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European University Continuing Education Network

EUCEN

EUCEN’s main aims are to contribute to the economic and cultural life of Europe through the promotion and advancement of lifelong learning within higher education institutions in Europe and elsewhere and to foster universities' influence in the development of lifelong learning knowledge and policies throughout Europe.

Lobbying Activity

Response to Communication on maximising the potential of talent mobility as part of the European Year of Skills

28 Sept 2023

The flow of migrants and refugees reaching Europe has been constant and is likely to continue in the coming years. The European Commission recognises that education plays a crucial role in helping migrants and refugees settle in new countries and environments. Validation of knowledge and skills can restore the pride and self-esteem that many migrants loss in their way from their home countries to Europe, and give them a chance to start a new life with dignity. EUCEN has designed and coordinated a number of projects connected to the validation of non-formal and informal learning (VNIL) in the last two decades. The latest, VINCE - validation for inclusion of new citizens of Europe, was focusing on understanding the challenges of migrants and refugies and finding ways to help them to integrate in Europe through VNIL. The project started identifying barriers and mitigating factors for the inclusion of refugees and migrants: from language learning to the recognition of qualifications, education is part of the integration process. The newcomers face many challenges and among them are obstacles to access the labour market or continue their studies, frequently because their competences are not easily recognised in the host society. Their skills and knowledge may not fit into predefined bureaucratic policies and procedures, documentation is lacking, or the curriculum they followed does not match certification structures in the host country. EUCEN wrote the EPALE blogpost Giving opportunities to migrants and refugees to get into higher education: setting the right context for learning that presents the complexities of migration and the barriers and mitigating factors that could help individuals https://ec.europa.eu/epale/en/blog/giving-opportunities-migrants-and-refugees-get-higher-education-setting-right-context-learning VINCE collected and analysed a total of 43 case studies from 8 different European countries in 2018 (find document attached). And the VINCE VPL Award 2019 was given to three external to the consortium real cases in Austria, Portugal and Italy http://vince.eucen.eu/wp-content/uploads/2020/02/Extract_eucenjournalulll2019_v3n1_FINAL_Part2only.pdf that also portraits the success of applying VNIL with migrant candidates. The VINCE project developed a number of tools to help VNIL professionals working with non-national candidates. The tools included a set of guides (about Europe, about some European countries, about higher education and about validation), a full articulated CPD training course for VNIL professionals to help them reflect about the challenges of migrants and their needs when going through a VNIL process, and a set of Policy Recommendations that highlighted 8 key points: Flexibility, Training, Speed, Self-Assessment, Monitoring, and Collaboration. We collected a few videos from real migrants explaining their experience from leaving their country until settling in Europe, going through validation processes and succeeding in their career. All the outputs and materials collected are available from https://vince.eucen.eu
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Meeting with Joost Korte (Director-General Employment, Social Affairs and Inclusion)

19 Sept 2023 · Meeting with EUCEN

Meeting with Nicolas Schmit (Commissioner) and

9 Jun 2020 · Videoconference on Vocational Education and Training (VET) and the impact of the crisis on VET.