The BEEHiVES project (Boosting European Exchange on Higher VET and Employer Involvement in Education Structures) addressed cooperation in the strategic partnership triangle defined as collaboration between HVET/PHE, employers and students. It examined how the strategic triangle contributed towards the development of skills relevant to labour market needs and equip students with the knowledge and skills relevant for their long-term employability, entrepreneurship and personal development. Our main question was: How can a strategic partnership and cooperation between providers of higher vocational education and training and professional higher education (HVET/PHE), employers and students be strengthened? The project brought together representatives of the strategic triangle to exchange innovative practices and deliver recommendations for improving employer involvement in HVET/PHE. In the first year of the project the partners identified how HVET/PHE is organized in six European countries (Basque Country/Spain, Czech Republic, Denmark, Flanders/Belgium, Germany and the United Kingdom). During the second year, the project surveyed stakeholders throughout Europe, through a mixture of methods to gain a more in depth understanding of their inter-collaborations. Main ResultsThe fast-pacing change due to developments in technology is a concern for all stakeholder groups, and implies an area requiring closer, more consistent, long-term collaboration. Effective methods of collaboration have centred around joint participation of stakeholders in governance and consultation structures, joint knowledge transfer and extensive surveying of stakeholders to inform decision-making.Compared to graduates from more academic streams of education, employers find graduates from HVET/PHE to be more employable. Nevertheless, they universally indicate that there is still significant room for improvement, arguing that graduates do not have the necessary soft skills and attitudes to enter the labour market without additional training. All stakeholders admit a significant difference in cultures between the three groups as the main barrier to strengthened collaboration. These cultural differences can be exacerbated by practices such as excessive bureaucracy and lack of flexibility at educational institutions; excessive focus on short term economic returns (rather than long-term benefits from training) on the side of businesses, especially during economic fluctuations and recessions; and the weakness of processes to enable student participation in most decision-making structures.Our research indicates that setting collaboration as a priority and then relying on organic growth, does not lead to a truly integrated strategic triangle. Collaboration is enabled at:-micro-level by strategies for supporting individualised collaboration pathways allow for individual students, SMEs and businesses to collaborate on specific projects-meso-level by structured collaboration boards within the structures of HVET/PHE organisations, business chambers or student associations allow for top-down coordination of the relationship providing that these boards have regular contact, to work on specific objectives measured against pre-set targets-macro-level by empowering regional forums bringing together all three stakeholders to set the goals of collaboration since these allow for the overall purpose of the strategic triangle to be set within a wider societal context.Impact and ConclusionsThe strategic triangle is at the heart of the BEEHiVES project, and more widely, the heart of the mission of HVET/PHE Institutions. Paying true attention to the importance of the triangle implies deeply integrating and mainstreaming these indicators into quality systems operated by all parties. The sum of our research indicates that collaboration in HVET/PHE has primarily been focused around collaboration between educational institutions and businesses for the benefit of students and the wider economy. Students themselves have not been seen as an equal participating partner in the strategic triangle in Europe, even though they possess great potential, especially as later alumni and possible employers. Future work should focus on ways to further support and strengthen their contributions.Furthermore, career guidance at HVET/PHE institutions and companies of students and employees has consistently been marked as critical to supporting personalised career development pathways. Thus, quality factors for such guidance processes promise to be a potential fruitful area for exploration.Finally, joint research projects seem to hold significant potential, particularly in enhancing long-term tripartite collaboration – exploring case studies of such projects promise to yield valuable information on further enhancing the strategic triangle.

