This article reviews Education for Sustainability (EfS) in the secondary sector across a range of countries. Drawing on journal articles, book chapters and official reports, it identifies some of the more successful approaches to implementing EfS within the secondary sector. The authors first discuss the importance of educating for sustainability…

Our study examines the organising of transitions in Vocational Education and Training in a rural Norwegian municipality. In Norway, Vocational Education and Training is diverse and interlinked in continual organising. Organising, in this context, is a continuous set of actions forming recognisable patterns that become institutions. An upper…

Over the last 15 years, different countries have developed low-level vocational education and training (VET) programmes for young people who struggle to enter or complete education at upper secondary level. Switzerland introduced nationally standardised two-year initial VET programmes in 2005, Norway in 2016. Data of interviews with curriculum…

Recent vocational education and training (VET) reforms in many countries have focused on reducing the number of VET qualifications available and restructuring qualifications so that they better meet the needs of working life. This literature review provides examples of how VET qualifications have been rationalised in various countries and briefly…

Continuing professional development (CPD) for teachers in vocational education and training (VET) in Norway has largely been either the responsibility of each individual teacher or a by-product of teachers' cooperation related to student placements. Additionally, VET teachers' professional development is influenced by external drivers. These…

Developments in five priority areas for VET, agreed in 2015 by the EU-28, Iceland, Norway, candidate countries, the European Commission and EU social partners, are at the centre of this report. Work in 2015-19 shows continuity with earlier national strategies and initiatives. It confirms the recent focus on apprenticeships and other forms of…

Schools today face the challenge of preparing students to live, work, and prosper in a rapidly changing world. As a response to this global challenge, Norway has adopted a national curriculum focusing on the development of 21st-century skills. In this study, we investigate if and how the tasks in science and language arts textbooks in…

Based on analysis of developments during the past two decades (1995-2015), the report provides important insights into the responsiveness of national VET systems, notably in relation to changes in demography, technology and the economy. Building on detailed national case studies, this report demonstrates how 'big shocks' (the fall of the Berlin…

This study is the first volume of Cedefop research on empowering adults through upskilling and reskilling pathways. It estimates the magnitude of the low-skilled adult population according to a broader conceptualisation which goes beyond educational attainment levels, and considers digital skills, literacy and numeracy, as well as skill loss and…

This report is the second volume of Cedefop research on empowering adults through upskilling and reskilling pathways. It presents the Cedefop analytical framework for developing upskilling pathways for low-skilled adults and illustrates its conceptual development. The analytical framework is aimed at supporting policymakers and stakeholders in…

This article presents a case study aiming at deepening the understanding of action research as a tool in professional development in pre-service teacher education. The case is the practice of action research in a teacher education programme for secondary school teachers in Norway. While there has been limited research on consequences of inquiry,…

Background and purpose: The interest in raising the competence of teachers through networks and network activities is increasing. This article is based on the voices of four newly qualified teachers who give us the opportunity to listen to experiences in authentic surroundings. The purpose of this article is to gain better insight into the type of…

Drawing on sociocultural perspectives on educational design, this article presents a qualitative study investigating how religious texts emerge as educational objects and mediating artefacts in Norwegian textbooks of religious and moral education. The article describes how the distribution of text references in textbooks influences the formation…

In this article, we analyse the school developmental work of a project team in Norwegian upper secondary schools. The team aims to improve teaching and learning by making use of new technologies. The aim of the article is to explore the "black box" of developmental work practices by analysing the interactions between the team members to…

This report provides an update of Cedefop's statistical overview of vocational education and training (VET) and lifelong learning in European countries. It illustrates progress on 33 indicators selected for their policy relevance and contribution to Europe 2020 objectives. These also provide a review of progress in key areas of education and…