Conference Agenda

The concept of “teacher leadership” is complex. The development of leadership qualities in teachers is combined with improving their autonomy and accountability at the same time. Teacher leadership, in its widest definition, is the process by which teachers, individually or collectively, influence their colleagues, principals, and other members of the school communities to improve teaching and learning practices with the aim to increased student learning and educational achievement (CCSRI, 2005, pp. 287-288). One of the characteristics of teachers with leadership qualities is their ability to foster a conducive environment for students, enabling them to realise their full potential. In general, teacher leadership is characterised by a combination of high intellectual and professional qualities and wisdom, literacy and sensitivity, proficiency in understanding the diverse psychological needs of students, and a capacity for adapting to changes. Teacher leadership promoted around the world, and Kazakhstan is no exception. For example, Qanay and Frost (2023) assert that the Teacher Leadership in Kazakhstan initiative professionality as described by Hoyle (1974), thus they can also contribute school improvements and build organisational capacity. Nevertheless, it is vital to consider that teachers actively interpret and implement teacher leadership concept based on the context and conditions (McLaughlin & Ayubayeva, 2015). Consequently, pedagogical leadership is distinctive, shaped by the objectives to be fulfilled and the prevailing context. Contemporary research widely agrees that teacher leadership qualities can be both innate and learnt. There is acknowledgment that individual can develop and enhance their leadership skills through intentional efforts and meaningful experience.

The ongoing implementation of the SHARE (School Hub for Action Research in Education) initiative across 22 Astana city schools in Kazakhstan, has demonstrated the potential for cultivating teacher leadership qualities by engaging teachers in collaborative action research (Ayubayeva & McLaughlin, 2023). Since 2019, the schools involved in the SHARE project have organised three cohorts: in the 2019-2020 academic year, the 1^st cohort comprised of 5 schools; in the 2020-2021 academic year, 2^nd cohort included 8 schools, and in the 2021-2022 academic year, 3^rd cohort consisted of 9 schools. It is worth noting that the impact of the SHARE on teacher development may vary, given that schools joined the initiative at different stages of its implementation.

In 2022-2023 academic year SHARE schools across all three cohorts were engaged in conducting action research on student engagement in classroom learning. A core team comprising of five teacher-participants from each school underwent trainings facilitated by Professor Colleen McLaughlin, Mrs Kate Evans and Dr Nazipa Ayubayeva. The trainings provided the participants with a structured algorithm, following which, each school identified the classes, a subject teacher for study, requiring video recording of her/his lesson, followed by the focus group interview with student and one-to-one interview with the teacher, whose lesson was observed, and recording a learning from the process of discussion and transcribing of the interviews. Obtaining permission from both students and their parents for video recording of a lesson was crucial to ensure compliance with the ethical standards. The process of conducting this small-scale action research revealed that while some members of a core team were active, the others were reluctant to take a responsibility.

Hence, the team of school coordinators, consisting of schools #37, #60, #62, #67, and #68, collaborated under the guidance of the national coordinator, Dr Nazipa Ayubayeva, who also served as a critical friend, to research the SHARE teacher-participants’ perception about teacher leadership. The aim of this small-scale research is to explore the effect of the SHARE initiative in fostering teacher leadership qualities among teacher-participants and beyond.

Self-efficacy has been widely established as an important construct in educational research and can be defined as the belief that own capabilities are strong enough to reach a set goal (Bandura, 1977). To date, there is extensive research on self-efficacy for student outcomes (Bartimote-Aufflick et al., 2016) and for teachers (e.g., Perera et al., 2019; Hajovsky et al., 2020). However, it has been less focus on school leaders’ self-efficacy (Fischer, 2020), which can be defined as the leaders’ belief in their own competence to induce change in their school (Fischer 2020; Tschannen-Moran & Gareis, 2004), and which proves to be a predictor of student achievement (Leithwood & Jantzi, 2008), organizational learning (Hesbol, 2019), and crisis management (Röhl et al., 2022). In particular, few findings exist on the sources and conducive factors that influence school leaders’ self-efficacy. Taking up this desideratum, the present study that is presented in the poster addressed the research question of what factors foster school leaders’ innovation-related self-efficacy.

Bandura (1977) proposed that mastery experience, vicarious experience, social persuasions, and physical and emotional states are antecedents of self-efficacy. The influence of these factors on self-efficacy has been widely researched and empirically proven (e.g., Pfitzner-Eden, 2016). We firstly hypothesize that mastery experience (here, perceived achievement), vicarious experience (here, mentors as role models), verbal persuasion (here, encouragement from mentors or colleagues), and emotional state (here, exhaustion) impact school leaders’ innovation-related self-efficacy (H1). Secondly, studies on factors which are included in professional training and development opportunities have indicated to influence school leaders’ self-efficacy positively (Anselmus et al., 2022; Fischer, 2020; Versland, 2016). Based on these findings, we hypothesize that also leadership-related professional development factors increase school leaders’ innovation-related self-efficacy (H2).

The issue of security in an organisation is a very important parameter for the smooth running of the organisation and its profitability. For educational organisations in particular, the issue of security is crucial as unsafe operating conditions cause dysfunction and obstacles to the educational process. The feeling of insecurity caused to students and teachers does not contribute to the smooth functioning of the school and the achievement of its objectives. The head teacher of a school and the teachers' association, as the collective governing body, play an essential role in ensuring all aspects of the safe operation of the school.

Safety in schools is divided into physical, emotional and digital (Hammond, 2020; Sergiovanni, 2000; Freiberg, 1998). In addition to the issue of safe facilities, there are also serious incidents of violence, such as shootings, kidnappings, etc., that take place in school environments (Armstrong, 2019).

Today, in the era of globalisation of knowledge and information, with the spread of digital technology and its use both for educational purposes in an organised and personalised way by every student or adult, information is accessible in many ways (Sherry, 2020).

School violence, victimization and acrimonious relationships in schools today are occurring with enough frequency to take on epidemic characteristics, and research to analyze them applies epidemiological methods. The term Epidemiology is a compound of the adverb " ep" meaning upon, the term "demos" meaning population and the term " logos" meaning the scientific analysis of the issue. "Epidemiology is the study of the distribution and determinants of health-related conditions or events in specific populations and the application of this study to the control of health problems." (Last, 2001, p. 61). Methods of investigating factors that harm public health are appropriate for investigating factors that negatively affect the work of schools. Education researchers who adopt the methods of epidemiology are able to identify key problems that harm the educational process and school effectiveness and find solutions. "The purpose-driven teacher understands the value of seeking information about the underlying problem so that the problem can be identified and solved." (McGiboney, 2023, p. 22).

The purpose of this study is to explore the views of school principals and teachers, as members of the faculty and therefore a collective governing body, regarding safety and the creation of a healthy school climate in the school.The research aims to highlight the current issues of safety and school climate in schools, which seem to be negatively escalating, and to record the views of school management on this vital issue.The choice to interview principals and teachers on these issues is made because they are the ones who are most knowledgeable about the relevant problems and the most competent to highlight the critical parameters that will help prevent risks or improve difficult situations.The principal and teachers experience the daily life of the school internally, they are not external evaluators.For this reason, their opinions and suggestions are the most valid and useful for taking measures that will help to create safe schools, schools that all teachers and students want to belong to. Based on the above, the research questions posed are:

A) What are the safety challenges according to the views of school principals?

B) What are the factors that compromise school safety and how do they address them?

C) What policies and practices can help overcome any problems in this regard?

Researchers argue that determining one’s positionality requires one to reflect on his/her multiple identities derived from group membership, roles and responsibilities, personality and value systems, characteristics and even language use. These factors may influence the research questions, methods and the way you interpret research findings. Hence, this small-scale research aimed to explore the teacher’s positionality in conducting collaborative action research.

The issue related to our own positionality was identified when we, as teachers, engaged in collaborative action research to examine students’ engagement in classroom learning (SECL). The SECL collaborative action research project was introduced as a part of the SHARE (School Hub for Action Research in Education) initiative that our school joined in September 2023. The team consisting of five teachers, who are the authors of this paper, from Nazarbayev Intellectual Schools of Physic and Maths in Astana (NIS), participated in trainings on SECL project conducted by Emeritus Professor of the University of Cambridge Collen McLaughlin, Ex-Principal of Bottisham Village College Kate Evans and the national coordinator of SHARE in Kazakhstan, Dr Nazipa Ayubayeva. In SECL collaborative action research, teachers were tasked with conducting structured action research, including delivering a lesson, videotaping this lesson, conducting a reflective interview with a teacher and students, transcribing and making sense of collected data and organizing an in-depth discussion of the findings. Each team member was responsible for one of the processes to be undertaken in the project. In all this processes we were asked to observe the ethical considerations.

The first stage of the SECL project was concluded with a reflective discussion on the processes undertaken facilitated by the national coordinator of SHARE. Through this deep reflection and discussion, it became evident that understanding our own positionality as teachers in this project was crucial for effectively harnessing the collected data to achieve valid, transparent, and accurate results for action. Hence, a decision was made to explore the aspects of teacher positionality before digging into the data on the SECL project.

This summary part of my dissertation deals with the conflicting gender equality discourses in the recent curriculum process for Finnish basic education. From the perspective of radical democracy, the study investigates the potential of an open curriculum process to bring discursive conflicts into light. Despite the study focuses on the Finnish context, it provides a global perspective on the open and inclusive curriculum processes.

The latest Finnish curriculum process provides a compelling perspective on the curriculum drafting and to struggles related to gender equality in basic education for two significant reasons. Firstly, the curriculum process demonstrated greater openness compared to its predecessors, which offered a possibility to members of society to voice their opinion on education policies during the process. Secondly, the Finnish National Core Curriculum (FNCC) for basic education underwent revision at the same time with the amendment (1329/2014) of the Act on Equality between Women and Men (609/1986) in 2014. Following the revisions, Finnish comprehensive schools are now required to formulate equality policies, and the understanding of gender was extended from a binary concept to gender diversity. In the latest curriculum process topic of gender gained visibility when both national and local policies had to adapt revisions.

Finland is well-known for being a model country of gender equality (Edström & Brunila 2016; Lahelma, Öhrn & Weiner 2021). Because of this reputation, there is a perception that gender equality achieved state of affairs. As a result, Finnish educational policies have stressed gender-neutral discourse, taken binary essence of gender for granted and avoided challenging gendered power relations (Edström & Brunila, 2016). Thus, the amendments to the Act on Equality may raise conflicting views on gender equality within a context accustomed to gender-neutral discourses.

The study critically examines discursive construction of gender equality (see Fairclough 1992; 1995), and asks, how gender equality is discursively shaped and what kind of conflicts between discourses arise at different phases of the curriculum process, in 1) FNCC 2004 and 2014, 2) the FNCC2014 draft and feedback comments given on it and 3) school-based gender equality policies (n=140).

The study also explores the notably open curriculum process, investigating how discursive conflicts on gender equality are addressed within the process and examining the transformative potential linked to these conflicts from the standpoint of radical democracy. Previous studies on curriculum process have assessed the success of the processes from the perspectives of shared meaning making, coherence, validity, transparency and consensus (e.g. Pietarinen et al. 2016; Säily 2021). However, deliberative democracy has been criticized for instance by policy researcher Chantal Mouffe. She (2013; 2020) argues that the principles of deliberative democracy often supersede the interests and ideologies linked to political matters. Furthermore, in the deliberative model, policymaking focuses more on the outcome rather than the conflicts that emerge during negotiation. Mouffe challenges deliberative understanding of democracy with her own model of radical democracy.

Within radical democracy, ideological conflicts are viewed as essential for the politicization of issues and for exposing the underlying power dynamics. Mouffe argues that consensus solutions do not eliminate power relations. Alongside with these notions made by Mouffe, feminist policy researchers (Lombardo et al., 2009; Prügl, 2011; Rönnblom, 2017) have emphasised the need of politicisation of gender. Then gender is to be articulated in terms of conflicting interests and as a matter of power relations (Rönnblom, 2017, p. 162; Elomäki & Ylöstalo 2021).

The study adopts a critical perspective on the tradition of deliberative democracy within Finnish curriculum studies. It assesses the capacity of radical democracy to effectively handle discursive conflicts and address the social power relations in the curriculum process.

