Shaping learning and skills for Europe

Roxana Mînzatu leads work to strengthen Europe’s human capital by advancing social rights, closing skills and labour gaps, ensuring quality jobs and fair transitions, promoting education and equality, supporting youth, tackling poverty, and fostering lifelong learning and workforce adaptability. 

Li Andersson is a Member of the European Parliament and Chair of the Committee on Employment and Social Affairs. In Finland, she has served as leader of the Left Alliance, Member of Parliament and Minister of Education in the Marin government (2019-2023).
Her political work combines a strong stance on fundamental and human rights, an ambitious environmental and climate policy with traditional left-wing policies such as strengthening workers' rights and reducing economic and social inequalities.

Mario Patuzzi is Head of the Unit VET Policies at the DGB Federal Executive Committee in Berlin. He is a political scientist and social business economist and has worked as a trade union secretary since 2004, initially in the area of trade union youth. In his current role, he is particularly concerned with the legal framework of the dual vocational training system and issues such as validation, the National Qualifications Framework, National Skills Strategy and quality assurance.

He represents the German Trade Union Confederation (DGB) on numerous bodies, including Cedefop’s Management Board. He is currently its chairman.

Zelda Azzarà has been a Cedefop expert in the Department for VET and qualifications since 2021. She works on qualifications and EU transparency tools and principles, particularly within the context of the European and national qualifications frameworks and learning outcomes approach. Currently, she is responsible for the project on transparency and transferability of learning outcomes.

He leads the Agency’s Skills and Work team and is principal research manager of its Digitalisation and Future of Work and Skill Mismatch projects. His proudest achievement is the development of two waves of the Cedefop European Skills and Jobs Survey.

Lidia Salvatore is expert for adult learning and continuing vocational training at Cedefop and is responsible for Cedefop work on empowering adults through upskilling and reskilling pathways and on CVET.  Prior to joining Cedefop Lidia worked as a research officer in Eurofound, in the field of youth employment policies.  

Jürgen Siebel joined Cedefop from the private sector in September 2019. As Executive Director, he is responsible for managing the Agency’s operations in accordance with the strategic direction of its tripartite Management Board.

Dr. Pilvi Torsti, is the Director of the European Training Foundation. She served as a State Secretary in three ministries in Finland: Ministry of Education and Culture (2013-2015), Ministry of Employment and Economic Affairs & Ministry of Transport and Communications (2019-2023). From 2017 to 2019, Pilvi Torsti was an MP and a member of the Education and Future Committees of the Finnish parliament. 

 

Cinzia del Rio has been the President of the Employment, Social Affairs and Citizenship (SOC) section of the European Economic and Social Committee (EESC) since April 2023. She has been a member of the EESC (Workers' group) since 2015.  

Beata Dziemińska-Skowron responsibilities involve labour market monitoring and preparing organisational and legislative solutions related to the adaptation of vocational education system to the labour market needs, as well as career guidance, the graduate tracking system and forecast of the demand for employees in VET occupations on the national and regional labour market. She is the Ministry’s representative in the EU expert and working groups. 

Riikka Heikinheimo’s task as Director of the Confederation of Finnish Industries is to follow and influence the politics and legislation in order to develop public system and private practices to meet the skill challenges. She has followed and influenced skills, competencies, innovativeness, growth and renewal throughout her entire career.

Henrik Kjeldsen is the CEO of EuroSkills Herning 2025, leading the planning and execution of Europe’s largest vocational skills competition in Denmark. With a strong background in leadership and project management, he is responsible for bringing EuroSills to life on Danish ground and delivering a successful event for all athletes and stakeholders involved.

Giuseppina Tucci serves as Treasurer of Civil Society Europe representing the Lifelong Learning Platform. She is also works as the Secretary General of the Organising Bureau of European School Student Unions (OBESSU), representing national school student unions across Europe. She is a strong advocate for learner-centred lifelong learning policies and stakeholders' involvement in EU policy making.

Scilla van Cuijlenborg is Vice-President of EuproVET, Board Member of the European Federation of Education Employers and Senior Strategic Policy Advisor for the VET Sector at MBO Raad Woerden, the Dutch association of schools in secondary vocational education and adult education, working on  European affairs, Innovation and research and the future of (VET) education.

Ludovic Voet was re-elected Confederal Secretary at the ETUC Congress in Berlin, in May 2023. He is responsible for the ETUC area of work for an economy that works for the people and the planet. He thus fights for a sustainable economic model, a reform of the economic governance and the EU Semester, fair taxation and an EU fiscal capacity and EU funds fit for the twin transitions. He also follows just transition, climate, energy and industrial policies as well policies of upskilling and reskilling of the workforce.

Theodor Grassos is Secretary-General of the European Association of Institutes for Vocational Training (EVBB). At the EU level, he has been working for different DGs and EU Programmes. 

