EfVET Annual Conference 2022: The meeting place of theory and practice par excellence

Brussels, Belgium, 31 October 2022:   The European Forum of Technical and Vocational and Training (EfVET) organised its Annual Conference between the 26th and 29th of October 2022 in Kuopio (Finland).

The event, hosted by two EfVET Finnish Members Ylä-Savo Vocational College and Savo Vocational College, brought together over 250 VET professionals from all over the world to the Savo Region of Finland.

EfVET Annual Conference is the meeting place of theory and practice par excellence. It is a unique opportunity where the world of education and training meets the world of employment.

Kari Puumalainen, Director Ylä-Savo Vocational College commented on the event: “Finland is a leading expert in the world of vocational education. We want to share our expertise with others, and at the same time find new international partners among educational institutions and other actors.”

During the conference, we have had the opportunity to discuss the theme “The Future Skills Revolution for VET and CVET in Europe” with the objective of giving training providers the opportunity to share their experiences in the learning and teaching of new skills in their educational set-ups and to design ways of collaboration between them.

In the panel discussion “The Future skills revolution. Are we in it already?” we could have the chance to hear from the world of schools and colleges and the companies and try to make connections between them. This is because EfVET supports training providers to reflect on the need to update, re-write and connect with key stakeholders to ensure that skills acquired at School, College or Applied University levels are industry driven.

Indeed, EfVET President Prof Calleja inaugurated the 31st EfVET Annual Conference with these words: “We need to consider the change due to technology but also because of development and labour market and, hence, it would be by no coincidence that two of the speakers that we invited in the panel discussion come from industry. Our aim is to really connect with industry and see what is happening in the workplaces. The speed of company is not our speed as they are based on providing products and services and we on providing education, but the more we synergise our cultures the better it is for our students.” He added: “Speed is also an excellent opportunity to make learning more relevant to working. Many people would like to work and study rather than study and then maybe work. The connection with work-based learning (WBL) is fundamental and the more use of apprenticeships programs and informal WBL makes learning more interesting.”

In his conclusions, Prof Calleja also made sure to convey another important message that came across the event: the issue of pedagogy of today, i.e. the style of teaching and the need to adapt the teaching to today’s generations, therefore, Prof Calleja referred to a need of a “pedagogy in movement which has variety in it rather than monotony.”

The last messages from the EfVET President concerned the embedding and responsiveness of VET to the issues of today: sustainability, climate change, eradication of poverty and marginalization, and gender equality. “We need to possibly embed all these issues in our pedagogy and the subjects that we teach in VET, also in line with young people desires”, Prof Calleja said.

The three pillars that EfVET President finally analysed are the acquisition of basic skills which we expect compulsory education to give to young people; future of education which is the future of WBL that will become the way young people will learn; the need of curricula and management systems that inspire the education with passion and drive; and, finally, attention to individual person with different needs that we have the duty to address in order to retain them in education or life learning.

The conference brought together over 250 practitioners, researchers, and educators from around the world, who are engaged in Vocational Education and Training. It hosted delegates from more than 150 institutions and covered more than 72 hours, 26 roundtables and 6 workshops held in two sessions in addition to 10 visits organised to colleges and companies in the Savo region of Finland.

We were sure that the one in Finland would have been a different experience offering the participants the possibility to see what is typical in the Finnish VET system and, at the same time, to explore what the future of VET might be. We are glad to have accomplished this and that members went back to their countries and colleges with a suitcase full of memories, experiences and ideas to be shared and implemented.

All information about EfVET Conference will be soon available on the EfVET official web portal at www.efvet.org and the Conference website at www.efvet-conference.eu

Press Release at this link.