In language courses, a near-standard variant and pronunciation is often used, whereas in everyday life in the everyday environment of learners, different variants of the majority language (in this case German) must be heard and decoded, whereby phoneme perception and differentiation play an essential role not only for the initial acquisition of German, but also for linguistic interaction in later phases, so that decoding problems on the part of speakers and listeners can be reduced.
Methods such as "before, during and after listening" are used in lessons (Field 2008:30), but these say nothing about the actual decoding ability of the participants, instead focussing on the typical "questions about the text" and rather testing general (prior) knowledge or global understanding.
It is forgotten that the context is only useful if the listeners can already decode precisely everything that has been said up to that point (cf. Field 2008: 136).
It is important to practise phoneme perception, i.e. decoding, with the participants right from the start so that the correct understanding of the individual sounds and thus the entire utterance is achieved.
The importance of reliable phonological representation for the phonological processing of L2 input provides a basis for the other skills that follow in the acquisition process; listening comprehension is closely linked to speaking and also plays an important role in the later acquisition of reading skills (cf. Boada & Pennington 2006)
However, it is not only the ability to decode when listening that is important, but first and foremost the connection between perception and production: what is not heard cannot be reproduced (Dieling 1994).
The aim is to investigate how (and whether) the phonemes of German (in the dialect-standard continuum) can be perceived (unaltered) or not, depending on the language(s) of origin of the participants.
In addition, the sounds of the participants' languages of origin should be analysed in order to investigate whether German phonemes that are also known to them in a similar form from their languages of origin can also be decoded and differentiated more precisely.
This would enable a more differentiated view of the sound perception of German, which would also allow the linguistic approaches to German to be taken into account.
It is expected that, in addition to general approaches to the sound perception of German that are given for learners of different first languages, it will also be possible to describe indications of learning success with regard to the perception of German phonemes or learning obstacles in this area that are related to the first languages.
It is assumed that if phonemes are already known from the learner's language inventory and occur in the language to be learnt, they are more likely to be perceived and articulated correctly.

People on the move frequently spend months or even years in the condition of “waiting” (Conlon 2011) in so-called “transit countries” on the periphery of Europe, such as Serbia and Bulgaria (Panayotova & Petrova 2020; Galijas 2019; Lukic 2016; Kogovsek Salamon 2016). This happens mostly due to political aspirations to limit immigration from Africa and the Middle East, the totality of which can be conceptualised as „geopolitical whiteness“ (Rexhepi 2023).The Balkans, which have historically been crucial to European bordering processes along ethnic and religious lines, are still an important site for border-making and identity-construction in the present day (ibid.: 7). These processes have sharpened following the most recent forced migration movement from Ukraine (Açit 2022). Arguably, one of the most fortified borders runs right through the heart of the Balkan peninsula, demarcating the inside and the outside of the European Union. This reality results in highly different legal frameworks regarding migration. Regulations such as the Dublin Regulation[1], which apply in Bulgaria but not in Serbia, lead to different reception conditions and different strategies employed by forced migrants. These in turn impact aims, requirements and provisions regarding language education programmes.

It has been established that civil society actors are crucial for adaptation processes of forced migrants (Galera et al. 2018; Spencer & Delvino 2018; Stock 2017; Van Dyk, Dauling & Haubner 2015), and states rely on civil society to provide necessary services (Tietje et al. 2021; Lorey 2012). This is even more pronounced in transit countries (Norman 2019: 43). In Serbia and Bulgaria there are currently no public programmes for language education as part of public migration policy, as opposed to most EU states at the core of Europe (Simpson & Whiteside 2015). Instead, adult education programmes are facultative and offered exclusively by civil society organisations. Due to historical developments and the aforementioned geopolitical positions the civil society organisations working in the field of forced migration vary widely between Serbia and Bulgaria. In Serbia the landscape is comprised mostly by local NGOs, many of which are rooted in the humanitarian crisis following the Yugoslav wars in the 90s, while in Bulgaria global NGOs such as Caritas or the Red Cross are most relevant. This project explores how ideologies about language(s) are governing discursive practices in spaces of civil society organised adult language education courses and how they can affect participants’. Specifically, the project combines a micro-analysis of communicative practices in different language classrooms (see: Heller 2015; Kern et al. 2015) with extensive analysis of interview data generated in conversation with teachers, learners and programme managers. In accordance with the principles of critical ethnography (Madison 2005), the aim is to map the language related rules and norms in the classroom, as well as the (self-)positioning of participants within the community of practice. Exploring Bourdieu’s sociolinguistic concepts of (il-)legitimate speech (see e.g.: Bourdieu 2017) and more recent perspectives on “raciolinguistic ideology” (like Rosa & Flores 2015) and “linguicism” (Dirim 2010), the project aspires to show discursive practices reinforcing and/or contesting linguistic stigmatization and racialised perceptions of the self and others.

[1] Council Regulation (EU) No 604/2013 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 26 June 2013, Official Journal of the European Union L180/31

Argumentative writing is a critical genre that involves justifying and supporting a position on an issue or topic with reliable evidence. They aim to persuade the audience by providing logical reasons for a belief or idea. Studies have shown that students often struggle to write rebuttal paragraphs and maintain an academic tone while developing their argumentative essays (Ozfidan& Mitchell, 2020).

Marzano's teaching strategies are known to have a significant impact on student learning, especially when they are well organised, systematically applied and properly assessed in class (Akdeniz, 2016; Marzano, 2003).

Marzano's nine strategies include setting goals and providing feedback, reinforcing effort and providing recognition, cooperative learning, homework and exercises, questions, hints and advance organisers, summaries and notes, recognising similarities and differences, creating and testing hypotheses, and using non-linguistic representations (Marzano et al., 2007).

These strategies, based on research on effective teaching, have been widely studied in the United States, but not in the Kazakh context, particularly in the area of teaching argumentative writing. This study aims to fill this gap and potentially extend the application of Marzano’s strategies to other educational contexts.

This study aims to assess the effectiveness of Marzano's instructional strategies in enhancing the writing skills of students in 11th grade English and 8th grade Kazakh language courses. By focusing on argumentative essay writing, the research seeks to understand how these strategies can improve students' writing abilities in different language contexts.

Objectives:

1. To evaluate the improvement in argumentative essay writing skills in English and Kazakh language classes after applying Marzano's instructional strategies.
2. To identify the challenges faced by students of varying proficiency levels (A, B, and C) in writing argumentative essays in both languages.
3. To assess changes in students' perceptions and difficulties regarding argumentative essay writing before and after the intervention

Within higher education, it is acknowledged that a sense of belonging is paramount to student engagement which ultimately impacts student success (Thomas, 2012; Kahu et. al. 2022). More recently, the concept of ‘mattering’ (Flett, 2018; Gravett, 2021) as an aspect of belonging has come to the fore, focusing on students’ sense of personal value to staff and peers rather than simply a sense of fitting in with a group. Diminished sense of ‘belonging’ has been linked to poorer academic outcomes for racially minoritized students than for white students in the UK (HEFCE, 2015; Millward, 2021). In addition, post-92 universities seek to provide a transformational learning experience to enable social mobility and increase access, participation and success amongst minoritized, marginalised and non-traditional students, but what exactly does it mean to belong and transform, and how do racially minoritized students make-meaning of these concepts in their learning context?

This study focuses on the lived experiences of racially minoritized undergraduate students within a post-92 Business School in the south-east of England. Exploring the immediate and extended environment of students’ lived experiences through their own photographs and metaphorical interpretations of these, factors which hinder or enable a sense of belonging and/ or transforming are examined and discussed.

Employing an arts-based methodology with reference to decolonising methodologies (Tuhiwai Smith, 2012) and Critical Race Theory, the study uses photo-elicitation and collage as methods to access deeper reflections on experience and situations which may go unnoticed or be dismissed (Hughes & Giles, 2010), thereby ‘making the invisible visible’ (Samatar et. al., 2021 p4). Through the creation of metaphors, and participants’ own interpretations of these, whiteness and patterns of oppression and resistance are identified using Reflexive Thematic Analysis (Braun and Clark, 2006 & 2022; Terry and Hayfield, 2020).

Whilst the research is contextually situated and conducted in the year post-Covid, the findings will have relevance to all universities looking beyond the headline statistics on ethnicity degree awarding gaps and drop-out rates to understand the lived experiences of students othered as ‘non-white’ in European higher education systems.

Roma, Europe’s biggest ethnic minority, continue to face prejudice and social exclusion (European Commission, 2020). European Agency for Fundamental Human Rights (FRA, 2023) reports ongoing deprivation and discrimination in all the key areas, cautioning about the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic and inflation. While global challenges amplify the struggle Roma face in Europe, it could be argued that Roma continue to live in uncertainty irrespective of them. Similar to other European countries, research in Serbia indicates stigmatization, lower levels of employment, participation in preschool, school and higher education, lower academic achievements, higher absenteeism and risk of early school leaving, and segregation in education (Civil Rights Defenders, 2018; FRA, 2023; Jovanović et al., 2013; Statistical Office of the Republic of Serbia & UNICEF, 2019). One of the priority areas of the Strategic Action Plan on Roma and Traveller Inclusion (2020-2025) is “supporting access to inclusive quality education and training” (European Commission, 2020). Britton (2014) emphasizes that quality education is crucial for oppressed minorities: without quality education, Roma are unable to change the circumstances they live in, fight discrimination and obtain other basic human rights.

Grounded in the theoretical framework of social justice education, this study emphasizes teachers as key actors in enhancing Roma students' learning opportunities and life chances. Inclusive education is related to “challenging the ways in which educational systems reproduce and perpetuate social inequalities” (Liasidou, 2012, p. 168). Aims to eliminate the oppression and marginalization of some groups of students are rooted in critical pedagogy (Giroux 1992; McLaren 1998, as cited in Liasidou, 2012). Teachers can have a crucial role in fostering trust between Roma students and schools and motivating them to participate (Bhopal, 2011, 468, as cited in Zachos, 2017). By choosing teaching and classroom management methods teachers either support or hinder students’ performances (Zachos, 2017). While critical pedagogy and social justice discourse are criticized for being abstract and neglecting learning goals, this study focuses on their practical aspects such as integrating students' personal experience into teaching, fostering critical thinking (Katz, 2014), empathy, activism (Burke & Collier, 2017), multiple perspectives and discussions, valuing diversity, and challenging the curriculum (Cochran‐Smith et al., 2009). Moreover, Cochran-Smith et al. (2009) argue that social justice teaching focuses on high achievements as a basis for challenging inequalities. This study also relies on the concept of teacher agency for social justice as defined by Pantić and Florian (2015). They combine the model of teacher agency (Pantić, 2015) with the framework for evidencing inclusive pedagogy in action (Florian & Spratt 2013), referring to teachers’ agency as their sense of purpose, competence, autonomy and reflexivity (Pantić & Florian, 2015, pp. 344–346). Teacher’s agency depends on micro, meso and macro level factors such as institutional structures and assumptions or teachers’ implicit beliefs (Pantić, 2021). Therefore, this study focuses on the role of the teacher in reducing inequalities for Roma pupils. The research questions are:

1) How do teachers view their role in promoting high achievements and social justice for Roma students?

2) How do teachers promote high achievements and social justice for Roma students through teaching, supporting relationships between students and collaboration with families?

3) How do other actors of the school community view the teacher’s role in promoting high achievements and social justice for Roma students?

4) What are the challenges and support mechanisms that teachers recognize in promoting high achievements and social justice for Roma children in Serbia?

As Lingard & Mills (2007, p. 234) warn, it is important not to be “too optimistic” nor “too pessimistic” about teachers' influence on social justice, but exploring different perspectives can help provide important insights into this potential.

Recently, Kazakhstan established a policy on inclusive education. By making adjustments to existing policies and introducing new ones, the country aims make the educational system inclusive with the goal of having 70% of all schools enrolled by the end of 2025 (Makoelle, 2020). The most recent developments in Kazakhstan indicate that inclusive education is still associated with special needs students and, as a result, only sometimes accommodates all forms of diversity. According to Zholtayeva et al. (2013, as cited in Makoelle, 2020), inclusive education in the Kazakh context entails integrating all students with special needs into the classroom, placing a focus on the use of a variety of methodologies and learning resources, as well as having school staff choose from a variety of approaches to the learning process.

