Nordland County has an overall plan for internationalisation for 2012-2025. The objective is to be the most international county in Norway by 2025. To deliver accordingly, Sortland Upper Secondary School must be a regional contributor in meeting the objectives: A) The County regions must be internationally attractive. B) Our students and apprentices will be "global citizens" locally, regionally and internationally. C) Educational organizatons will be integraded into larger internationalisation initiatives. Our school must develop the region's future workforce by developing relevant vocational-, language-, and cultural competencies. Also, a rapidly growing international workforce living in our region, will be integraded better and more rapidly. Consequently, participation in Erasmus + VET learner practice is important for our students. Our specific objective was to provide two weeks of international vocational learning workplacement for our students.
Sortland Upper Secondary School is a subsidiary of Nordland County. The school is located in the regional centre of Vesteraalen, Norway. Our Service and Transportation vocational curriculum was designed to offer two years in upper secondary school, and two years of apprenticeship in private or public organizations. We covered four vocational trade areas: Office and Business Administration, ICT services (Up to 2020), Sales, and Security. We recruited students from all over the Vesteraalen and Lofoten regions, a total of approx. 50 000 inhabitants. The region experiences a strong growth in internationalisation in the above mentioned trade areas. In order to meet the increased international competency requirements, we seek to develop and offer a combination of vocational skills, language and cultural competency. Since English is the main and preferred language in servicing foreign customers and business networks, we actively seek to improve and develop new and relevant learning arenas where this combination can be offered with the greatest impact. For vocational students in particular, "learning by doing" is paramount. An intensive workplacement period in an international environment where relevant vocational workpractice is executed, is our preferred choice.