This briefing reports on recent developments affecting Europe's recognition regimes -- both professional and academic. At the start of 2023, the European Year of Skills, the author looks at the context facing higher education stakeholders across four areas: the European labour market, Ukraine, developments in the higher education sector and the…

This briefing reports on recent developments affecting Europe's recognition regimes -- both professional and academic. Currently, the principal change factor is the drive to digitalise, accelerated by the new circumstances created by the pandemic. The crisis in Ukraine, too, has prompted a range of initiatives. Meanwhile, uncertainty still…

In the last eight months, Europe's recovery agenda has become clearer. The focus on digitalisation is sharper and other developments already in train have accelerated. Questions of training and qualification are back into the spotlight -- in an EU labour market now smaller as a result of Brexit. As usual in times of labour market disruption,…

This article investigates what is claimed to be a shift towards national and European education systems based on Learning Outcomes (LO). We propose to delineate LO into three instruments (pedagogical, policy and organisational). When LO are related to a pedagogical debate, they can easily be positioned to constructivist learning theories in which…

This article contributes to the comparative literature on the growing role of "validation of prior learning," by analyzing the emergence and implementation of VPL in North Macedonia. Based on documents and qualitative interviews, the article provides an historical- institutionalist perspective on these processes. The article argues that…

The Capacity Building for Higher Education (CBHE) action of the Erasmus+ Programme supports the modernisation and development of HEIs and educational systems in the Partner Countries. The higher education sector is a driving force for the economy and society as a whole and the role of the CBHE action is important as it has a long-term structural…

There are dual roles of higher education institutions as recipients of higher education policy and as agents for change in the knowledge economy in their regions and in the world. In the case of academic institutions within the European Union, they are primarily the recipients of policy change influenced by the European level. Secondarily, they…

The construction of European education policy builds on a widely shared goal of transparency in qualifications, upheld by the popular narrative of mobile students endowed with scholarships from the EU Erasmus programme, which allow them to transfer credit points between universities and across national borders. EU education policy is increasingly…

This paper aims at highlighting and interpreting current empirical facets of the Greek educational pathogeny through a sociological approach. Especially, the paper tries to investigate the relationship between education and employment in modern Greece based on the annual statistical report of KANEP/GSEE, choosing both selected facets and…

EU policy makers are facing increased urgency to integrate and energise the professional labour market, especially in the context of the fallout of the COVID-19 pandemic, the push towards the green and digital transitions and the defence of the Single Market following Brexit. This latest policy briefing on the recognition of professionals looks at…

This research paper is one in a series produced as part of the Cedefop project The changing nature and role of VET (2016-18). The aim of the paper is to provide an overview of how CVET is conceptualised in various international level policy documents and how it is referred to across countries. It discusses national conceptions of CVET, the…

This report aims to provide insight into the realities faced by higher education academic staff at a time of fast-moving change and increasing societal demand. Fluctuating student numbers, new funding and steering mechanisms are among the features of today's European higher education landscape, but not enough is known about how academic staff are…

This article provides an overview of the profiling of higher education programmes in Europe as part of the overall process of higher education reform in Europe over the past decade (2000-2012) and of the role of Tuning in this process. The article starts with a recall of the architecture and objectives of the change process, based on the interplay…

Students and scholars leaving their homes in search of education and knowledge is not a new phenomenon. An indispensable resource for understanding the international mobility of students, this book reveals how the global mobility of such students, scholars, programs, and institutions of higher education have evolved over time. Kemal Guruz explores…

Certificates, diplomas and titles are commonly known as qualifications. Their purpose is to show employers, training providers, and individuals what the person holding the qualification has learned and can do. Every country issues many different qualifications, but for the European labor market to work as intended--that is for European citizens to…