Research on inclusive policies and practices implies that inclusive leadership poses a distinct challenge. In line with Ryan's (2006) perspective, inclusive leadership involves collaborative procedures that broaden the scope of leadership to address matters such as teacher involvement, the presence of administrators at different organizational levels, and engagement with the school community. Therefore, this research aims to explore the following questions:

• What leadership practices does the principal employ to promote inclusive education within the school?

• What obstacles does the principal encounter while fostering and guiding inclusive education initiatives?

• How does the principal support school staff and educators in adopting inclusive education principles in their classrooms?

This research seeks to study the actions of a school leader in Taldykorgan that promote inclusive education. Their views could provide insights into how the school administration, staff, teachers, and parents establish inclusive practices in their contexts. This study will examine school leader's overall views and understanding of inclusion, their specific strategies and the problems they experience while implementing inclusive education.

The study underscores the significance of inclusive education as a crucial factor for school improvement, with a school leader playing a pivotal role in expanding learning opportunities for all students. The research holds importance in multiple ways: Firstly, it advances inclusive education in Kazakhstan by highlighting successful practices that can be adopted by other school leaders to foster more inclusive school cultures, resulting in better student outcomes. Secondly, the study identifies leadership skills and strategies that can facilitate the development of effective leadership practices, benefiting policymakers and school leaders seeking to enhance their leadership capabilities. Lastly, the research offers evidence-based recommendations to inform policy decisions to enhance inclusive education in Kazakhstan, promoting inclusive schools' growth and practical leadership approaches. Given the limited research on leaders' perspectives in this domain, the study substantially contributes to the existing literature on inclusive education.

Even though 750 millions classify as vulnerable, vulnerable workers with generally lower levels of human capital, are scientifically understudied As a result of a literature review, vulnerability has been widely used in VET as a synonym for being disadvantaged, stereotyped, marginalized, or theorized and conceptualized loosely or not at all. The theoretical concept of vulnerability allows the link between VET and social justice, here conceptualized as educational equity, to be captured. The term vulnerability represents that oppression is structurally present in all systems, including workplace education. (Lopez-Fogues, 2016).

Vulnerability is not understood as only physically, but as relational vulnerable in the context of its social situatedness (Burghardt et al., 2019). This tries to capture individuals as well as groups as being part of bigger systems of power and hierarchies, which are being re-produced, re-negotiated and re-discussed in interpersonal relationships which leads to differing levels of vulnerability. Organizations and practices, such as VET, play a double role in a) constituting and b) depending on social infrastructure (Scheibmayr, 2023).

Limitations of certain groups, such as vulnerable workforce, are usually not considered when designing training (Carvajal Muñoz, 2022). If recognised as a concept in VET, it can be used as an anthropological category which inevitably brings the pedagogical obligation to avoid violation (Burghardt et al., 2019).

In order to conceptualize vulnerability in vocational education and training (VET) at both the individual and the organizational level, the question arises as to whether existing theories, focusing on work-based learning (WBL) theories, are applicable. The idea is to identify common conceptualizations and theorizations of vulnerability in VET in order to reconceptualize it's value as a tool for exploring the underlying social structure of organizational practice in VET, with a focus on WBL. Following the example of Corlett et al. (2019), vulnerability should be used here as an alternative, more humane idea of the individual learner in VET. This can offer an alternative way of seeing human limits and provide alternative discourses to the dominant neoliberal ones.

Student mobility has been constantly growing across the globe (Rizvi & Lingard, 2010). More and more students participate in short-term mobility programmes such as the ERASMUS+ exchange study programme, and the provision of English-taught programmes has been expanding. Following this global trend, Finland has also increased the number of English-taught programmes and courses across universities (Wächter & Maiworm, 2014) which led to a steadily increase of international degree students. Indicatively, in 2001 the number of international students in Finland was 6,877 and in two decades it tripled to 20,868 in 2020 (Finnish National Agency for Education, 2018, 2022a). These developments increased the cultural diversity inside higher education classrooms which subsequently raised the need to use flexible and culturally diverse teaching methods (Leask, 2009), as well as to implement inclusive approaches and responsive strategies (Larke, 2013). Furthermore, teachers are expected to consider students’ experiences and knowledge to construct new knowledge (Biggs & Tang, 2011) while students familiarise themselves with the new learning environment, have their own expectations (Stier, 2003) and points of reference (Hahl, 2016).

Forming culturally diverse groups has been shown to have a positive impact on students’ academic and sociocultural adaptation (Wang, 2012). Yet, group work between culturally diverse students does not ensure intercultural interaction (Moore & Hampton, 2015) as it can be affected by different communication styles, values, and approaches (Reid & Garson, 2017). Following the work of Reid and Garson (2017) this paper discusses how students’ experience group work in a culturally diverse environment in higher education. The research questions are: 1) What aspects of group work contribute most positively to students’ learning experiences in an intercultural setting? 2) What are the most common challenges faced by students in an intercultural group setting? 3) What strategies were most effective in overcoming those challenges?

The participants of this course were mainly exchange students in their bachelor’s level studies and a few students from the master’s degree programmes (international and Finnish students) who attended a course on Multicultural Education. The course’s participants were mainly from European countries (n=20) followed by Asian (n=16), African (n=1), and Central American countries (n=1). As a compulsory task for the course, the students were instructed to spend approximately 8 hours to read a case study (provided by the teacher), discuss it withing their group and then prepare a 20-minute presentation about it. Instructions about the focus of the presentation were also provided. The case studies were authored by the course book and were based on interviews with high school students. These case studies included the reflections of these high school students on their academic life, personal experiences, and their ties with their cultural background and family. In addition, each case study focuses on a significant theme relevant to the high school student profile such as immigration matters, language and cultural dynamics, stereotypes, identity etc. The goal of this activity was to engage in a critical analysis and discussion of the case study, exchange perspectives, develop teamwork abilities, create a presentation, and highlight effective strategies for teachers who teach in culturally diverse classrooms.

This study presents a quantitative analysis of empirical research on the objectivity of evaluation throughout the term's summative assessment in specialized schools.

In the field of education, evaluation is the process of determining the efficacy, caliber, or performance of curriculum, instructors, pupils, or organizations. The purpose of evaluation is to collect data that will enable decision-makers to make well-informed choices on the efficacy and enhancement of educational initiatives. Evaluation criteria may include time, purpose, evaluator, focus, criteria, kind of data, and level. The assessment based on timing is the main topic of the work.

In Kazakhstan's educational system, examinations are always very important. While each academic has given their own explanation of the importance of assessment, it is important to note the observations of S. Mirseitova, who supplied three definitions of assessment:

Evaluation: To make well-informed judgments, evidence must be gathered, analyzed, and interpreted. A wider range of tasks are included in evaluation with the goal of determining how well educational procedures and results work.

Assessment (Monitoring): This phrase refers to the ongoing monitoring and assessment of students' academic performance as they move through the learning process. Evaluation aids in monitoring modifications and modifying instructional tactics for improved outcomes.

Grade (Mark or Grade): This is the phrase used to describe the final assessment of a student's academic performance. A grade is an evaluation, either numerical or letter-based, that shows the student's degree of knowledge and proficiency in a certain area.

For the purpose of comprehending and evaluating the efficacy of Kazakhstan's educational system, each of these concepts is crucial. (2004)

In the event of examining the data and literature of researchers who have already defined and conducted studies regarding objective assessment of learners, it’s clear to observe that their conclusions match. “Although academics, instructors, and students are interested in this issue, the current method for measuring knowledge is far from flawless.” stated G. Romashkina (2005) and A. Slobodin (2002). “There is no absolutely objective evaluation.” concluded B. Walvoord (1998). When it came to defining objectivity as fairness or honesty, Robin Dee Tierney provided an expanded definition that was considered a crucial finding of the study. Fairness in educational evaluation is required by several imperatives, including pedagogical, technological, and democratic imperatives. Since fairness is neither binary nor a characteristic of an evaluation task or instrument, it is comparable to the measurement attributes of validity and reliability. (2013)

Two years ago, a new school in Kazakhstan opened its doors for the purpose of conducting the research. Overestimating the present school evaluation was a concern during the first academic year. In this sense, the current academic year saw the coding of summative works. We may make the following deductions after examining the acquired average indicators of quality and learning accomplishment throughout a two-year period of study: Learning success is at 100%. The degree of knowledge lies between excellent and acceptable. However, in the second academic year, the caliber of knowledge declines. In the first quarter the quality of knowledge amounted to 42.03%, in the second quarter it amounted to 62.55%. While in the last academic year it amounted to 70.19%.

The study's significance is defined by the necessity to enhance the present evaluation technique for students' knowledge and to identify students' current knowledge and abilities in dynamics.

Due to the large range of assessment methods, the research problem—the absence of impartiality in the evaluation of students' summative work—is pervasive.

The objective of this research is to quantify the development of evaluation objectivity and academic outcomes to the previous year after introducing and implementing new assessment methods, in particular “coding”, that can increase impartiality.

The demographics of students in schools are more diverse than ever in today’s globalized world due to the growing cultural, linguistic, and developmental diversity in classrooms (Florian, 2017).1994 Salamanca Statement and Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities has started international movement for inclusion to be norm and promoting all students to have equal rights to access to education. Within growing advocacy and policy reforms, inclusive education has been recommended as the most practical way to educate students with needs (Chow et al.). Teachers are seen as key figures/ agents to implement inclusive education and determine the success of inclusion in mainstream schools (de Boer et al., 2011; Feng, 2012; Moberg et al., 2020; Robo, 2014; Shevchenko et al., 2020). In other words, the success of inclusive education heavily relies on teachers using appropriate methods to be able to address to different needs of learners. Yet, teachers reporting lack of competence, insufficient knowledge and not being supported raise an issue (Seo, 2020).

In view of the fact and considering that higher education institutions are offering Teacher Education (TE) programmes for pre-service teachers to be qualified to teach in mainstream classes which in turn raise concerns about how adequate teacher education programmes are and how pre-service teachers should be prepared sufficiently respond to students with diverse needs. TE is divided into two main stages: Initial teacher education and Continuing Professional Development (CPD) in which this research will based on ITE for Inclusion in two divergent contexts: Republic of Azerbaijan and Scotland.

This comparative research will discuss the teachers’ role in shaping inclusive education in two contrasting cultural settings: Republic of Azerbaijan and Scotland with a focus on ITE for Inclusion. The research aims to present latest situation of inclusive education, introducing ITE programmes and how inclusion is embedded in the programs. Furthermore, information on how/ what pre-service teachers are being taught to be prepared to teach students with needs in both given contexts will be provided.

The research will employ two theoretical framework: Amarta Sen's capacity approach to explore how ITE programs contribute to building capabilities in pre-service teachers for inclusive practices, and a cross-cultural comparative analysis approach to illuminate factors that foster similarities and differences in ITE programs for inclusion between two countries characterized by divergent educational and cultural norms.

The research question and sub-questions guiding the study are:

1. How does initial teacher education (ITE) programmes prepare pre-service teachers for inclusive practices in the Republic of Azerbaijan and Scotland?

1.1 What differences and similarities exist between Azerbaijani and Scottish’s ITE programmes for inclusion?

1.2 What are experiences of senior pre-service teachers in their involvement with ITE programmes for Inclusion?

1.3 What are the experiences of teacher educators in the context of ITE programs for inclusion?

In the past 10 years, the Further Education and Training (FET) sector in Ireland has undergone fundamental reform (Rami & O’Leary, 2017). FET in Ireland is now an umbrella term to describe all post-compulsory education and training outside of Higher Education. SOLAS (An tSeirbhis Oideachais Leanunaigh agus Scileanna which translates as Further Education and Skills Service) was formed in 2013 as the state organisation responsible for funding, planning and coordinating FET in Ireland.

This study is driven by the question, ‘What impact has sectoral reform has had on the professional identity and practice of teachers in Ireland’s FET sector?’ As the first phase of wider multi-phase study, this systematic literature review will provide the initial groundwork for mapping the activity system (Engeström, 2016) of teachers in FET. This mapping will inform conceptual and theoretical frameworks for subsequent study phases.

Ireland’s national FET strategy (SOLAS, 2020) proposes an evolution of the FET sector in Ireland, prioritising agility and responsiveness to changing societal and economic needs. Owing to the separate evolution of ‘Further Education’ and ‘Training’ sectoral components, reform has raised ideological tensions within FET. Criticism from those within adult and further education traditions have claimed reforms represent a neo-liberal paradigm-shift (Glanton, 2023) with a bias towards training traditions. A top-down re-organisation of the sector and the acceleration to align education with employability is noted by O'Neill and Fitzsimons (2020) as contributing to a "contested profession" of FET teacher.

