November 27, 2003 Johan van Rens, Director 11Lisbon - Copenhagen - Maastricht ConsortiumGlobal Skills Village Helsinki May 2005

Tom Leney LeneyTO@qca.org.uk

Challenges and Opportunities that European countries face

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Competitiveness

The ‘Lisbon scorecard’

EU is weak on competitiveness and performance. Disappointing economic and employment development. Lisbon goals will not be reached without more action and innovationKok 2004

3Lisbon - Copenhagen - Maastricht ConsortiumGlobal Skills Village Helsinki May 2005

Competitiveness: who leads?

Higher gross domestic product per capita

than USA: only Luxembourg

More productive per hour: Austria, Belgium, France, Germany, Ireland, Luxembourg, Netherlands,

Different countries, different challenges - Productivity; employment; skills; investment; innovation

Successful models in Europe: the Nordic group? The case of Ireland?

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Educational attainment

General comparison

Educational attainment of adults in selected OECD countries, 2002-2003

0

10

20

30

40

50

60

EU 25 Australia Canada Japan South Korea USA

Low skilled ISCED 0-2 Upper/post secondary ISCED 3-4 Tertiary ISCED 5-6Source : OECD 2004

5Lisbon - Copenhagen - Maastricht ConsortiumGlobal Skills Village Helsinki May 2005

Skills and competences to meet future needs?

• Anticipating future skills and labour market needs: new risks, new approaches (Finland futures)

• Which are the key competences? (Estonia reforms)– Entrepreneurship is one: active skills and/or skills for

business start-up (Austria steps ahead)• Developing broad occupational competencies through

workplace learning is now the key factor for VET reform in

Europe (the Netherlands define)• Validation of informal and non-formal learning opens doors

(France innovates; Slovenia reforms)

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Low skills

By 2010 almost half of additional jobs will require

tertiary level education and almost 40 % upper

secondary level. Half (± 100 million) of EU workforce

has to up skill

At present 80 million EU citizens are low

skilled.

7Lisbon - Copenhagen - Maastricht ConsortiumGlobal Skills Village Helsinki May 2005

Lifelong learning: target low-skilled groups in the workplace

• The challenge for participation in lifelong learning. 1. Only 5 EU member states reach the EU target:

UK, Finland, Denmark, Sweden, Netherlands.

2. Variations between sectors: Communications/textiles

3. Workers with lower education attainment six times lower chance to participate in training (Frico Cheese)

4. Older workers (Sparbanken 55+), workers in declining industries (Poland, re-skilling mining regions),migrant groups (AEDGP, Romania), workers in small companies (Japan, automotive)……

• From initiatives to strategy? (Denmark)

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Early school leavers

Policies exist but benchmark of 10 % will

not be reached by all. UK disappoints. Vocational

streams and work-based learning help, but

quality, flexibility, innovative links to the world

of work are necessary

9Lisbon - Copenhagen - Maastricht ConsortiumGlobal Skills Village Helsinki May 2005

Quality VET reduces the numbers of early school leavers

• EU countries with a high proportion of young people in IVET tend to have high upper secondary completion rates and low dropout rates. Slovenia is a clear example.

• The challenge is quality– Programmes attractive to learners and to enterprises– Flexibility: focus on the learner– Links to general education– Pathways to higher education

• Quality IVET: a robust strategy - ETF’s message

10Lisbon - Copenhagen - Maastricht ConsortiumGlobal Skills Village Helsinki May 2005

Lowering barriers to mobility

• Migration after enlargement lower than expected

• VET can reduce barriers and ease frictions that currently inhibit the mobility of workers and learners

• VET has an important role to play – but is not the major driver behind migration

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Investment in human resources and quality

EU spends similar % of GDP on education as

USA (5.1%). But private spending is much lower.

Investing in skills and literacy levels will increase

quality economic growth, social cohesion and

have major benefits for individuals

12Lisbon - Copenhagen - Maastricht ConsortiumGlobal Skills Village Helsinki May 2005

VET: invest more and better!

• Investing in VET brings rewards to companies and to individuals, though often seen as a cost or treated with reluctance. Returns on low level VQs?

• Quality in initial VET, widening access to CVT, increasing European links all create costs as well as benefits: sources of funding?

• Implications for governments, employers and individuals

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Innovation strategies

Ensuring highly skilled VET professionals. Emphasis on concrete action at decentralised

level and by the social partners Establish synergy between VET policies and

economic and employment policies. Innovation agreements and tripartite commitment to foster investment in human capital

Special attention to key competences, ICT literacy and learning partnerships

14Lisbon - Copenhagen - Maastricht ConsortiumGlobal Skills Village Helsinki May 2005

Innovation in VET teaching and learning

• ‘Competence-based VET is explicitly aimed at the key issues in professions and careers, and prepares the learner’ (the Netherlands; Slovenia)

– Focus on the learner: programmes and assessment– Embrace ICT

• ICT skills • integration into work and learning processes

– Innovation through learning partnerships (GOLO project) – ‘Bench learning’: tools to scale up innovation (OMC2)

• Overcome the fragmentation of the VET profession (roles; locations; IVET/CVT)

15Lisbon - Copenhagen - Maastricht ConsortiumGlobal Skills Village Helsinki May 2005

?Three questions

• A lifelong learning strategy so stakeholders develop to optimise the learning opportunities for all target groups in the workplace?

• Quality, attractiveness, flexibility of initial VET?

• How will we best progress the agreed objectives, since countries are on different starting lines for VET and may develop differing visions of lifelong learning?

16Lisbon - Copenhagen - Maastricht ConsortiumGlobal Skills Village Helsinki May 2005

Peer learning?

• Europe enables …– Country clusters– Sectoral and social partner initiatives– Networks, research, mobility, etc … involving wider publics

• Knowledge transfer– Initiation– Adoption/adaptation– Capacity building

• From initiatives to sustainable innovation: up scaling

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Contacts

CedefopThessaloniki Greeceinfo@cedefop.eu.intwww.trainingvillage.grhttp://communities.trainingvillage.gr

Lisbon-Copenhagen-Maastricht Consortium QCA LondonLeneyto@qca.org.ukhttp://www.refernet.org.uk