All European countries are committed to the objectives of the climate agreements and they all have set out their climate targets. These targets can only be reached by involving Education and more precisely Vocational Education and Training.Portfolios, qualification structure, curricula, pedagogical and didactical approaches and last, but not least the cooperation with the labour market, it all needs to be designed for a future-proof and circular economy..How can we design Education and Training in such a way that current and future professionals will obtain the required innovative knowledge and skills in order to realize the ambitions of the climate agreements or in other words how can we contribute as VET sector to the green ambitions of the new European Commission, where Climate change and its consequences are very high on the agenda. The need for action and tangible results were already defined at the climate summit in Paris (2015) and once again confirmed at the recent climate summit in Madrid. The transition towards more sustainable energy sources, a circular economy and digitalisation has a large impact on the labour market and thus on Vocational Education and Training.In order to realize the ambitious climate targets, it will be necessary to innovate and adapt VET on several levels: Technological innovation will result in considerable shifts in the type of work. People will lose their existing jobs and new jobs will emerge. All that requires new skills for the new generation, but also for the current working force, which is needed from an inclusive point of view, as well as from an economic point of view. The transition needs to be affordable for citizens in order to have the necessary public support and it requires not only technical changes, but also changes in attitude and behaviour of citizens. Relevant emerging messages for this project proposal are:•We need to develop programmes where the changing nature of work, the environmental issues (climate change), demographic changes, circular economy and ongoing technological changes need to be taken into account. •We need to develop tailor made and digital provisions.•We need to engage employers more than it is currently done.•We need to work on the further Professionalization of teachersAll together a very challenging situation, where VET plays a crucial role, in initial VET programs, as well as in Adult Learning, as this is all about Lifelong Learning. The project EXPECT is a project without intellectual outcomes, but with the objective to exchange and to stocktake Good Practices in order to learn from each other, to report on the lessons learnt at several relevant stakeholders and to lay the foundation for a later and more comprehensive follow up project.This project will try to find possible answers to the question of how VET can contribute to all these challenges. The partnership will investigate the state of affairs in the partner countries, the progress they are making towards the climate targets, the role that VET is playing in this process and the strategies and instruments that are being applied in the other countries. This will be done through 7 Peer Learning Activities (PLA's), that will be held in all partner countries; Austria, Finland, Italy, Latvia, Netherlands, Spain and the UK. The kick off meeting and the final conference will be combined with the first and the last PLA. The meetings (PLA's) are the backbone of the project and meant to learn from each other. A standard reflection form will be used by all partners after every transnational meeting in order to come to an assessment of the Good Practices along the same lines. Partners will reflect on what they have seen in the other countries, whether and how the strategies or instruments are useful in their own situation and why not, if that is the case. Finally, the project will result in a portfolio of Good Practices and recommendations for a follow up project, that needs to contribute to a joint (European) approach in the future . The added value of such a transnational partnership is that Good practices from different countries will be gathered. The well balanced partnership contains two (2) Associations of Colleges, a Chamber of Commerce, a Research Company and four (4) VET-colleges. This choice was based on the results of a desk study, as we wanted to have some good performing countries, some medium performing countries and some countries that still need to make a lot of progress to reach the climate targets. All this will turn the project in a real learning partnership. As the transition towards VET-systems with a strong focus on these sustainability goals is relatively new for all countries it offers also the opportunity to come to a more shared approach in Europe which will help to make programs easier to compare (transparancy), to facilitate exchanges and finally to contribute to a greener and sustainable Europe, supported by responsible citizens.