The current Irish FET sector will be explored through the Three-Perspectives Model of VET (Cedefop, 2023), representing overlapping and competing perspectives of Socioeconomic/Labour Market, Education System and Pedagogical/Epistemological. This lens allows comparative analysis of the Irish FET system reforms and other relevant national VET systems in Europe.

A Socioeconomic/Labour Market perspective focuses on FET’s place in Irish society. The SOLAS sectoral reforms have prioritised an outcome-based approach to FET and prioritised jobs creation. This has led to a perceived commoditisation and marketisation of education, leading to FET being subservient to the interests of the economy rather than being driven by emancipatory educational goals (O'Brien, 2018).

From an Educational System perspective, we will examine the infrastructure that has developed under sectoral reform. The role of FET within the wider education system will be reviewed. A performative funding model has been criticism as contributing to a shift from a flexible learner-centred approach to a simplified funder-centred system-driven model (O'Brien, 2018), similar to the new public management approach to further education in England (Smith & O’Leary, 2013).

The role of the FET teacher will be examined from a Pedagogical/Epistemological perspective. Terms such as ‘adult education’ have disappeared from the FET narrative, while others such as ‘inclusion’ and ‘lifelong learning’ have been redefined within an FET driven by a neo-liberal training agenda (Glanton, 2023). The reframing of ‘Teachers’ in FET as ‘Learning Practitioners’ (SOLAS & ETBI, 2017; SOLAS & ETBI, 2020) further demonstrates the contested professional status of teachers (O'Neill & Fitzsimons, 2020) within a reformed sector.

Finally, building from the Pedagogical/Epistemological perspective findings, the Activity System (Engeström, 2016) of FET teachers will be mapped. This unit of analysis helps to frame the professional identity and practice of teachers in FET, and identify inner contradictions and tensions stemming from sectoral reform.

This study investigates the interactional aspects of selfies created on Snapchat by Swedish teenagers in a vocational school environment. Despite Snapchat's popularity among Swedish youth, discourse analytic perspectives on its use have been limited. By employing a discourse analytic lens, this study seeks to unravel the nuanced interactional aspects of selfies produced by Swedish teenagers on Snapchat within a vocational school context. Through the integration of video recordings and screen-captured smartphone interactions, we aim to shed light on the complex dynamics of this visual communication medium. Additionally, our examination encompasses broader cultural and social implications, emphasizing the significance of impression management in shaping self-presentation and identity construction within the realm of visual culture. Additionally, the concept of impression management, as proposed by Goffman (1990), is applied to analyze the processes of self-presentation within these visual interactions.

Data are drawn from 75 hours of video data concerning Swedish students in upper secondary vocational education engaged in smart phone usage in school. In line with previous research on selfies in educational settings, the study sheds light on the transformative potential of selfies as a tool for reimagining and enriching the educational experience.

Keywords:

The abstract concerns the results from a current project, “Creation and perception of meaningfulness in the transition from school-based training to workplace-based training” that is conducted within the Danish Centre for Knowledge about VET (CEVEU) Om Center for viden om erhvervsuddannelser - CEVEU in the period 2022-2024. In the project, we study students’, teachers’, and trainers’ perception of meaning related to the students’ transition from school-based education and training to the first period of workplace-based training in the Danish dual VET system. The focus is due to a significant part of the high dropout in Danish VET being located to the transition from school to work. (DEG, 2023; Aarkrog & Kamstrup, 2023).

The presentation of results from the project will focus on students’ perception of meaning and meaning making in the transition between school and workplace-based learning. Due to the high dropout rate connected to this transition it is interesting to explore what is meaningful to the student and what can cause the students to experience a lack of meaning in their vocational education at this point. The concept of meaning is highly inspired by self-determination theory (Ryan and Deci 2017, Ravn 2021). The project seeks to answer the following research questions: What do students perceive as meaningful in their education, both while they are in school and during workplace based training and what do students do to create meaningfulness, including meaningful connections, in the transition from school to workplace based training?

Using transition as a theoretical concept (inspired by Ågren 2023 and Holmegaard, Madsen & Ulriksen 2014), we analyze how students perceive meaning in the transition from school to workplace-based learning. Students' experiences of meaning in a current situation are influenced by the experiences they carry with them and their imaginaries of the future. In the transition from one place to another, students may see their experiences in a different light, or they may encounter something that affects their ideas about the future. In other words, experiences of meaning may change when students are in transition and move from one place to another or simply progress in their education. It is this movement that the concept of transitions captures in terms of highlighting when students' sense of meaning strengthens and weakens. Transition does not only occur from the day students leave school to the next day when they show up for training. The transition begins from the beginning of the school journey where notions of the workplace shape the student's experiences of meaning, and it continues in training, where students' experiences from school similarly influence their sense of meaning.

A national review of Ireland’s Youthreach education programme for early school leavers, found staff retention to be a future challenge for the programme (Smyth et al., 2019). With no previous research into staff retention in Youthreach, this study explores the unique characteristics of the programme to identify variables influencing staff intention to leave.

Teacher retention is a significant issue in many countries across mainstream education provisions. This trend is also prevalent in Ireland, with the Teachers’ Union of Ireland (TUI) (2018) finding that 46% of new-entrant teachers do not see themselves in the teaching profession in 10 years. Teacher shortages at post-primary level have been reported (O’Doherty & Harford, 2018), with Ireland’s teacher shortage figures being above the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) average (OECD, 2020). Notably, steps to address teacher recruitment and retention difficulties in Ireland have been described as fragmentary, piecemeal, and potentially damaging to the Irish education system and the profession of teaching (Harford & Fleming, 2023).

Unlike teacher shortage issues in mainstream settings, little research has been undertaken in alternative “second-chance” education settings such as Youthreach. Noting that a decontextualised study of teacher attrition and retention has little value for understanding and dealing with the issue (Kelchtermans, 2017), it is important to explore the factors most relevant to the Youthreach context.

Youthreach is a Further Education and Training (FET) provision, providing fulltime education and training for 15-20 year-olds with learning, emotional, and behavioural difficulties (Department of Education and Skills [DES], 2010). Students in Youthreach tend to present with high levels of adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) (Gordon, 2017), with four or more ACEs found to increase the risk of physical disease, depression, drug abuse, and suicide risk (Hughes et al., 2017).

With up to 70% of students in Youthreach presenting with special educational needs (Gordon, 2017), many Youthreach students require additional support to succeed in reaching their potential. The diverse academic, social, and emotional needs of students with emotional and behavioural difficulties require classrooms to be staffed by experienced special education teachers (SETs) with the prerequisite skills and knowledge (Adera & Bullock, 2010).

The designation of Youthreach centres as Centres of Education (DES, 2010) rather than as schools has resulted in many educators in Youthreach not having a requirement to be registered teachers as per Section 30 of the Teaching Council Act (2001). This means that there is no prerequisite training, qualifications or experience required for two-out-of-three employment grades in Youthreach. This variation in roles and professional standing was highlighted by Smyth et al. (2019) as contributing to the logistical and operational issues.

As student-staff relationships are key to early school leavers re-engaging with education in Youthreach (McGrath, 2006), understanding how best to recruit and retain stable staff teams of motivated and skilled educators is vital.

With no previous research undertaken to guide staff recruitment and retention strategies for Youthreach, this study set out to explore the programme’s unique characteristics to better understand how these may influence staff retention.

This study was driven by the research question, “What are the contributing factors to staff retention difficulties in Youthreach?”, with the following qualitatively and quantitatively orientated specific research questions:

1. How prevalent is the intention to leave among current Youthreach staff? (Quantitative)

2. What factors contribute towards staff intention to leave in Youthreach? (Qualitative & Quantitative)

3. What factors mediate staff intention to leave in Youthreach? (Qualitative & Quantitative)

Increasing digitalisation throughout the world is significantly impacting work processes and activities as well as competence requirements for employees. In the context of nursing care, the introduction of ICT-supported documentation and communication systems and mobile end-devices is of particular importance (Daum, 2017). The transmission and documentation of patient care information (PCI) in healthcare institutions, which are essential to ensure continuity and quality of patient care (Daum, 2017; Güttler et al., 2010), are profoundly affected by the introduction of digital devices and digitalisation (e.g., Rouleau et al., 2017). This raises the question of what digital competences nurses need to successfully cope with PCI transmission.

Internationally, various catalogues of digital competences exist (e.g., Becka et al., 2020; Kuhn et al., 2019). Some of these catalogues address a generic population and not specifically nurses and other healthcare professions (Vuorikari et al., 2022). Furthermore, to date, the international catalogues of digital competencies for nurses and healthcare professions have not been formally integrated into Swiss national educational programmes (e.g., Brunner et al., 2018). Switzerland lacks a consensus on basic digital competences in the field of digital health (e.g., Kuhn et al., 2019). This study applied a work analysis approach to identify typical exemplary professional situations of PCI transmission with digital devices in Swiss hospitals and the competencies required to cope successfully with these situations (Volpe et al., in preparation). It is based on the so-called ‘course-of-action’ approach to work analysis (Durand & Poizat, 2015; Theureau, 2006). This is a theoretical tradition of work analysis inspired by Francophone ergonomics (Filliettaz et al., 2015), a key assumption of which is that the design of learning environments and programmes should be based on a detailed understanding of workplace practices and requirements (e.g., Daniellou, 2005; Durand & Poizat, 2015; Guerin et al., 2007). To analyse real work practices and identify typical situations of PCI transmission, the researchers applied a video ethnography approach, which was performed with on-site observations and video recordings of the professional activities of 24 nurses in six hospitals. Subsequently, the nurses were invited to participate in individual self-confrontation interviews. During these interviews, the nurses were shown video footage of their professional practices and asked to identify the meaningful aspects of their lived experiences using a semiotic approach. Each video clip consisted of a selection (made by the research group) of observed situations relevant to the PCI transmission theme.

The researchers identified six key moments in the transmission and documentation of PCI with digital devices, represented by selected and validated situations and a set of digital competences that the nurses applied or would have been required to successfully deal with these situations.

The results of this study are of high practical relevance, as they can guide the development of nursing competency frameworks and the conception of training content that closely mimics real work situations. They contribute to the existing literature by concretizing the existing international catalogues of digital competences.

The importance of involved stakeholders and the resulting social networks in international VET cooperation is highlighted in a large number of empirical studies (see e.g., Gessler, 2019). While social network analysis has a broader range of empirical use cases in a wide variety of educational settings (see e.g., Hodge et al., 2020; Jan & Vlachopoulos, 2018), the state of research related to VET (see e.g., Ditchman et al., 2018) is found to a much lesser extent, as is the coverage of social capital within international VET research (see Gessler & Siemer, 2020; Siemer & Gessler, 2021). This paper focuses on the development of social capital in the course of network building and its sustainability in an international consortium using the case study of the funded Erasmus+ project AI Pioneers. The following research questions will be pursued in the context of the submission:

1) Which actors play a central role at the beginning of network building in the field of vocational education and training?

2) What is the intensity of the relationships over the course of the network formation?

This paper will draw on various theoretical approaches in network research to build the theoretical and conceptual framework of the study. As the funded project is an innovation project, the promoter model is used to apply the "content-related dimension of support" (Gessler & Siemer, 2020, p. 46) within the egocentric networks to be analysed with the roles of power promoter, expertise promoter, process promoter and relationship promoter (Witte, 1999). The basic idea of the promoter model is the assumption that promoters are able to overcome barriers in the innovation process due to suitable resources, which has a promising effect on the implementation of projects (e.g., Gessler, 2019; Witte, 1999). Furthermore, the differentiation between bridging and bonding social capital, and thus the intensity of relationships, is crucial (Patulny & Svendsen, 2007). The distinction between strong and weak ties can be traced back to Granovetter (1973). Following on from Granovetter (1973), Marsden and Campbell (1984) empirically addressed the question of which further indicators can be used to capture the strength of social relationships. The authors primarily identified indicators for the closeness of relationships and also refer to the frequency of contact as well as the duration described as the years of acquaintance (Marsden & Campbell, 1984). Following on from this, Gessler and Siemer (2020; see also Siemer & Gessler, 2021) introduce a specification in the form of a level model for measuring the closeness of social relationships which is applied in the course of the present work: 1) Pure exchange of information, 2) Mutual exchange but distanced, 3) Goal-oriented coordination, 4) Cooperation, and 5) Trust in each other. The different levels are characterised to varying degrees by the features of relevance, reciprocity, intentionality, interdependence and consistency, so that the intensity increases over the five levels and the attributes of the subordinate levels are to be assigned to the superordinate levels as well.

