Post added by Michael Graham
If you want to know more about NQF developments worldwide, here I point you to the Global NQF Inventory 2017. I know, I’m a little late with this one……. It is a global survey of NQF developments, reporting the latest trends, key issues, progress and challenges in 100 countries.
It is the third edition and, like the previous two, co-produced by UNESCO and two EU agencies, Cedefop and my own office, the European Training Foundation. It comprises two parts. First, a set of thematic chapters, covering issues such as systems supporting NQFs, how NQFs foster lifelong learning, validation of non-formal learning and NQFs and so on. Second, a country by country survey of 100 countries, where we use a common structure of NQF characteristics and criteria to get an idea of each country’s NQF. It also covers world-regional qualifications frameworks.
A Cedefop colleague, Slava Pevec-Grm, and I presented the Inventory at the Asia-Europe Meeting in Seoul, South Korea in November. More about that later. I’ll give you a very brief summary of main issues, but find below links to the two volumes.
What’s new – main findings
What does the Inventory add to our sum of knowledge? The number of NQFs worldwide has stabilised. We are at 150 NQFs now, an impressive figure. Perhaps this is saturation point. We will not see many new ones. QFs have a higher policy profile than in 2015 – they contribute formally to achievement of the UN’s Sustainable Development Goal number 4 and the EU’s New Skills Agenda for Europe.
QFs are more firmly established in more countries. And regional frameworks - which link different national frameworks into a common system or area in the same region of the world are deepening in implementation. The European Qualifications Framework is perhaps the most obvious success. 39 countries participate in it, 33 of which are linked to each other via the EQF; and most of which now use NQF and /or EQF stamps on their certificates. We can also see that in Asia, the ASEAN Reference Framework has entered implementation.
NQFs do support validation of non-formal learning and mainstream it. They drive conversion to learning outcomes in qualifications and curricula. This takes us to impacts of NQFs, itself a chapter in the thematic Volume 1. Most impact is observed in this shift to outcomes; in transparency of qualifications; in stakeholder engagement. Less impact is recorded in visibility to some employers and in some countries, the wider public.
I mentioned we presented the Global Inventory at the Asia-Europe Meeting of Education Ministers, called ASEMME6, in Seoul in November. This grouping of Ministers of Education from European and Asian countries belongs to the wider Asia-Europe Meeting, or ASEM, which seeks to deepen relations between the continents in political, economic and social policies, build partnerships and develop mutually beneficial activities. The Global NQF Inventory is an output within its programme of actions.
I participated in the 3 days of meetings, which covered a range of education and training topics. NQFs featured prominently in these, cited by Ministers from many countries and senior officials as tools for mobility and lifelong learning in particular. What struck me was the similarity of challenges domestically, but also how these cannot be separated from a country’s outward-facing policies. NQFs remain national tools, connected to national, distinctive, education and training systems, but we are seeing a convergence, one tool which is facilitating this being NQFs. It is a manifestation of globalisation.
2019 – 4th edition
The ASEM conclusions asked UNESCO, Cedefop and ETF to produce a fourth edition of the Global NQF Inventory for its 2019 meeting. We will. We anticipate that some NQF issues by that time might be relations with the evolving World Reference Levels, resourcing NQFs and making them visible.
http://www.cedefop.europa.eu/en/publications-and-resources/publications/2221
http://www.cedefop.europa.eu/sl/publications-and-resources/publications/2222
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