The project “Mainstreaming Procedures for Quality Apprenticeships in Educational Organisations and Enterprises” (ApprenticeshipQ) wanted to support educational institutions and placement providers to offer high-quality education to their apprentices. The project’s proposed assessment of quality has made these processes more manageable and will benefit all stakeholders. These benefits include lifelong learning for teachers, professors and tutors, enhancements for placement providers, improvement of apprentice’s skills development and overall higher quality of the learning experience.Quality is key to assuring positive outcomes for all stakeholders involved and this project therefore focused on approaches to securing and developing high quality apprenticeships that will in turn help foster stronger collaborations between employers, providers and students. However, experiences, concepts and vision on how to leverage the potential of practice and work-based learning (WBL) for the field of HVET was lacking. The project addressed this issue through comprehensive quality criteria to give guidance and orientation on how to structure those parts of HVET which take part in the world of work. In fact, no proposal existed on how European Higher Vocational Institutions may adapt their internal quality systems to ensure proper supervision and control of apprenticeships, or even what a minimum level of quality for an apprenticeship should entail. The intention of the ApprenticeshipQ project was to:develop an ApprenticeshipQ toolkit, which provides a clear framework for quality management of apprenticeships at organisations, particularly educational institutions and placement providers, ensuring systematic feedback; foster mutual trust and respect through regular cooperation and better quality management between the apprenticeship partners;ensure the content of HVET programmes is responsive to changing skill needs in companies and society;ensure fair, valid, and authentic assessment of learning outcomes in apprenticeships; support the continuous professional development of in-company trainers and improving their working conditions. The ApprenticeshipQ toolkit was developed by:identifying and analysing different forms of apprenticeships and work-based learning to design and test a typology of apprenticeships;identifying the strategic goals of the main stakeholders involved in HVET to inform quality management;identifying the factors that stakeholders consider essential for QM within the strategic partnership;providing a set of best-practice examples for QM at education institutions and at placement provider sites;identifying quality criteria including their measurement indicators in different education institutions and various industry sectors. This knowledge was applied for target groups including educational institutions, placement providers and apprentices by creating the ApprenticeshipQ toolkit, consisting of:an institutional quality management framework for apprenticeships;an online-assessment tool for quality management;an apprenticeships QM manual for educational institutions containing instruments, methods and tools they can work with to develop a joint quality culture between themselves and small and medium enterprises; an apprenticeships QM manual for enterprises containing instruments, methods and tools they can work with to develop a joint quality culture between themselves and educational organizations. a harmonisation and translation guide with policy recommendations. To test, validate form consensus in the field the project consulted extensively with stakeholders by organising:Workshops in 6 countries involving more than 500 QM experts and other expert stakeholders from the training and education site;Field tests in 6 countries involving more than 300 employers, quality managers, trainer and teachers, HVET institutions, etc.;Surveys, interviews and presentations in 6 countries involving more than 1.300 employers, QM person responsible for the placement as well as the HVET institution site, teachers and trainers.Through the involvement of chambers of commerce, standardization bodies and associations of European institutions of Higher VET in the project, ApprenticeshipQ reached a wide impact, and ensured the inclusion of its processes amongst both placement providers and educational institutions. This in turn led to an enhanced quality management and hence improved quality of apprenticeships in Higher VET around Europe, which is going to increase the attractiveness of HVET as an educational pathway thus enhancing the employability of apprentices and students.

GirlsTech set itself the goal of supporting the participation of women in the field of Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM). Although Europe needs more highly skilled technicians, the participation of women in STEM is very low in most European countries. Europe needs to use all the talents available, especially the talents of woman, but in fact there is a strong underrepresentation of women in the field of STEM. The project therefore focuses on peer learning activities, getting inspired by strategies from other countries and finding out which approaches from the partner countries might be suitable for others.In order to identify the needs and issues relevant for the target group, a project team was selected from three groups: high-, medium and low performing countries. Result of this selection was a collaboration of colleges and universities with a local or regional function and institutions with a national outreach. The selected partners came from eight different European countries who prepared the meetings in their own country. These meetings included a presentation of the different VET systems and their interventions to promote participation of women in STEM. During these meetings particular attention was paid to the good practices from the different participating countries. The projects achievements can be categorized in four main findings. First of all, gender stereotypes in STEM start early. Secondly, educators need to consider female entrance in STEM as a strategic priority. Thirdly, in order to engage girls teaching strategies should be redesigned. Lastly, retaining women in the STEM workforce is important. So, the open exchange of practices and ideas between the different EU countries lead to added value for the target group beyond the national context. On the basis of these findings, some valuable interventions were recommended. Especially from the good practices, some effective and transferable policy measures were identified. For example, gender equality as a policy goal contributes to (compulsory) participation of girls in STEM programmes. Also a focus on Life Long Learning, financially and substantially, can have an impact on girls choosing for STEM as a second chance. Other successful policies mentioned are, among other things, gender aware teaching, clear cooperation between schools and technical companies and female teachers as role models.The impact of this project will differ from country to country. In the Netherlands, the MBO Raad (the Netherlands Association of VET colleges) was able to disseminate the project results nationally among their member colleges. The MBO Raad is also involved in a follow-up of the project, which contributes to the sustainability of GirlTech within the Dutch contect. Beyond the Dutch context, it is likely that this project has an impact on the social inclusion of girls in STEM. What is certainly important, is that the view on gender policies and gender awareness of all the participating partners is improved. Specific information about the project can be found on www.innotecs.eu. Click on GirlsTech in the menu.