Since the broad public launching of artificial intelligence (AI)-based large language models in autumn 2022, a debate about potential benefits and risks of AI in education, including vocational education and training (VET) arose (cp. Chiu et al. 2023, Nemorin et al. 2023, Windelband 2023). But, as there is only little experience and almost no evidence referring to this technology in education, most publications discuss potential developments and are based on estimations. A broad consensus is, that AI will have serious influence on teaching, training and learning – but if this influence appears as threat or potential often depends strongly on the beliefs of the authors. Additionally, the various dimensions of complex teaching and learning processes might be tackled very different by AI.

Against this background, a transnational consortium with colleagues from Spain, Portugal, Slovenia and Germany decided to deliver a small piece of evidence about the usefulness of AI in a very concrete setting:

Can AI support drop-out prevention in electronic learning (e-learning) via personalised tutoring?

Drop-out rates in e-learnings are high, cp. for example Khali & Ebner (2014) or Dopler et al. (2023). Among the various potential reasons for drop-out is one, that can be influenced by (human or artificial) tutors: If the learner is lost at a certain point, individual support might guide him or her back on the track.

In an era of globalization, driven by the prevailing neoliberal trend colleges and other higher VET institutions have predominantly focused on measuring their success through criteria such as research excellence and their ability to adapt to the ever-evolving demands of the job market. This development can also be witnessed in Swiss Universities of Applied Sciences (UAS), which were established in the mid-1990s.

However, this myopic approach often neglects other vital dimensions of their mission (Marginson, 2023). These institutions play a pivotal role not only in equipping individuals with job-specific skills but also in cultivating responsible citizenship and nurturing the capacity for lifelong learning. It is imperative to recognize that the diversity of post-secondary institutions are not only providers of human capital (Marginson, 2019) with curriculum shaped by labor market needs; rather, they should be esteemed as institutions dedicated to human development, community anchors, the promotion of the public good (Marginson & Yang, 2022), democratic education (Molnar, 2010), the cultivation of civil society and global citizenship (Franco, 2002) – specifically in the field of vocational education and training.

Particularly in countries such as Switzerland, with its coordinated market economy (Hall & Soskice, 2001), educational institutions focus strongly on imparting specific specialist knowledge and awarding corresponding diplomas that are in demand on the labor market. Recent Swiss studies looked mainly on the impact of UAS in regional labor market innovation and development (Lehnert et al, 2020; Pfister et. al., 2021; Schlegel et al., 2022). However, there are no studies examining the civic role of Universities of Applied Sciences or their role in promoting civic education.

This case study is part of an international comparative study on the civic role of post-secondary educational institutions, which focuses on German-speaking countries, the USA and Canada as well as a sample of East Asian educational systems (Kost, Mou & O’Shea, in prep.). The study examines the civic and democracy-promoting role played by such institutions in Switzerland. This includes, in particular, questions about the specific levels at which this is expressed (legal foundations, service contracts, mission statements, curricula, specific events and activities). As a sub-study of an international comparative study, in addition to the presentation of the results for Switzerland, a positioning of the results within the international context is provided, thus offering a variety of points of reference for colleagues from different countries.

VET has a rather heterogeneous reputation worldwide, which causes challenges for various countries. The negative reputation of VET is often associated with higher salaries of academic professions (Kopatz & Pilz, 2015) and social recognition (Bosch & Charest, 2009). This perception coincides with a growing shortage of skilled workers, especially on a mediate qualification level, which makes vocational training even more necessary. However, the challenges vary significantly between countries. This paper provides insights into the general reputation of the public Brazilian VET system and the perception of this system from the perspective of the Federal Institutes of Education, Science and Technology (FIs). Public and private institutions can provide VET qualifications in the Brazilian Educational System. Whilst upper secondary VET combines general and vocational subjects (including access to tertiary education), apprenticeships focus on 14–24-year-olds on a secondary education level, combining practical and theoretical parts (OECD, 2015). Both approaches offer professionalization towards a specific occupation. Compared to other OECD countries, VET participation in Brazil is low, whilst the upper secondary VET drop-out rate with 11% is high (OECD, 2023). This study aims to identify possible levers to bring the Federal VET system in Brazil closer to young adolescents and to identify acute challenges that cause young adolescents to decide against an educational pathway in the Federal VET system. The available data suggest that VET in general has a rather low reputation in Brazil (OECD, 2023) although there is a huge demand. Therefore, this paper aims to answer the following research questions:

• What is the current reputation of the public VET system in Brazil and what are the reasons for this situation?
• What are students’ aspirations for choosing public VET in Brazil?

To gain a better understanding of the factors influencing the relation between educational opportunities, both rational choice theory (individual level) and the skill ecosystem approach (system level) form the theoretical basis of this paper.

On an individual level, sociological rational choice theory (e.g. Arrow, 1973) is suitable for explaining social phenomena at the aggregate level in a structural-individualistic approach. The basic assumptions of these approaches form a theoretical reference point for the statements of the educational representatives in the interviews conducted within the scope of this explorative study. Rational choice theory posits that young individuals are expected to exhibit rational behaviour when making decisions related to their education. Consequently, they operate in a way that maximizes their utility based on their personal preferences, where action is considered utility-maximizing when individuals select from a range of potential courses of action the one that most effectively advances their desired objectives while incurring minimal costs (Green & Shapiro, 1999). However, young people are limited in their rational behaviour due to the lack of advanced information regarding the anticipated advantages of their educational choices (Arrow, 1973; Garibaldi, 2006; Jovanovic, 1979).

Alligning with a a systemic approach, the skill ecosystem approach offers a holistic understanding. Defined by Finegold (1999) and Brown (2022), this approach perceives educational choices and professionalization being influenced by the present ecosystem, leading to different (area-based) educational and economical pathways, forming a bridge between labour-market-centred demands and policy driven supply. The aim is to offer a holistic, diverse and adaptable approach with a focus on creating solutions to skill-related challenges considering global and local contexts. This approach provides a basis for explaining (regional) differences in terms of educational choice and qualification. Within this study, the focus referring to the skill ecosystem approach are institutional and political framework conditions. This comprises aspects such as legal regulations, governance forms and structures and their public perception, regulations and the negotiation of ethnic standards (Ostendorf, 2019).

International policy transfer in education per se and in Vocational Education and Training in particular has been a topic of interest across the world and across several disciplines (Phillips, 2008; Phillips & Ochs, 2004; Portnoi, 2016; Scott, Terano, Slee, Husbands & Wilkins, 2016; Steiner-Khamsi & Waldow, 2012). The term refers to the process of exchanging and adopting policy measures, reforms, strategies and ideas from one context to another (Dolowitz and Marsh, 2000; Li and Pilz, 2021), either with or without adaption to the new context. With respect to vocational education and training, the apprenticeship training in German-speaking countries has been a role model for many countries all over the world for decades and there were countless attempts to transfer at least elements of it to other regions and countries (e.g. Euler, 2013; Oeben and Klumpp, 2021). In the field of (labour-market related) adult education, policy transfer is less obvious though it was particularly international organizations which “borrowed” concepts of lifelong learning and learnt from one another as regards learning over the lifespan (e.g. Jarvis, 2014). Other examples of policy transfer in education refer to higher education and the Bologna, the learning outcomes orientation, qualifications frameworks or New Public Management tools (in terms of e.g. the use of monitoring or benchmarks in education).

However, there are few compendia that unite different international perspectives about the topic. Literature has tackled TVET in selected countries (Ertl, 2006), the transfer of the dual apprenticeship system to other countries (Gessler, Fuchs & Pilz, 2019; Pilz, 2017) or policy transfer in the field of skills development and skills regimes. There is a significant number of scientific publications that either address policy transfer (or policy learning or policy diffusion) in general or in fields different from education. Those that do address policy transfer in VET do hardy focus on international perspectives on VET development or they are not available in English.

Against this background, this contribution is based on an upcoming handbook on policy transfer in TVET and beyond seen from an international perspective. Approx. 60 scholars from all continents provided insights into policy transfer from a wide spectrum of international perspectives. They explore policy transfer in respect to learning, be it voluntary and purposeful, incidental and accidental or purposeful (Phillips and Schweisfurth, 2011). Also, the book addresses theoretical foundations of policy transfer, methodological approaches to policy transfer studies, skills development in light of the political economy, the impact of international policies, the influence on the politics of international organizations on policy learning across nations, historical reflections, cultural and anthropological perspectives, policy transfer from the global North to the global South as well as new trends in policy transfer. Geographically, the chapters span a wide range of countries including e.g. Cuba, Denmark, Estonia, Germany, Ghana, India, Ireland, Northern Macedonia, Serbia, Slovenia, the USA, the United Arab Emirates or Vietnam.

The European policy landscape urges a commitment to lifelong learning for all adults, emphasizing its benefits at individual, societal, and economic levels (e.g. Council of the European Union, 2021; European Commission, 2017; Ministerie van Sociale Zaken en Werkgelegenheid & Ministerie van Onderwijs, Cultuur en Wetenschap, 2018). To achieve this, inclusive and attractive learning systems are essential, necessitating individual responsibility and agency towards learning. The central research question arises: What kind of socio-spatial environment is required to activate adults to learn? This literature review aims to conceptually explore the components of a conducive socio-spatial environment for adult learning, identifying success factors that can inform the development of inclusive learning systems.

The literature review focuses on vulnerable adults, those lacking resources to overcome difficulties independently. Adult learning, broadly encompassing formal, non-formal, and informal types, serves diverse purposes like personal development, leisure, and career support. Emphasizing lifelong development (Kuijpers et al., 2019; Kuijpers & Draaisma, 2020), the review draws on the capability approach to assess if individuals have the freedom to aspire to learning and if conversion factors facilitate turning this capability into actual learning.

The review adopts a three-level framework (micro, meso, macro) to analyse factors influencing adult learning participation (Boeren, 2017; von Hippel & Tippelt, 2010). At the micro-level, individual agency is crucial, where factors like aspirations, competence, and autonomy influence learning. Learning is seen as a socially embedded process, emphasizing the importance of the social context and communities in triggering change or supporting learning. The meso-level considers the socio-spatial learning infrastructure that activates adult learners, connecting macro-level policies to specific interventions at the local level.

At micro level, individual agency, comprising aspirations and competence, interacts with the social context in determining the willingness of adults to learn. A capability approach is employed to assess the freedom to aspire to learning and the presence of conversion factors for actual learning.

This meso-level looks at the whole socio-spatial learning infrastructure that activates a learner (Rutten & Boekema, 2012). This level examines the wider learning infrastructure beyond education providers, including material, discursive, social, and technological mechanisms. The meso-level is critical in operationalizing macro-level policies into interventions responding to specific adult learning needs in a socio-spatial context.

Given this multi-level framework, the central research question is: How can the socio-spatial environment activate a vulnerable person to learn, and what conditions constitute such an activating environment at meso-level? Three sub-questions support the investigation: 1) What conditions are needed to reach potential adult learners and engage with them? 2) What conditions are necessary in a socio-spatial environment to develop an effective infrastructure? 3) What should be prioritized in terms of policies to support the conditions for an effective infrastructure? The literature review navigates through micro and meso-level factors to answer the research question, aiming to identify conditions facilitating the creation of a conducive socio-spatial environment for adult learning. The analysis is expected to inform policy and practice, enhancing existing socio-spatial environments to activate adults to learn.

In recent decades Ireland has become a much more culturally and linguistically diverse society, experiencing considerable inward migration driven by economic, political, social and cultural factors. Simultaneously, education systems have been experiencing significant reform with an increased focus on inclusive education and mitigating educational and social disadvantage. Data from the national funding agency for further education and training (FET) in Ireland shows that over 20% of learners enrolled in FET programmes are from migrant backgrounds (SOLAS, 2021). However, in stark contrast to the growing body of literature exploring cultural and linguistic diversity in the compulsory education system in Ireland (e.g., Smyth et al, 2009; Devine, 2011; Rodríguez-Izquierdo and Darmody, 2017), research related to multilingual learners in the further education and training sector is limited.

