Already in 1973 the Faure Commission insisted on the fact that 70% of all learning is informal. At the time it was demanded that education would build on this phenomenon and provide the necessary opportunities for it. Then in 1996 after the publication of the Delor Commission report this perspective was resumed with a new focus on activating people’s unrealised skill potential. To achieve this, the aim was to develop wherever possible one comprehensive learning system integrating both formal and informal learning. Part of this approach is also the re-definition of the role of the learner. All in all it signals a departure from knowledge-oriented to skill-oriented learning. Key skills are explicitly mentioned in this context. The Memorandum for lifelong learning and EU and ERW consultations support this direction and emphasise the necessity for a fundamentally new understanding of teaching and learning as a base for lifelong learning: equal recognition of different learning and education contexts as well as validating non-formal and informal learning achievements compared to regular vocational qualifications. The development of suitable standards, assessment and recognition procedures, skill portfolios and the introduction of institutional requirements for a consistent and transparent European framework for evaluating vocational qualifications are fundamental reference points in this process.
The aim of ICOVET was to develop and test validation procedures for vocational skills of young people gained outside the framework of institutional education. Research of the Deutsches Jugendinstitut on vocational integration of disadvantaged young people has shown, that integration can be successful if the funding and support network is matched to the requirements and background of the young people in question. One of the obstacles here is the lack of reliable information on the skill level of individuals. School leaving certificates in particular at the level of lower education often don’t accurately validate the factual skill level of individuals in particular neglecting the level of basic skills and procedural knowledge. Furthermore there often is an extreme difference in achievement within one level of certification as well as high uncertainty whether one’s basic skills can be matched to vocational and business requirements. In particular there is a lack of information on skills gained during extra-curricular experiences (e.g. employment, voluntary work, the use of new media). According to Deutsches Jugendinstitut these are very relevant for increasing someone’s employability. For young people the lack of specifically tailored support for their individual skills often results in negative understanding of their abilities and low self-esteem that can influence further learning. Educational institutions on the other hand are not aware enough which young people would ultimately benefit most from their programme i.e. to which it would neither be over nor under challenging.
Particular interest in this context was placed on how the results of such a validation instrument can be fed back into the design of pre-vocational education and vocational qualification of disadvantaged young people. How can teaching and training staff help to transfer informal and non-formal learning experiences into the institutional learning context? To support staff in their role as advisors and mediators the project developed a framework and best practice guide for the methodical and didactical inclusion of informal and non-formal learning. The best practice guide is envisaged as a guideline for schools and institutions providing them with valuable information for planning personalised education and development. To follow this up a train-the-trainer module seeks to establish systematic reference to the changing teaching/learning dynamic by communicating to the teaching staff new perspectives for more mentor-oriented and more supportive education models based on higher transparency of qualifications and skills.
The target group for this project are on the one hand disadvantaged young people at transition stage between school education and vocational training, i.e. adolescents that have been excluded from regular, vocational qualifications due to unsuitable school education, social disadvantages, or structural discrimination and have not risked to find support matching their particular conditions and requirements. Secondly, the project targets experts working in institutions that offer relevant opportunities, and policy makers of the educational sector, social welfare, labour administration on a regional, national and European level responsible for the design of such support programmes. The third target group form human resource departments of companies, chambers and similar institutions. Target sectors are institutions that offer specifically support programmes for disadvantaged young people. In Germany these are: polytechnics, youth welfare service, companies; In Greece, Great Britain, Ireland and Romania and Spain equivalent institutions offering vocational qualification programmes to disadvantaged adolescents post school education. Together these institutions share the desire to recondition the support for social disadvantage, to develop and build on social and personal skills, tackle learning deficits and offer opportunities to catch up on missed educational qualifications, helping to find suitable professional perspectives and relevant training, mediation of basic skills necessary for successful learning.
Research of the Deutsches Jugendinstitut on extra-curricular learning of young people has shown that there is a clear difference in the kinds of skills gained between the genders (Wahler 2003). Moreover Schulewski has shown in her study on ‘Doing Gender’ conducted with experts working with the disadvantaged, that the chances for boys and girls to gain key skills during such support programmes are heavily influenced by how much experts reflect on and integrate gender related issues into their work. However, there is currently little consideration of ‘gender mainstreaming’ in approaches to validating informal and non-formal learning. Consequently the institutions of this partnership evaluated parallel to the individual project stages the corresponding gender-specific effects and consider the results for the work on the developing level.
