Project Implementation Plan WP 2007 ILP 07-01 Key Competences
1. Background The discussion on key competences has recently received heightened interest in view of the slow progress education systems were making to prepare learners for economies requiring multi-skilled, highly innovative and adaptive people and for societies in which individuals need to manage complex careers alternating more frequently between working and learning. An EU framework defines communication in mother tongue and a foreign language, basic literacy in maths, science and technology, digital competence, learning-to-learn competence, interpersonal, intercultural, social and civic competences; a sense of innovation and entrepreneurship and cultural awareness and expression as the key competences essential for lifelong learning. A key question for reform practitioners is how these key competences are developed by individuals and which learning settings, methods and contents are conducive to promoting those. The issue is about creating an enabling learning environment and using effective, experience-based learning strategies in schools and other places of learning, or essentially about modern pedagogies or, as it was formulated in Germany in the early 1990s, ‘action competence’. With this project we aim to explore further and understand the concept of key competences and how these are developed, using the case of transition countries, and to draw policy conclusions for future education and reform processes. Policy lessons will be disseminated at the ETF, EC/ international donors’ and partner country level and shall be integrated in future VET reform designs, possibly supported with national, EU or other donors’ funding. An ETF project on Key competences for lifelong learning was launched in 2006 as a regional project, in which Albania, Croatia, the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, Serbia and Montenegro are involved. A first expert meeting took place in Turin, 30-31 March 2006, where OECD and EU key competence frameworks, issues and policy implications for partner countries were discussed. One outcome of the meeting was an agreement amongst the countries involved to assess in more detail how the development of key competences is currently promoted in current teaching & learning practices and where respective shortcomings are. The final outcome of this assessment was to come up with a number of recommendations for the countries as to how to shape education and training reform processes and how to move forward with the key competence policy agenda. For their research, the countries selected two out of the eight key competences - Learning to Learn (LtL) and Entrepreneurial spirit & innovation, and the work was divided as follows:
Educational level Primary Education Primary Education and Secondary VET Secondary VET Secondary VET and
Country Croatia Montenegro Serbia fYR Macedonia -
Action developing instruments and support research in other countries revising/developing instruments research revising/developing instruments research revising/developing instruments
Higher Education Secondary VET and Higher Education
Albania
-
research revising/developing instruments research
By early 2007, participating countries will have: • drawn up a policy brief containing policy recommendations regarding LTL and entrepreneurship competences; • developed an advocacy/ media plan based on the research results and • completed their research with students, teachers, school managers, policy-makers and other key stakeholders and produced a synthesis report outlining key policy conclusions and recommendations;
• presented results to high-level educational policy officials and the press.
2. Objectives and results Objectives of the project are: • Participants understand the concept of key competences and develop relevant policy conclusions and recommendations to suit learners’ needs and contexts in their own countries. • Policy lessons have been disseminated and a debate has been launched at the ETF, EU/ international donors’ and partner country level about the rationale and concept of key competences and how future education and training reforms could be shaped to develop key competences through conducive environments & frameworks and suitable teaching and learning strategies. Expected results of the final phase of the project in 2007 include: • Participants are aware about how key competences, in particular LtL competence and a spirit of entrepreneurship & initiative, could be developed and what needed to be changed in the current system; • Key policy lessons for education and training reforms with a view to help promote the development of key competences have been synthesised, covering the following aspects: o Legislative and governance framework/ Autonomy of schools o School management and school culture (incl. support provided to schools and within schools) o Role of inspection or system monitoring/ supervision (the role of advisers in schools) – if relevant o Curriculum framework o Competences of teachers and teachers’ training o Teaching methods o (Learning outcome) Standards, tests & examinations (incl. the giving of marks) • Policy lessons have been shared and discussed with a wider audience inside and outside ETF with a view to integrate them in future ETF projects and education and training reform designs in partner countries. See Logical Framework attached in Annex 1. 3. Scope • Project approach
In the conclusive project phase an expert will be hired to review, as an example, the VET teacher training modules developed in Montenegro for their potential to help teachers understand and practice the development of key competences. A final conference will be organised at the ETF end of March 2007, where the expert will present his or her findings. In addition, country teams will present their findings from research, using a common format (see attached in Annex), and work towards some common policy conclusions and recommendations. The ETF will write these up and include them as a chapter into the ETF Yearbook 2007 or publish them as a stand-alone article. As most of the policy recommendations will be about teaching and learning practices, the development of key
competences is planned to be taken up as an important topic by the IPA Teaching and Learning project.
Annex 1 – Logical framework – Key Competences INTERVENTION LOGIC OBJECTIVELY VERIFIABLE INDICATORS SOURCES OF VERIFICATION RISKS AND ASSUMPTIONS extremely limited timeframe. To allow not only for the implementation of relevant development projects in participating countries, but also ensure adequate closing-up and dissemination phases (in the country and across countries), projects would need to continue and receive more funding in and beyond 2007. Number of participants involved in the ILP is very small which may limit the policy impact.
OVERALL OBJECTIVE Participants of the meeting as well as ETF staff will fully understand concept of key competences with special focus on two competences, learning to learn and entrepreneurship learning
On the regional conference in March national expert teams will present their findings and recommendations from their research project on key competences.
Regional expert conference National dissemination events. Input to ETF publication
SPECIFIC OBJECTIVE(S) Participants understand the concept of key competences and develop relevant policy conclusions and recommendations to suit learners’ needs and contexts in their own countries. A debate has been launched with a view to pay more attention in the future to the importance of key competences in future education and training reform projects in ETF partner
Constructive discussion about the concept of key competencies and their implications for educational planning, processes and outcomes during regional conference and results disseminated through national dissemination activities; concrete teaching and learning policies and practices suitable to develop key competences with both young people and adults will
Workshop agenda Participants’ reflection papers, including recommendations for their own countries or institutions; ETF synthesis paper with focus on key definitions and concepts, innovative teaching and learning methods and key findings from the projects including relevant case studies. ETF Cappuccino discussion Input to ETF publication
countries and how to develop these through conducive environments & frameworks and suitable teaching and learning strategies.
be presented during conference; Instruments used include literature reviews, identification of relevant studies or cases
RESULTS R1: Participants are aware about how key competences, in particular LtL and an entrepreneurial spirit, could be developed and what needed to be changed in the current system;
Constructive discussion about the concept of key competencies and their implications for educational planning, processes and outcomes during regional conference and results disseminated through national dissemination activities;
R2: Key findings are synthesised and presented to a wider audience inside and outside ETF.
“Cappuccino” Dissemination activities in countries National reports published on ETF web site ETF publication
MEANS ACTIVITIES 1.1: External expert undertakes review of research reports from five participating countries. 1.2: ETF/EGA organise final 2-day conference for 30 participants at ETF end March 2007 2.1: External expert/ETF draw up synthesis report and publishes article. Hiring of expert through AGMIN fwk contractor EGA fwk contractor
PRECONDITIONS