A review of the international literature exploring the participation of learners from linguistically and culturally diverse backgrounds in vocational and post compulsory education systems in Europe, North America and Australia identified several barriers or enablers to participation and success for multilingual learners; linguistic (e.g. Kanno & Varghese, 2010; Rusert &Stein, 2023), pedagogical (e.g. Choy &Warvik, 2019; Rosvall et al, 2018), sociocultural (Onsando &Billett, 2009), psychological (Ben-Moshe et al, 2008), informational (Atanasoska and Proyer, 2018; Morrice et al, 2020), financial (Chadderton and Edmonds, 2015; Jeon, 2019), and structural (Atanasoska and Proyer, 2018).

This paper seeks to establish (1) how multilingual learners are reflected in macro-level de jure education policy related to Further Education and Training in Ireland and (2) to what extent the policy literature addresses barriers to participation for this cohort. In total, 17 documents were selected based on a purposive sampling strategy. Analysis of the documents was conducted using a priori codes derived from the literature on barriers and bridges to participation in vocational education settings for multilingual learners from ethnoculturally diverse backgrounds. While linguistic concerns constitute the most frequently referenced policy recommendations, little consideration is given to the inter-related factors which contribute to success or distress for this cohort of learners.

Vocational education and training (VET) is of central importance in Germany concerning economic development and social integration. The demand for VET among young people, however, has systematically declined in recent decades, a trend that had even intensified in the pandemic context (BIBB 2023). One reason is the demographic trend in Germany reflected in declining numbers of school leavers. These days, young people increasingly aim for school-leaving certificates on a high level and show a high tendency to enter a HE study programme afterwards (BMBF 2023). If they decide for a VET qualification, they do so preferably in the commercial field rather than in the technical field or in STEM professions (BIBB 2023). This indicates that VET appears to lack appeal, particularly for high-achieving young people (Hoffmann & Henty-Huthmacher, 2015, p. 3; BIBB, 2023).

In view of the increasing requirement levels in STEM professions (Warning & Weber, 2017; Arntz et al., 2020), there is a decreasing motivation among young people to take up such a profession. In addition, from the companies’ perspective, they are often not up to the requested requirements (Kuhlee et al., 2022, p. 673). In particular, there is a lack of suitable high-achieving applicants holding an HE entrance qualification in demanding technical training occupations. Therefore, these young people are considered as an important target group for image campaigns and innovation approaches in VET in order to meet the demand for skilled workers with vocational qualifications (Kroll, 2018, p. 132; BIBB, 2023). Taking this into account, the 17 projects within the InnoVET initiative of the Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) aim to design new higher VET qualifications focussing on industrial and technical fields in particular. The aim is to strengthen VET through further education and training courses – partly dovetailed with academic education - and thus to increase the attractiveness of VET.

But what makes VET attractive to young people? What makes a vocational career pathway attractive compared to an academic one? What do young people think about these newly designed vocational programmes? Can these programmes influence young peoples’ decision in favour of a vocational training and career pathway? These questions have neither been the focus of the InnoVET projects nor of empirical studies (Neu, 2021) and against this background are getting investigated more deeply in this paper. Based on empirical data from the research project GInnoVET, the paper discusses parameter of attractiveness of VET from the perspective of young people, presents the central design features of the newly designed qualification programmes and discusses the extent to which these programmes could influence the decision of young people for a VET pathway.

The theoretical background gets provided mainly through expectancy-value models (e. g. Eccles, 2011). The basic idea behind such models is that an educational pathway is favoured when it has a high subjective value and therefore also a high perceived benefit for the person and when at the same time the person expects to be able to achieve this option successfully. Personal, social and institutional factors are relevant for the respective assessment of the subjective value and the expectation of success (Schnitzler, 2019).

A distinction can also be made between influencing factors that arise from the training phase itself and those that arise from the future prospects associated with a successfully completed VET programme (Neu, 2021). According to Heublein et al. (2018), aspects of the training conditions and having the opportunity to shape the training conditions oneself can be subsumed under attractiveness during VET qualification. However, after completing the qualification, expectations of the labour market, aspects of professional self-realisation and skills acquisition become relevant for participants.

Globalisation has increased interest in educational policy transfer in the academic and policy debate. This includes vocational education and training (VET), whose role has been emphasised by policy makers all over the world after the global financial crisis of 2007/8. VET, so it seems, can be an efficient tool to combat unemployment and increase economic productivity.

Based on this assumption, the last decade has seen an exponential rise of transfer activities and accompanying research of the model of dual VET from the German-speaking to other countries. While success of transfer endeavours has been mixed, research tends to focus on issues of implementation rather than underlying social relations and actors’ interests in both sending and receiving countries.

In this paper, we will discuss the transfer process of dual VET to Serbia, where in 2017 a law introduced dual VET as a separate track in the traditional school-based VET system. This had been preceded by reform discussions, encouraged and supported by the EU and German speaking donor countries, of what was perceived as an outdated, theory-biased and not market-responsive VET system. The dual VET reform has been meant to decrease youth unemployment and skilled emigration. Yet, more visibly than in other countries, the introduction of dual VET in Serbia was met with resistance by academia, civil society and trade unions largely based on concerns that it could increase social and educational inequities. While the implementation process, started in 2019, is still young and valid monitoring data on the intended impact of dual VET is unavailable, the transfer process in itself offers promising terrain for an analysis focused on underlying social relations rather than on success or failure at the level of implementation.

Our research question is therefore what role political interests of the involved internal and external actors have played in and how (diverging) conceptions of education have framed societal debates on the transfer process.

In this paper, we will first challenge the predominantly pragmatic research approach to dual system transfer by unpacking the notion of context. Beyond an examination of actors’ roles, interests and their (conflictive) relations, this includes discourses, conceptions and imaginaries of education. Second, we will relate this to the discussion on the purpose of education. Indeed, the opposition to dual VET in Serbia, beyond immediate concerns over wage dumping and curricular narrowing, transmits conflicting imaginaries of education. While the presumed success story of dual VET is framed by economistic conceptions defining human capital formation as education’s main purpose, humanistic objectives, such as social equity, continue to underpin collective imaginaries of education in Serbia, basically as a heritage from socialist Yugoslavia.

Our conceptual framework refers to two interrelated strands of academic debate in comparative education. First, we will draw on policy transfer literature, in particular on the analytical approach that examines motivations of transfer and its impact on existing policies and power constellations (e.g. Steiner-Khamsi, 2014). Rappleye’s (2012) ‘political production model’ of educational policy transfer will serve as analytical guidelines. This model postulates that political objectives tend to determine transfer decisions to a greater extent than the technical suitability of particular education policies from other countries. Second, Rappleye’s model will be complemented by Crossley’s and Watson’s (2003) notion of context, which points to the significance of culture, including discourses as well as understandings and imaginaries of education that predominate in a given context.

Our objective is to contribute to an analytical rather than normative academic debate aimed at understanding social relations, actors’ roles and educational imaginaries that might underpin collective efforts to support or oppose the reforms in question.

Vocational education and training (VET) is traditionally understood as a primarily national policy field that is particularly characterised by national traditions and path dependencies. However, numerous research studies in recent years demonstrate that VET is no longer only organised at national level. In addition to an already established strand of research on the Europeanisation of national VET policy (Busemeyer 2009; Trampusch 2008; Bohlinger / Fischer 2015; Münk / Scheiermann 2018) and an ongoing interest in the international policy transfer of vocational education and training (Li / Pilz 2023), there is now also work that addresses phenomena that have received fewer attention so far, such as the role of international organisations (Klassen submitted; Vanderhoven 2023; Maurer 2008, 2012) or cross-border cooperation between regions in different countries (Graf 2021). This work raises the fundamental question of the extent to which VET has developed into an international policy field in its own right.
In this paper, we propose to analyse those activities as different types of international VET governance. A governance perspective opens up a view of political design processes that do not emanate solely from a hierarchically conceived state. By international VET governance, we mean the organisation of structures, processes and/or content of VET that transcends national borders. This definition comprises several elements. Firstly, it refers to activities that transcend national borders and therefore cannot be understood exclusively as part of national VET policy. Secondly, these are formative activities that aim to address and shape vocational education and training, for example in material form (e.g. through project funding) or in non-material form (e.g. through standardisation). Thirdly, we focus international VET governance on the organisation of structures, processes and/or content of VET. In doing so, we draw on the classic distinction between polity, politics and policy, which was also used by Kutscha (2010), for example, to define national VET policy, but extend it to include policy beyond the nation state.
In order to differentiate different types of international VET governance, we derived four governance dimensions out of the governance literature: Firstly, as mentioned above, international governance is characterised by the specific diversity of actors involved. These include, in particular, states, international and supranational organisations, non-governmental organisations, transnational public-private partnerships, but also companies and trade unions, which are particularly relevant in the field of vocational education and training. Depending on the policy field, different actors are active in different weightings. Actors interact with each other in certain actor constellations. The identification of such actor constellations provides an entry point for describing international governance activities in more detail. Secondly, the governance activities within these actor constellations are based on certain institutional arrangements, i.e. rules, structures and processes that set the framework for the interaction between actors. These can be formally codified, for example in international treaties or co-operation agreements, or they can have an informal character and be based, for example, on shared interests or convictions. Institutional arrangements thus form the basis on which governance activities take place. Thirdly, governance takes place by means of specific instruments that are available and used by actors. The academic literature identifies a range of different governance instruments. For the area of education policy, Parreira do Amaral (2015) identified four governance instruments – norm setting, agenda setting, funding and coordination of activities (Parreira do Amaral 2015, 374). More generally, Braun and Giraud (2014, 182–188) differentiated between the instruments of ‘regulation’, ‘financing’, ‘structuring’ and ‘persuasion’. Given the dynamic nature of governance activities, it seems impossible to compile an exhaustive and fully comprehensive list of governance instruments.

This theoretical paper seeks to problematise conceptualisations of vocational education and training (VET) and its relationship with Just transitions and neo-liberalism.

It addresses 4 Key issues:

1. It examines differing conceptualisations of VET and their ideological significance.
2. It relates the Eurocentric conceptualisation of VET to constructions of policy science.
3. It suggests doxic conceptualisations of VET have difficulty in accommodating wagelessness.
4. It examines ‘just transitions’ concern with the marginalised alongside an expanded understanding of VET

Neo-liberalism provides a backdrop to the paper.

The paper calls for an expansive conceptualisation of vocational education and training (VET) that moves beyond a narrow instrumentalism lodged within a redundant neo-liberalism that stresses the needs of employers and the labour market. Monk et al (2023) draw our attention to the increasing presence of VET research and researchers from the global south in the leading VET journals. In much the same way as the salience of the global south has previously been played down in VET, so too have questions of race and ethnicity, and the climate emergency. These currents rest alongside a literature that addresses ‘just transitions’ (Spours & Grainger, 2023). It is only recently that such questions have come to the fore in VET journals located in the global north (Avis, 2023ab; Avis et al, 2017; Avis et al, 2023; Monk et al 2023; VET4 2023). Stomporowski (2023) calls for a revival of VET analyses and for the development of a critical-ecological theory of VET. This paper initially engages with VET and its social construction. There are two points to be made. Firstly, VET and its conceptualisation is a site of struggle. Secondly can VET be rid of its close association to the needs of employer and adopt an understanding that seeks to contribute to individual and social well-being. This is followed by a discussion of the capitalocene and its relationship to green agendas. This is accompanied by an analysis of leading supranational organisations such as the World Economic Forum (WEF), UNESCO, ILO and focuses on debates about education, sustainability and green agendas. The World Economic Forum is used as a key example. Somewhat counterintuitively, this section then leads into one that comments on the annual conference speeches in 2023 of leading British politicians. The importance of this is that these politician’s reprise many of the same themes as those of the supranational organisations. It is easy enough to criticise the narrow version of VET as being deeply conservative. The point is that we should be cautious about attributing an inherently progressive politics to expansive versions of ‘just transitions’ and VET. This is after all an empirical question that cannot be determined by theoretical fiat being a site of contestation and struggle shaped by the balance of power between capital and labour.

