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AEROVET

General InformationECVET Technical SpecificationsPartnershipMore Information

Duration

36 months

General approach/description of the project

The AEROVET project builds on the outcomes of the AERONET pilot project which looked at qualifications and work tasks in four partner countries in the aeronautic sector. As part of the pilot project, an inventory of ‘typical professional tasks’ common to the work of all aircraft construction professional across Europe was identified. Combining the work processes in different plants, the project partners found a set of very clear ‘work steps’ which are repeated in workplaces in almost all plants.

The aim of AEROVET project is to develop units of learning outcomes based on an inventory of Typical Professional Tasks (TPTs) to cover the profession of aircraft maintenance staff too. Qualifications in the aeronautics sector are characterised by:

The existence of European standards regarding qualifications of certain professions in this industry (namely regarding maintenance);

The fact that aeronautic products for a single airplane are produced in different countries across Europe and have to meet the same quality criteria;

Constant changes of work processes and materials used.

As such, this high-tech professional sector requires the establishment of a common language and strong transnational cooperation in order to ensure the quality of the final product.

The project outcomes will be tested during three-month transnational exchanges of trainees within Airbus. Whilst exchanges currently exist, the learning outcomes of participating students will be recognised as part of the AEROVET project. Given that some qualifications are awarded by higher education institutions using ECTS, the relationship between ECVET and ECTS will also be explored by analysing the permeability of different programmes.

Target group

The target group for this project is trainees within Airbus. The idea is to send French apprentices to Germany (and German apprentices to France) and compare their achievements with those apprentices who did not take part in mobility.

Dissemination

The German projects AEROVET, CREDCHEM and SME Master Plus held their final conference on 16 January 2012 in Berlin. A joint publication (together with the VaLOGReg project) has been distributed (currently only available in in German language).

Transfer And Accumulation

Approach and tools

A workshop with with teachers, trainers, workers and policy makers took place to discuss assessment issues. The result of the workshop was the idea that assessment should be qualitative and performance-oriented. The tool used is the assessment grid which will be a main part of the Learning Agreement (see matrix in the presentation Rome Seminar, slide 15).
Underlying knowledge, skills or key competences can be displayed in the matrix, under each work step. These work steps are not independent parts but they form a whole.

By using this matrix, coordinators of the department where the apprentice has worked or the “home institution” can see at once, what the trainee has done, where the trainee has worked and how well he performed.

Learners’ assessment

The person in charge of assessment will estimate whether the apprentice has worked observed/ under instruction/ under surveillance/ independently. As a mode of assessment, the expert workers are asked to evaluate the performance of the apprentices in terms of the quality of their participation in the work process.

Lessons learnt

From a pragmatic point of view, the feedback of teachers and trainers was that any “unit-certificate” would be at best – at this stage of the projects – an “add-on” to the national qualification. A key message was that institutions would not work with a too complex instrument.
Another recommendation from the project is to respect existing instruments / tools. E.g. Airbus is renewing their system of competence development of trainees. If instruments developed do not fit their instruments they will not use it.

From a pedagogical point of view, the project partners highlight that each part of apprenticeship is a necessary but not sufficient contribution to the process of becoming a competent worker. More important is the ability to combine these parts. When the trainee has completed mobility units, he should be able to work on certain tasks, in the context of a professional situation (i.e. in combination with the others). He should master the whole production process, from initial stage to finalisation of production work.

As a preliminary proposal, the project envisages that the combination of all necessary mobility units, when already assessed alone, should be assessed again, in the context of a professional situation.

Units of learning outcomes

Method

The AEROVET project aims to further develop the inventory of tasks developed by AERONET to cover the profession of aircraft maintenance staff. A first step consisted in checking that the previous approach fits with the ECVET recommendation. The compatibility of the TPTs with the concept of ECVET units was tested during a workshop with teachers, trainers, workers and policy makers took place to discuss the TPTs identified in AERONET. The result was that the TPTs satisfy the requirements for units as they consist of a coherent set of knowledge, skills and competence that can be assessed and validated. On the basis of common tasks identified, learning outcomes and units of learning outcomes were designed.

A number of issues emerged:

Some units may be too large for mobility periods;

Units are not automatically taugh ’en bloc’ (or ’spiral’ curriculum) which makes it difficult to achieve one unit during a mobility period.

Learning outcomes in a unit are often taught not once but several times during the apprenticeship training programme.

There are some learning outcomes (units) which are partly not teachable at schools and only on the workplace.

Lessons learnt

In order to ensure that units are suitable for mobility, it is necessary to observe the apprentices on site, see what they should be able to do, and identify which aspects are best suited for mobility periods. The aim is to determine coherent parts of the TPTs that do not lose their meaning when taken separately. As a preliminary result, it seems that each TPT consists of several mobility units. For instance TPT 1: Production of metallic components for aircraft or ground support equipment includes 8 Mobility Units (e.g. Metal forming by means of ACB/ABB press).

ECVET Points

At this stage of the project the added value of allocating points has not been clearly identified.
The main technical obstacle is to allocate “ECVET-points” to units with nation-wide relevance.
Why?
The British example: The NVQ-units do have points in terms of their absolute weight. Regarding the fragmented British systems, these units can be combined to dozens of qualifications. It is quite obvious that the relative weight differs.
The German example: Respecting the fact that many small and specialised enterprises are qualifying young people, the educational system is based on minimum standards. It would be very hard / impossible for specialised enterprises. to fulfil the requirements of regular standards (in terms of relative weight)
Considering that this element of ECVET should be tested too, the project developed the following interim proposal:
- The ECVET points are not part of the unit but of the learning agreement.
This arrangement could solve the challenges sketched above.

Consolidation of partnerships in formal agreements

The template for Learning Agreement proposed by the project is the one designed by SME Master +. It was felt that there is no need to design a new one as it is perfectly suitable.
The project will use standard document from the recommendation.
Transcript of record could be included with the Learning agreements.

Projects 2008 to 2011

Projects 2011 to 2014