training courses to adapt to labour market, sectoral or individual up- and re-skilling needs.
Transparency and portability of VET skills and qualifications
European principles and tools, such as EQF, ESCO, ECTS, Europass and ECVET, provide a strong basis for transparency and portability of national and sectoral qualifications across Europe, including the issuing of digital diplomas and certificates.
This thematic category looks at how individuals are supported in transferring, accumulating, and validating skills and competences acquired in formal, non-formal and informal settings – including learning on the job – and in having their learning recognised towards a qualification at any point of their lives. This is only possible if qualifications are transparent and comparable and are part of comprehensive national qualifications frameworks. Availability of qualifications smaller than full and acquirable in shorter periods of time is necessary; some countries have recently worked on developing partial qualifications, microcredentials, etc.
This thematic sub-category refers to the development and implementation of qualifications that are smaller than full qualifications (alternative credentials) or are acquired in a shorter learning experience. It includes microcredentials, partial qualifications, units of learning outcomes (ECVET principle), digital badges, etc. These are owned by learners and can be combined or not to get a full qualification.
Subsystem
Further reading
Country
Type of development
Cedefop, & ReferNet. (2025). Responsive cross-over qualifications: Netherlands. In Cedefop, & ReferNet. (2025). Timeline of VET policies in Europe (2024 update) [Online tool].
https://www.cedefop.europa.eu/en/tools/timeline-vet-policies-europe/search/28440