Concepts such as “generic competences” are based on the assumption that they have an overarching character and do not apply to only one occupation. Nevertheless, in a research project on generic competences (Freidorfer & Kraus, 2023; Freidorfer-Kabashi & Gonon, 2022), we identified occupation-specific differences in the understanding of generic competences.

Based on the increasing importance of so-called generic competences in vocational education and training (VET), “critical thinking” (CT) and “problem solving” (PS) in particular, we investigated the question of what importance trainers in companies attach to these generic competences and what they understand by them. This question was analysed in two occupational fields that are similar in their service character, one of which is more of a person-oriented service (hotel industry) and the other more of a technology-oriented service (IT). It became clear, among other things, that on the one hand there are overarching aspects in the understanding of generic competences in which the representatives of the two fields are similar, and on the other hand there are clear differences in the way in which CT and PS are understood. This is surprising insofar as the concept of “generic competences” is based precisely on the assumption of its overarching meaning.

The field-specific understanding of generic competences is interpreted in this paper with recourse to a cultural studies approach (During, 2010). The core element of this approach is a concept of culture that emphasises the importance of socially shared practices that are linked to shared forms of meaning and mutual expectations in action. From this perspective, the culturally embedded social practices are seen as highly interwoven with the routines in working life, shared values, and the experiences of people. Therefore, the difference in understanding CT and PS can be interpreted as an expression of the different vocational cultures in these two occupational fields.

Two related concepts from vocational training research are instructive for a deeper understanding of vocational culture as an analytic perspective: The concept of training cultures is primarily known from international comparative VET research (Brown & Evans, 1994; Pilz, 2012; Pilz et al., 2023). It shows the cultural embedding of training that has developed within a socio-historical context (Clarke et al., 2021; Deissinger & Gonon, 2021). Training cultures emphasise that the established training systems are also culturally anchored in the societies that have produced them and which in turn have been shaping them. It is used in a similar way at company level to emphasise the close link between corporate culture and training activities (Polo et al., 2018). Whereas training cultures highlight the importance of socio-cultural context, vocational identity reveals the relation between socio-cultural contexts and identity formation (Ferm & Gustavsson, 2021, Pleasant, 2019). The concept of vocational identity is used to describe the process of how a person develops an (emotional) attachment to their respective occupation, which is an important aspect of personal development and identity (Chan, 2019; Klotz et al., 2014). In essence, the development of a vocational identity takes place in the interaction and cooperation relationships in the course of the respective work together with colleagues and customers or clients.

Both concepts emphasise how the perception of the world is shaped by the integration of (individual or collective) actors in a specific cultural context with the associated social practices. Consequently, a field-specific understanding of generic competences can also be seen as an expression of different vocational cultures and social practices in these fields. The article discusses how this perspective helps to understand the differences in the understanding of generic competences between IT and the hotel industry and their relevance for vocational education and training.

Over the past 20 years, there has been a significant increase in the numbers of work-based-learning programmes in Higher Education in Germany. These degree programmes placed at the intersection of vocational and higher education systematically combine academic studies in higher education institutions with practical work experience in companies. The growing importance of these programmes is reflected in both, the increasing number of such study programmes offered and in the rising number of students in work-based-learning programmes (Hofmann et al., 2023, p. 10). Furthermore, the expansion of these programmes is supported by education policies that aim to strengthen the interlinkage between vocational and higher education more intensely (Kuhlee & Irmscher, 2018, p. 9). Despite the increasing relevance of work-based-learning programmes little is known about the specific student clientele, their specific motives for choosing such a programme and their interest in terms of the academic and the practical field. In addition to the role of content interest or the high practical orientation of these students, existing evaluations indicate that important motives for choosing a work-based-learning programme are the combination of theory and practice or associated career opportunities (e.g., Nickel et al., 2022; Hesser & Langfeldt, 2017).

Existing research in higher education suggests that in addition to the motives for choosing a course of study other motivational variables that develop during the course of study are also important factors in terms of study success (Kegel et al., 2020; Blüthmann, 2012, pp. 291). However, the available studies tend to focus on single motivational variables in terms of their relevance to study success. This raises the question of whether a more differentiated and multidimensional consideration of motivational factors, in their interplay, can contribute to a better understanding of their influence on study success (Kegel et al., 2020).

Based on these considerations, this paper analyses in more detail the interplay between intrinsic and extrinsic motives for choosing a work-based-learning programme, academic interest and interest in practical work among students. The following questions arise: (1) To what extent can student profiles be distinguished in terms of their motivation for choosing a course of study and their interests? (2) How can these student profiles be described in terms of key characteristics such as educational background and migration background? (3) To what extent do these student profiles differ in terms of perceived study success?

The article focuses on the importance of vocational identity and compares this dimension between different branches. As a further aspect, approaches to the development of vocational identity are presented, which Vocational Education and Training (VET) schoolteachers or in-company instructors can provide.

The development of vocational identity is a central target in VET and is of particular importance for the career development of employees. After all, the consideration of vocational identity as a characteristic of successful vocational education and training has a long tradition in the context of scientific analyses of VET and is currently experiencing a certain "renaissance". Vocational identity is to be regarded as a central topic or target in VET and a relevant pattern for analyzing current discourses on the recruitment of skilled workers and the reduction of apprenticeship drop-outs.

Different theoretical operationalization have been written in the literature, and there is no uniform (scientific) definition of "vocational identity". Nevertheless, the development of a vocational identity is a key aspect in VET, especially since a highly developed vocational identity makes a substantial contribution to the development of occupational competence. Therefore, it is a requirement in order to be able to carry out vocational challenges competently and independently (Thole, 2021; Heinrichs et al., 2022).

Rauner (2017) defines vocational identity as follows: "Vocational identity is the result of a development process that is intimately linked to the development of occupational competence. Strictly spoken, the development of vocational identity is a dimension of occupational competence development."

The degree of vocational identity depends on the occupation and apprenticeship, especially since occupations have different identification potentials, i.e. indicators of the attractiveness of an occupation. This means that development is not continuous. Rather, it requires the active engagement of the individual subject with his or her individual occupational environment. Accordingly, the development of vocational identity is based on an interaction with the environmental conditions (in the apprenticeship), in the sense of a subjective experience of vocational identity, reinforced and supported by the individual's self-reflective processes (Rauner, 2017; Thole, 2021; Heinrichs et al., 2022).

With a high level of emotional attachment to the occupation learned, job-related disadvantages, such as low pay or shift work, are often tolerated. In a positive understanding, it can be expected that a strongly developed vocational identity can lead to greater job satisfaction and better performance in everyday working life. Consequently, vocational identity can have an influence on long-term motivation and activity at work, as well as increasing the sense of responsibility and quality awareness (Rauner, 2017). These are reasons why companies and VET schools should have an interest in promoting the vocational identity of their apprentices at an early stage.

Therefore, two research questions are analyzed:

• Which relationships exist between vocational identity and other dimensions such as job satisfaction, or meaningfulness of own work?
• How can schoolteachers and/or in-company instructors (systematically) promote vocational identity in VET?

The aim of this study is to contribute to the support of and the development of vocational identity in VET. In order to achieve this, practical suggestions and advice are given on how to promote vocational identity in apprenticeships in companies and VET schools. The results and suggestions should be transferable to various European countries with a school-based VET system, a dual VET system and also to countries with a "training on the job" approach.

The aim is to provide information on how the development of vocational identity in VET can be promoted in different contexts or systems. The transfer should succeed on the basis of two studies from Germany, which were carried out in various schools and companies in different VET sectors.

The smart specialisation of countries and regions is one of the challenges at Spanish and European levels for their economies to become more competitive and sustainable in a global context. The aim is for regions to ‘be more specialised’ in order to become ‘smarter’, identifying their assets and strengths in terms of innovation and articulating priorities that concentrate their efforts in order to maximise results (REDIDI, 2021; European Commission, 2020; Foray et al., 2018). This concept of specialisation has been introduced in the European framework mainly through the Cohesion Policy (2014-2020), which has evolved into the current programme (2021-2027). In this programme, the role of talent has been strengthened as one of the key elements for the innovative process, not only in the scientific and technological field but also in the business and organisational field. Indeed, one of its specific objectives is to foster capabilities for smart specialisation, industrial transition and entrepreneurship (Fontana et al., 2023).

Within this framework of specialisation, the role of the Vocational Education and Training (VET) system in developing skills for absorhing and socialising of technological and organisational innovations is recognized. Thus, it is a catalyst for the acceleration of applied innovation processes in companies (Hazelkorn & Edwards, 2019), especially in Spanish SMEs. It is from a combined approach to innovation that includes both the DUI (learning by doing, using and interacting) and the STI (science and technology-based innovation) approaches (Jensen et al., 2007), that the specialisation of VET professionals becomes increasingly valuable.

The role of VET is strengthened because it is a key system for providing professionals to the surrounding enterprises, which can accelerate the transfer of skills needed to implement new technologies and/or systems in SMEs (Navarro & Retegi, 2018; Albizu et al., 2017). To identify how important is the VET system in fostering SMEs innovation process, two contextual factors must be taken into account: On the one hand, Spain has a moderate innovative performance, according to the European Innovation Scoreboard (European Commission et al., 2023), the specialisation of SMEs professionals can be a catalyst for improvement. The hybridisation of professional profiles and the specialisation of curricula and qualifications are key in this respect. On the other hand, more than 99% of the Spanish enterprises are small and medium-sized.

The most recent normative developments in Spanish VET, the Organic Law 3/2022, of 31 March, on the organisation and integration of Vocational Training (BOE, 2022) and the Royal Decree 659/2023, of 18 July, which develops the organisation of the Vocational Training System (BOE, 2023), propose different mechanisms for VET specialisation. These are the so-called ‘specialisation courses’, the curricular innovation in the basic provision of the different levels of VET, the development of applied innovation projects, the specialisation of vocational training centres, the creation of integrated centres (providing both IVET and CVET), and the creation of smart specialisation networks, among others. In this paper the novel VET figure of the “specialisation courses” is analysed in the context of smart specialisation from a territorial and business perspective. It is important to point out that specialisation courses are an innovative lifelong learning tool that facilitates the professional development of VET graduates.

While work placement is widely considered as a popular approach to fostering employability among higher education institutions, surprisingly little is known about the mechanisms through which placements can support students’ transition from university to the labour market. The aim of this study is to provide a dynamic understanding of students’ transition from work placement to the graduate labour market, with a focus on graduate earnings differentials due to heterogeneous job transitions. Using data collected from three waves of economics graduates of a UK university who did a work placement, this study examined three hypotheses: the gain of a pay premium for graduates who remained with their placement employer, also termed `foot-in-the-door' or employer-persistence effect; the persistence of low pay as students transition from work placement to graduate employment, in short, low-pay persistence effect; the pay progression as students transition from low-pay work placement to higher paid graduate employment, in short, low-pay stepping-stone effect. Our empirical investigation is underpinned by a conceptual model that builds on the movement capital framework, a conceptualisation of career mobility that is based on turnover literature. Specifically, we present a model that links the movement capital that students develop while on placement with their internal and external perceived employability. Correspondingly, these two types of perceived employability are linked to internal and external job transitions, which, in our context, translate into working for the placement or a different employer, respectively, upon graduation. Finally, the type of transition graduates make may lead to differential earnings (salaries).

In Norwegian teacher education a new reform was initiated in 2017 aiming at developing what is called “Teacher Education Schools” (The Ministry of Knowledge, 2017). The aim is to develop professionally relevant teacher educations by strengthening the quality of student teachers’ placement periods and teaching practice in schools. Another aim is to stimulate cooperation on research and development, and to strengthen the professional relevance and quality of teacher education and the institutions. Both previous experiences and methodological and epistemological arguments have long pointed towards a shift in this direction (Darling-Hammond, 2006; Eikeland, 2012a).

The regional education authorities in Oslo and Akershus and a group of researchers in the Department of vocational teacher education at the OsloMet University developed the Action research project LUSY (teacher education schools in vocational teacher education), aimed at developing vocational teacher education schools with three vocational upper secondary schools (VET), with funding from the Norwegian Research Council. The main aim for the project is to develop a binding and lasting cooperation between the schools and OsloMet to create the best possible vocational teacher education and VET. The intention is to form binding and lasting cooperative structures between VET and OsloMet University.