"By the time of the project application, the issue of immigration and the integration of immigrants were high on the policy agenda of EU and OECD countries, both from an economic and a social point of view. Active participation of immigrants in the labour market and, more generally, in public life was (and still is) vital for ensuring social cohesion in the host country and the ability of migrants to function as autonomous, productive and successful citizens. It is also critical for facilitating their acceptance by the host-country population. The reason for an exchange of Good Practices through PLAs was the fact that some European economies and societies are far more successful than others in integrating immigrants into their labour markets and better in offering opportunities to young immigrants to unfold their talents and obtain qualifications. The main objective was to share good practices, to learn from each other and to take over successful approaches, there where possible. For that reason the MBO Raad, as initiator of the project, tried to build a mixed partnership of policymakers on one hand and providers (schools) on the other. This succeeded in all partner countries, although the providers side was generally stronger represented.It is also important to say that the flow of refugees has drastically decreased in the period between the birth of the project idea (mid 2016) and now, which made the project however not less important, as the groups are still there, but the huge sense of urgency was not the same as before and the number of newcomers was for all partners smaller than they expected at the start of the project. The partners realized however that such flows of newcomers can be repeated in the future, which made the focus on the transferability of the lessons learnt for future situations still very important.According to the initial project plan, we had six (6) transnational meetings held in The Netherlands, Finland, Germany, UK. Sweden and Denmark.The partners prepared their own meetings (PLA's), including a presentation of their institution, the work they are doing, their national or regional system and a selected number of Good Practices (interventions) regarding the integration of newcomers. After all these meetings, partners reflected on the value for them of the demonstrated GP's by using astandard reflection form about the possible application of the GP in their own daily practice. In this reflection it was also asked to explain how these good practices could be applied in the own situation and if not useful, why not. Next to this, partners reported about their dissemination and valorisation activities and used a standard form for this, which was called the ""Capturing and measuring reach of the project."" Finally all transnational meetings were evaluated by the AoC from the UK.It needs to be said that all partners were rather satisfied with the composition of the partnership and the variety of Good Practices, as there was a large diversity of partners ranging from a rather small scale approach in Finland with relatively small groups of immigrants to the large scale integration policy in NL and UK, where a lot of the planning tends to be on a national level. This made that situations were not always comparable and that some of the GP's might not be transferable, but it was nevertheless inspiring to see how partners are working on the same challenges, but with other legislations and on another scale.It was very informative to see how different political choices work out in the practice and to see the pro's and contra's of such choices. This was rather clear in the case of the rather strict (in the eyes of some partners: harsh) policy of Denmark (Randers). Newcomers were offered opportunities, but only if they participated in a full program of learning language and culture, whilst also working in companies. Staying away had immediately consequences for their income.There has been one important change in the project and as a result of that also regarding the distribution of tasks, which was the cancelling of the second LTTA in Sweden. This was done in consultancy with the national NA, as we had made a mistake in the application by calculating only the travelling costs to the LTTA venues, but not the subsistence costs. In order to make it financial feasible, we decided in close consultation with the NA to have one LTTA instead of two. The change in the distribution of tasks was that The Swedish partner had not to organise a LTTA. In spite of having only one LTTA instead of two, we certainly reached our objectives. But it goes almost without saying that two LTTA's should have had a wider impact than one, simply because we should have reached more people."