Workshop on Lifelong Learning
Cyprus, 4th October 2010
On 4th October 2010 in Cyprus there was the second sub-regional workshop organised within trans-regional cooperation in lifelong learning among education stakeholders. Interests of teachers were represented by ETUCE (European Trade Union Committee for Education), interests of students – OBESSU (Organising Bureau of European School Student Unions) and interests of employers in education – EFEE (European Federation of Education Employers).
The workshop was targeted at teacher trade unions, student unions and employer representatives from countries from the Nordic, Baltic, Central and Eastern Europe regions: Austria, Bulgaria, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Ireland, Latvia, Lithuania, Norway, Poland, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia, Sweden, Switzerland, the Netherlands, UK.
The workshop was intended to be an awareness raising and brainstorming event, where an equal number of the three main project target groups, teacher unions, students and employers, gathered along with representatives from local and national authorities. The workshop offered key stakeholders in general education in Nordic, Baltic, Central and Eastern Europe regions the opportunity to network. In trans-regional cooperation at European level, the workshop aimed at providing an environment convenient for the different groups of stakeholders to discuss current policy practices towards lifelong learning, learning from each other and discussing possible transfer of practices within different national systems. For some national stakeholders the workshop was the first occasion to meet and cooperate.
The workshop in Cyprus was the second among two sub-regional workshops taking place in the Co-Reg-LLL project, organised by ETUCE, EFEE and OBESSU.
During the workshop participants were invited to work on identifying the strengths, weaknesses and opportunities of the national lifelong learning strategies, in order to encourage the development of their common understanding of these policy documents. A cross-border analysis was completed on how the stakeholders could contribute to the national lifelong learning implementation by improving the contribution of general school education to the acquisition of key competences for lifelong learning. Representatives from the European Commission, the Cluster on Key Competences for LLL and national representatives were invited to speak at the workshop. Their presentations were aimed at informing the three groups of stakeholders on up-to-date policy and legislative developments in the EU member states towards ensuring lifelong learning activities for everyone.
An Advisory Group, composed of three representatives from the teacher trade unions, the student organisations and the employers in education respectively, guided the project implementation and participated in the development of the final product of the project; joint guidelines on the implementation of national lifelong learning strategies.
Please take a look at backgorund information on the LLL project.