VETExpress (Express VET Mobility Database and Guides for ECVET Cluster of Countries) project will be conducted under the coordination of Turkish MoNE- Directorate General for Vocational and Technical Education-DG TVET. The partners of the project are: Izmir Provincial Directorate of National Education (Izmir-TR), Izmit Vocational and Technical Anatolian High School (Izmit-TR), ITS IOTA APULIA FOUNDATION (Lecce – IT), DEHOGA (German Hotel and Restorant Association) (Magdeburg – DE), and C.E.I.P. JUAN CARRILLO (Ronda – SP). Due to the different structures of qualification systems and divisions of responsibilities among stakeholders across the Europe, the understanding of ‘who is a competent institution’ with regard to ECVET varies greatly. The range of institutions and bodies that can be involved covers Ministries and other national authorities, social partners, chambers and representatives of sectors as well as education and training providers.Using ECVET for transnational mobility implies that; In another country, the competent institution (the home institution) validates and recognises credit for units of learning outcomes. ECVET credit points are allocated to the learning outcomes, enabling the learner to add these credit points to those necessary to achieve a particular qualification. In other words, ECVET can demonstrate documents that show and prove the competencies acquired in a foreign country. Therefore, not only the proof of learning outcomes achieved during mobility activities but also the recognition of (formerly) achieved learning outcomes in a country is possible with ECVET. In this sense, outputs of VETExpress will be innovative, in that, they will either be supporting the transnational mobility (O3) or including the Guides (O2) that are expected to be sufficient to enlighten many EU countries in national level and contributing the Lifelong Learning targets.One of the intellectual outputs of VETExpress Project; Student Guide, Parent Guide, Teacher Guide and School Guide (O2) will be prepared for competent institutions and stakeholders that would like to support ECVET for mobility in their own qualification systems. These guides will be prepared for all stakeholders in order to explain the facilitating role of ECVET in transnational mobility of students in a user friendly and apparent manner.These guides are not planned as simple texts written in pdf format but will be equipped with products that will make young people appreciate the value of VET who are using social networks and digital technologies intensely in daily life.Transfer of achieved learning is not supported by a legal framework in many European Countries. Therefore, transfer of achieved learning between schools and selected qualifications takes place only as part of pilot projects. VETExpress Project includes activities that support the dissemination of results of many previous pilot projects on ECVET. The International Conference at final phase, which is planned as one of the Multiplier Events of the Project, will bring together the experiences of previous ECVET and mobility projects conducted by Turkish and European beneficiaries. VETExpress will be complementary to the previous initiatives and projects by participating institutions and organizations.Each partner of VETEXpress (Germany, Italy, Turkey and Spain) is from a different ECVET cluster of countries. Therefore, this partnership represents 4 different clusters of ECVET. In this context, with its intellectual outputs as Needs and Situation Report on ECVET (O1) and Policy Papers (O5), the outcomes of this project is expected to create a European added value which cannot be achieved with activities carried out in a single country (in local level).With this project; key staff; teachers, experts , and managers will be trained about using the developed ECVET guides. The teachers need to be competent and well-informed about ECVET implementation. 4 LTT’s will be organized in order to use the outputs of the project in most effective way. 2 of the LTT’s will be organized for vocational education training teachers and 2 of them will be organized for vocational education students. So it will be possible to realise the problems before the project ends.Consequently, in this project, it is aimed to improve transparency, recognizability and effectiveness of the ECVET and prepare the consultative Policy Paper to imply ECVET in countries’ education systems.
The European Credit System for Vocational Education and Training (ECVET) aims to formally recognize the knowledge, skills and competences acquired by individuals in another country, and to facilitate the transfer of credits between the EU and Program (Erasmus +) countries. Within the scope of the Erasmus + Program, our project named ““Express VET Mobility Database and Guides for ECVET Cluster of Countries – VETExpress” has been implemented for 33 months and activities have been carried out to increase the recognition and applicability of the ECVET system. Outputs supporting the ECVET system were obtained within the scope of the project. “Student, Parent, Teacher and School Guides (O2)”, one of the project intellectual outputs, was made available to competent institutions and stakeholders who intend to support and use ECVET for mobility activities. The guidelines have been prepared with the objective of explaining ECVET's facilitating role in transnational mobility activities to all stakeholders in a user-friendly (easily understandable / applicable) approach. “Recognition of Prior Learning” is not supported by the legal framework of many European countries. For this reason, recognition of prior learning between schools and for selected achievements can only be realized through the implementation of pilot projects. With this project, the results of many previous ECVET pilot projects were disseminated. The International Conference, which was planned as the last of multiplier activity and held in the last stage, shared all the outputs and evaluations obtained in the project with the Turkish and European beneficiaries. The qualifications and the experiences of the project coordinator and the partners, stand out as a different aspect of the VETExpress project than many previous projects. Each partner in the project (Germany, Italy, Turkey and Spain) represents a different cluster of ECVET countries. Thus, with the partnership structure of the Project, it was possible to represent different clusters of ECVET. In this context, the outputs of the Project, such as the Current Situation Analysis and the Policy Documents (O5) on ECVET, have made this project a significant added value that cannot be achieved by a single country at a European level. As the project coordinator “Ministry of National Education-DG for VET” and the partners included all the relevant stakeholders, decision-makers and policy-maker institutions of the each partner’s region in to the Project studies. In addition, the participation and contribution of the individuals in our target group, such as students and parents, to the activities and outputs were provided. The main activities realized within the scope of the project are planned in a way to support the project outputs. During the development of the outputs “student, parent, teacher and school guides (O2), common templates for ECVET (O4), and Vetexpress Platform (O3)” each project partner has completed their preliminary preparations by conducting Needs and Current Situation Analysis (A4) in their own country. Draft guidelines and templates were prepared by the responsible institution with the support of all partners, and improved during the transnational project meetings. Furthermore, related documents were used in the short-term joint personnel trainings (C1) and guides and templates were developed by taking the opinions of the participants. In the first multiplier (E1) event, participants contributed to their development by evaluating the guidelines and templates developed. In line with the comments received, guidelines and templates were finalized. Simultaneously, Vetexpress Online Platform (O3) has been developed under the responsibility of our project partner İzmir Provincial Directorate of National Education. The platform was drafted according to the comments of the project partners, the results of the needs analysis, and the final version of the guidelines and templates. In the short term joint personnel training (C2), the participants were told to use the platform, they were provided to make an application on a case study and their evaluations were taken and used to update the platform. In addition, during the implementation of the Vocational Education Student Mobility activities (C3, C4), the platform was piloted and thus tested and evaluated with a real study. A Policy Document (O5) has been prepared according to the results and situations encountered during the project process. Each project partner has prepared a Policy Document for its own country. The draft Policy Document was officially shared with the relevant institutions and their evaluations were taken. In the dissemination workshop held in Ankara with the participation of stakeholders, policy documents and project outputs were introduced and evaluated. The project outputs were shared with the participants during our last activity, the multiplier event (E2).