The advent of the Internet around the turn of the century saw an increase in the use of ePortfolios by VET institutes. Some ePortfolios were developed as ‘add-ons’ to learning management systems and others as a simple repository for students to store digital artifacts. Recent developments have seen the emergence of Massive On-line Open Courses (MOOCs), gamification and serious games, mobile use of web-based tools and the increased use of products such as Blackboard and Moodle. Other than making ePortfolios responsive for use on tablets, there has been relatively little advancement of ePortfolios in VET in this decade. The LEAP ePortfolio project aims to create a ‘step change’ in the use of ePortfolios. It will result in a learner-centred, process-based pedagogical tool to improve learner and VET provider performance and VET processes. This will be achieved through the development of a responsive and versatile ePortfolio developed around a four-step pedagogical model: Learn, Engage, Apply and Perform (LEAP). The LEAP ePortfolio will integrate the use of open digital badges and elements of gamification and will be suitable for use with formal and non-formal VET courses. It will enable VET teachers and trainers to develop and deliver rich, personalised and adaptive learning experiences leading to improved learner achievements, increased retention and completion rates, potentially requiring less time and resources. The six partners from the UK, Austria, Cyprus, Greece, Ireland and Portugal will develop and deliver a series of VET courses. These will be designed for use in their own national context and delivered using the LEAP ePortfolio. Some partners will engage part and full-time students and others learners from employment. The VET courses will include a mix of short and longer term courses in IT, management and coaching, health and safety, languages and IT, thereby demonstrating the flexibility and versatility of the LEAP ePortfolio. In total, 200 learners and 30 teachers and trainers will be engaged in the project. In addition to the development of the LEAP ePortfolio, the project will deliver two additional outputs: the LEAP ePortfolio and Good Practice Handbook and a policy report called, 'ePortfolios: Taking the LEAP'. The Handbook will provide a comprehensive guide to best practice and how to maximize the value of the LEAP ePortfolio specifically and ePortfolios per se. The policy report will present the pedagogical and economic case for the widespread use of ePortfolios within VET - it will be the centre-piece of a series of multiplier events at the end of the project. The LEAP ePortfolio project will raise the awareness of VET stakeholders, policy-makers, VET, further and higher education institutes and employers of the potential of ePortfolios as VET tool. Partners will present a cogent argument for renewed interest and investment in the development and use of ePortfolios by demonstrating how the LEAP ePortfolio impacts on the competences and performance of learners and VET teacher/trainer.
Digital learning tools are being increasingly used by VET providers (e.g. MOOCs, LMS and on-line meeting platforms). The aim of LEAP was to create a ‘step change’ in the use of ePortfolios as process-based pedagogical tool to improve learner and VET provider performance. One of the main objectives of the LEAP project was to develop a multi-lingual, easy-to-use ePortfolio capable of supporting a range of vocational courses and to test the use open digital badges. To achieve this, partners developed a detail specification and wireframe diagrams and planned to hold a series on national pilots testing different types of courses from short courses to full diploma qualifications. The LEAP specification detailed the user access rights and functionality for four roles: (1) the local administrator; (2) learners; (3) assessors; and (4) moderators. The specification called for LEAP to include: a set of communication and notification features enabling users to be automatically notified of actions and up-dates to learner portfolios; course and unit progression measures designed to motivate learners; file upload and shared access areas; flexibility for partners to input their own courses based on the ECVET model with Learning Outcomes (LO) and Assessment Criteria (AC); and multi-level reporting tools to support moderation sampling and quality assurance in-line with Awarding Body requirements. A second key objective was to capture and share good practice in the development and use of ePortfolios. Partners planned to deliver a series of national pilots involving a variety of short and longer VET courses from a Level 7 Diploma in Strategic Leadership and Management to introductory IT and languages courses as well as technical courses for gas fitters/engineers. The range of courses resulted in LEAP being tested by a variety of different learners including college/university students, senior managers, and executives from business to technicians from the energy sector. The LEAP project planned to have an impact via set of dissemination and pilot activities on six target different target groups: (1) Teacher/trainers x 30; (2) Learners x 200; (3) VET/HE/FE Centres; (4) Partners (x 6); (5) European business community; and (6) VET Policy stakeholders. By the end of the project, partners had developed and delivered over 30 different VET training curricula/courses and had engaged 443 participants and 34 VET teacher/trainers in the pilot test – this is significantly more than planned. As well as producing an e-Portfolio Good Practice Handbook, a set of 20 case studies featuring LEAP users, partners also published a detailed report called, Taking the LEAP. The report sets out a series of recommendations regarding the development and use of e-Portfolios and digital badges in the context of VET. The report, the e-Portfolio, the User Guides and the Good Practice Guide were published in Greek, German, Portuguese and English. Whilst the COVID19 pandemic presented some challenges for the project, it also created some opportunities. For example, the Cypriot partners reported: “The piloting of LEAP platform with real online data was actually expedited because of the pandemic. It was a handy solution to overcome the restrictions imposed for onsite training. The first lockdown in March 2020 and subsequent restrictions were imposed a couple of weeks before the commencement of 3 courses involving 75 learners, 6 assessors for 50 units. The options were to either cancel the courses or take a chance with LEAP and in combination with Zoom to deliver the various units. The pressure from the learners themselves to attend online some of the course units was sufficient to lead us to the decision to test the LEAP platform on a real-life situation”. To share the product results and to ensure the wider impact of the LEAP project, partners implemented an extensive set of dissemination activities. The dissemination strategy involved nearly 200 separate dissemination activities and reached just under 85K people. The six Multiplier Events which were designed to showcase the three project products (i.e. the LEAP e-Portfolio, the e-Portfolio Good Practice Handbook and the Policy Report, Taking the LEAP) were attended by 184 people. LEAP continues to be used by partners. The UK partner is using it to support the delivery of its Chartered Management Institute Level 3, 5 and 7 vocational qualifications in Management & Leadership, Coaching & Mentoring and Professional Consulting. The UK partner has integrated LEAP into its overall digital learning strategy enabling its learners to access LEAP from inside its Learning Management System (LMS) ManagementDirect creating a seamless link from learning to assessment. All qualification assessment and moderation are now delivered using LEAP. By the end of the LEAP project 84 learners from the UK had completed a Level 3, 5 or 7 qualification in Management & Leadership, Coaching & Mentoring or Professional Consulting. The Irish partner stated: “ITT is looking forward sharing the benefits of this platform with other colleagues in the Institute in the future. ITT will merge on the 1st of Jan with CIT (Cork Institute of Technology) and will become the MTU (Munster Technological University). This means more staff will be available to be informed about the existence of the LEAP platform. It is envisaged that in the future, training session for the LEAP platform will be offered to colleagues across the Institute in the hopes that this platform will be adopted more widely across the Institute”. In the longer term, partners are considering how to increase the number of languages supported by LEAP thereby opening potential use of LEAP in other European countries and the potential for the licensing of LEAP enabling other VET institutes to benefit from using the LEAP e-portfolio.