He has also collaborated with the Structural Reform Support Service (now DG Reform). He is currently working with EU institutions and key umbrella organisations in employment, education and social inclusion. He is a member of the European Commission's 'Working Group on VET and the Green Transition’ and the ‘Working Group on Adult Learning – Opening Up Opportunities for All’.

As Secretary General of the European Parents' Association, Petra brings a vital perspective to addressing teacher shortages in vocational education and training by emphasizing the crucial role of actively engaging parents and fostering strong collaboration between families and educational settings to ensure quality education. Her background in education and parental coaching, informed by the voice of parents across Europe, underscores this essential link.

Irene Psifidou is the VET for Youth - Teachers and trainers team facilitator at the Cedefop’s department for VET and Skills. In her 20-year service as an expert at Cedefop, Irene is leading the Agency’s work on inclusion and excellence. She oversees Cedefop’s new European VET teachers Survey, the creator of the ‘VET toolkit for tackling early leaving’ as well as the ‘VET toolkit for empowering NEETs’, and the coordinator of Cedefop’s European virtual community of ambassadors. 

She also co-manages a new research project on Digital skills for tomorrow: promoting inclusive excellence in VET to map and assess the current landscape of digital skills provision by employing natural language processing (NLP) techniques.

Agnes Roman has been senior policy coordinator of the European Trade Union Committee for Education (ETUCE) for 15 years, responsible for trade union policies on formal education and teachers’ qualification. She has been cooperating with Cedefop on a pan-European survey on VET teachers’ professional development, and on its polit survey since 2018. 

Iryna Shumik is the Director General of the Directorate of Vocational Education at the Ukrainian Ministry of Education and Science. She was previously Head of the Department of science, higher education and certification expertise at the Department of Education and Science of the Dnipropetrovsk regional administration. In 2003 she received the Prize of the Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine for the contribution of youth to the development of the state.

Daniel Wisniewski PhD MBA – Secretary General of the European Federation of Education Employers (EFEE), Co-Founder and Coordinator of Educational Leadership Network Europe (ELNE), Manager of the European Education Month (EEM), Founder of #EducationChatter YouTUBE channel, Expert in education policy - member of various Expert Groups on education and training coordinated by the European Commission and OECD.

Brikena Xhomaqi is the Director of the Lifelong Learning Platform - European Civil Society for Education (former EUCIS-LLL). LLLPlatform represents over 40 European civil society networks in the field of education, from early childhood to adult education, including formal, non-formal and informal learning providers and learners. 
She is the co-chair of the European Economic and Social Committee Liaison Group of Civil Society. She is a former member of the Civil Society Europe Steering Committee, Head of Office of the European Students’ Union (ESU) and Director of the Erasmus Student Network (ESN).  

Professor Vlado Dimovski is a distinguished management and organisational theory scholar at the University of Ljubljana, Faculty of Economics. He is a leading expert in organisational learning, knowledge management, and leadership. 

Dr Barbara Dorn is Director for Education/Vocational Training at the Confederation of German Employers’ Associations (BDA). Her key activities are coordinating position making processes in the field of education and vocational training, developing strategic position papers and representing the employers’ view at national and European level. 

Carlo Frising is the Vice CEO at the Chambre des Salariés Luxembourg, CSL (professional chamber representing the interests of the employees). He oversees the Luxembourg Lifelong Learning Centre, the CVET centre of the CSL. He is a member of the Advisory Committee on Vocational Training (ACVT) of the European Commission and a member of the European Trade Union Confederation (ETUC) Education and Training Committee.

 

Andrea Leruste  is Deputy Head of Unit B3 at DG EMPL (Vocational education and training, Skills Portability, Cedefop). She was previously Deputy Head of Unit for European Social Fund Plus. Until 2017, she was responsible for microfinance and social enterprise support and previously for gender equality. 

Robert is a senior adviser responsible for issues concerning migration and mobility, education and skills, social dialogue and the European Labour Authority.

Prior to joining BusinessEurope, Robert worked as a political adviser for the Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe (ALDE) party.

Peter Thiele is Deputy Director for VET policy at the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF).
He represents Germany in several international, European and national VET strategy and programme committees, and heads the BMBF Division for Vocational Continuing Training Policy, covering basic policy issues, skills strategy, innovation and digitalisation in VET and several innovation programmes.

 

Mario Nava is the Director-General of Directorate-General for Employment, Social Affairs and Inclusion of the European Commission.  
Previously, he was the Director-General of DG REFORM and has held Director and Head of Unit posts in the DG for Financial Services. He was also President of the Italian Financial Market Authority. He teaches at Bocconi University and at Solvay Business School. In 2023, he was awarded the title of Bocconi Alumnus of the year.
 

Ali Al-Jaberi is a professional presenter and moderator of high-level events, with a background in journalism and academia. He worked as a  TV Correspondent for AP (Europe), TV presenter and  war reporter for De Standaard and Trouw newspapers . In addition, Ali was appointed Lecturer of Public Management  at The Hague University. He is the winner of multiple public speaking awards.