The purpose of this paper is to highlight and discuss what education practical teachers need in order to strengthen the quality and professional relevance of teacher education. The background is empirical examples from the action research project LUSY. Practical teachers (teacher trainer/supervisor) are teachers who guide teacher students in their pedagogical practice in schools.

The research questions are about the practical teacher's competence - what their work tasks need to be, what content is identified as necessary for the education of practical teachers, how the education is organized and how practical teacher education (supervisor training of practical teachers) can contribute to strengthening the connection between the educational institution and the field of practice in teacher education. The empirical results are based on experiences from planning, implementation, and assessment of a school-based practical teacher education (course) for schools and practical teachers who are participating in the LUSY-project.

A professionally relevant education can be defined as being characterized by a close coherence between content and tasks in the profession and the educational content. Such education is largely in accordance with the competence demands of the profession (Hiim, 2017; Sylte 2020). There’s a multitude of research indicating that insufficient professional relevance is a challenge in teacher education as well as in professional education in other areas. One of the reasons seems to be that collaboration between educational institutions and professional workplaces is not sufficiently developed (Canrinus et al., 2015; Heggen & Smedby, 2015; Hiim, 2013; Sylte, 2020; Young, 2004).

The project is based on a holistic, multi-dimensional understanding of knowledge where professional knowledge have many forms. Much research on VET is based on a concept of competence that is frequently defined as a holistic set of knowledge, skills and attitudes applied to solve specific tasks (Koenen et al., 2015; White Paper 28, 2015-2016). However, the use of the concept of competence in VET is often unclear and varies (Lester & Religa, 2017). A main aim in the project is to show how professional knowledge is constituted, and how the organization of collaboration between educational institutions and fields of practice can be strengthened through the projects first innovation, the school-based practical teacher education.

Epistemological analyses of professional knowledge based on pragmatic approaches pose the theoretical framework of the project (Dreyfus & Dreyfus, 1987; Schön, 1983; Sennett, 2008). Connections between theories of professional knowledge, organizational learning, and professional didactics will be investigated (Eikeland, 2012a; Hiim, 2017; Sylte, 2020).

Close-to-practice research in educational contexts such as a Swedish upper-secondary school vocational education and training (VET) involves a collaboration between researchers and VET teachers. Here, an example of research collaboration between a building and construction teacher and a researcher is presented. In the Swedish context, close-to-practice research has been recently advocated as a means to strengthen the scientific base of teacher education (cf Cochran-Smith & Lytle, 2009). Therefore, the Swedish government has piloted a national programme to fund and stimulate the growth and trial of collaboration models between academia and the school called in short ULF. ULF stands for Utbildning (Education), Lärande (Learning) and Forskning (Research). Common projects often involve interventions to improve different aspects of education, e.g., teaching and instruction activities. Sometimes there is a close connection to a school’s quality assurance work. However, the explicit goal is to facilitate collaboration between academia and schools on an equal footing. Eplicitly, the need for creating symmetrical relations between the researchers and teachers prcatitioners are emphasized along with the presumed and sought for complementarity of each part’s contributions. Close-to-practice research presents however considerable challenges due to the tensions surrounding different interpretations of teacher knowledge as professional and academic. According to the Education Act, both scientific grounds and proven experience are two stipulated bases for education in Sweden. In particular, the relation between these two, cognizant of theory/practice division, may influence the collaboration practices (Bergmark & Erixon, 2020). To sum up, close-to-practice research presents challenges regarding the variety of knowledge contributions as well as the level of engagement on the part of teachers practitioners (Anderhag et al., 2023; Magnusson & Malmström, 2022). Swedish VET is mainly school-based and integrated with upper-secondary education. The vocational teacher works in a Building and Construction Programme, one of the 12 vocational programmes. Vocational teachers are responsible for assessment of student performance in school and in workplaces, e.g., building sites. That is why a close co-operation with the appointed supervisors is required for students’ vocational learning. Previous research on learning to become a building constructor shows traces of apprenticeship traditions still present. As a result, students may encounter a strong division between theory learnt in school and practice at building sites (Berglund, 2009: Fjellström, 2015).

The aim of the article is twofold, to illuminate 1) how a vocational teacher and a researcher develop knowledge of teaching practice regarding vocational didactics, and 2) to develop a methodology for researcher-practitioner collaboration. The focus for the collaboraton is on the integration of vocational knowledge across school- and work-based parts of education as a central and generic issue in vocational education and training. The research questions are as follows: What characterizes a collaboration between a vocational teacher and a researcher in close-to-practice research? How does the process of collaborative researcher-vocational teacher knowledge development in student work-integrated learning emerge?

Self-study is used as a theoretical approach (Cooper & Curtis, 2021; Kitchen et al., 2020; Vanassche & Kelchtermans, 2015) in line with the study’s main interest in the theory/practice interface in vocational didactics generated from self-understanding of experience. The intention driving the study is to reflect the researcher-teacher practices within the institutional framework of upper-secondary VET (Craig & Curtis, 2020; Ergas & Ritter, 2020). The main interest for the collaboration is to investigate the events that the teacher stages to help the students connect their learning experiences in workplace-, and school-based parts of education. When the teachers and researchers make meaning of actitivities they stage together the collaboration can contribute to self-understanding of various facets of collective me-as-a-teacher, which is formed through and in social relations in teacher communities (Mokuria & Chhikara, 2022).

Vocational education and training (VET) can play a crucial role in the socio-economic integration of migrants and refugees (Nilsson, 2010). This role can be understood and articulated through various dimensions, such as skill development (Guo, 2011), recognition of prior learning and qualifications, and cultural integration via social networks and support systems (Brücker et al., 2021). However, the relationship between VET provisions and the inclusion of immigrants in the labour market and society has received little research attention, and even if so, they mostly have an Anglophone focus and setting, see Rosvall et al. (2019) and Jørgensen et al. (2021).

The proposed symposium aims to explore how vocational education and training systems (VET), in conjunction with employers, contribute to the socio-economic integration of migrants and refugees, with a focus on Germany, Sweden, and Poland.

Germany and Sweden have a rich immigration history and have been among the top destinations for migrants in Europe, thanks to their strong economies and social protection regulations. These countries have also received a significant number of asylum seekers and refugees. Poland, traditionally, has been an emigrant-sending country. However, in recent years there has been a significant shift, with Poland becoming a destination for migrants, particularly from neighbouring Eastern European countries, mostly Ukraine and Belarus. The analysed countries vary in terms of VET organisation. Germany has a dual VET system, combining employer-based apprenticeships with vocational schooling. Sweden has transformed its VET from a non-integrated, semi-dual model to an integrated, state-regulated model. Poland's VET system can be regarded as a statist VET regime, which obtains high commitment to VET from the public sector but implies relatively low employer involvement.

The symposium aims to maintain a historical perspective, recognising that the approaches to vocational training and migrant integration in the three countries are deeply rooted in their respective historical, cultural, and economic contexts (Broberg, 2016). This perspective will allow us to understand the current and past strategies of decision-makers and employers in a broader temporal frame, highlighting the evolution of VET systems in response to changing industry demands, particularly due to technological changes and globalisation as well as changing migration patterns. In this context, the current migration crisis, spurred by the war in Ukraine, presents new challenges and opportunities for VET systems in the three countries. The symposium also aims to analyse the impact of the European education policy tools mostly related to qualifications frameworks, targeted to lifelong learning and transparency of qualifications that can foster migrant integration into European Union labour markets.

In view of an increasing number of job vacancies and demographic trends in Germany, bottlenecks in the training and labour market will continue to worsen (Kubis, 2023). Politically controlled labour migration from third countries therefore opens up opportunities to meet the future demand for skilled workers (SVR, 2022). Such challenges do not appear to be new; foreign labour was already being recruited in Germany in the 1960s (Oltmer, 2012). This article focuses on the topics of migration, labour market integration and the role of VET in this context. It aims to systematically analyse two central "immigration phases" in Germany, their political control and the associated effects on the labour market and the VET system. In the first phase of immigration, around 14 million labour migrants came to Germany between 1955 and 1973. Bilateral agreements formed the central basis, regulating the conditions for recruitment, temporary employment relationships and the return of so-called guest workers to their home country. Politically, the aim was not to achieve permanent labour market migration and social integration. The lack of an integration strategy and the failure to promote vocational training for guest workers led in the long term to the emergence of an underclass that was economically, culturally and linguistically segregated (Höhne et al., 2014). A total of 3 million immigrants remained in Germany permanently with their families. In comparison, the second immigration phase, during the period of the refugee crisis from 2015 to 2019, was not characterised by any significant long-term recruitment of skilled workers. Labour market integration remained largely unrealised, not least due to a lack of skills relevant to the labour market and asylum law conditions (Brücker et al., 2015). Both educational and labour market policy measures as well as civil society integration concepts were primarily aimed at refugee children and young people as well as adults with the prospect of staying (Baethge & Seeber, 2016; Krings, 2020). With regard to these phases, a restrictive migration policy can be assumed. With respect to the current challenges on the labour market, there is now a noticeable trend towards the employment of workers from the EU and the easing of immigration criteria for highly qualified skilled workers from third countries. At the same time, vocational training and accompanying integration policy measures are increasingly being implemented (Werding & Lembcke, 2023). This article presents these in more detail and discusses them against the background of historical experience.

Baethge, M., & Seeber, S. (2016). Herausforderungen der Flüchtlingsmigration für die Strukturen beruflicher Bildung in Deutschland. Expertise im Auftrag des Sachverständigenrats deutscher Stiftungen für Integration und Migration für das Jahresgutachten 2017, Göttingen. Brücker, H., Hauptmann, A., & Vallizadeh, E. (2015). Flüchtlinge und andere Migranten am deutschen Arbeitsmarkt: Der Stand im September 2015. Aktuelle Berichte, 14/2015. Höhne, J., Linden, B., Seils, E. & Wiebel, A. (2014). Die Gastarbeiter: Geschichte und aktuelle soziale Lage. WSI Report, 16. Krings, T. (2020). Arbeitsmarkt und Migration. In A. Röder & D. Zifonun (Hrsg.), Handbuch Migrationssoziologie (p. 1–22). Springer VS. Kubis, A. (2023). IAB-Stellenerhebung 4/2022: Neuer Rekord mit 1,98 Millionen offenen Stellen, In: IAB-Forum 9. März 2023, https://www.iab-forum.de/iab-stellenerhebung-4-2022-neuer-rekord-mit-198-millionen-offenen-stellen/, Call date: 30. January 2024. Oltmer, J. (2012). Einführung: Migrationsverhältnisse und Migrationsregime nach dem Zweiten Weltkrieg. In: J. Oltmer, A. Kreienbrink & C. Sanz Díaz (Hrsg.), Das "Gastarbeiter"-System. Arbeitsmigration und ihre Folgen in der Bundesrepublik Deutschland und Westeuropa (p. 9–21). Oldenbourg Verlag. SVR – Sachverständigenrat zur Begutachtung der gesamtwirtschaftlichen Entwicklung (2022). Energiekrise solidarisch bewältigen, neue Realität gestalten, Jahresgutachten 2022/23, SVR, Wiesbaden. Werding, M., & Lembcke, F. K. (2023). Erwerbsmigration nach Deutschland: Chancen durch gesteuerte Zuwanderung. ifo Schnelldienst, 76(5), 42–46.

The aim of the article is to present the evolution of vocational education policies and changes in the approaches of employers in Poland in response to labour market and migration challenges and European integration. As in other countries of the Eastern bloc, Poland’s VET regressed with the transition from a centrally planned to a market economy after 1989, and Poland’s school system entered a path of ‘de-vocationalisation’. This situation has changed only in recent years. Decreasing unemployment rates, strong economic growth and increasing demand for skilled labour alongside negative demographic trends, migration outflows and persistent skill shortages resulted in a reemphasis on vocational and adult education, which were additionally impelled by European policies such as the promotion of qualifications frameworks and the development of dual VET (Markowitsch, & Dębowski, 2022). Also, the attitudes of employers changed. Reegård and Dębowski (2020) noted increased activity by employers at central and VET school levels. The heightened focus on VET from the policy and employers coincided with the massive influx of migrants since 2014. The outbreak of war in February 2022 caused an influx of war migrants on a scale unprecedented since World War II. It is estimated that in mid-2022, about 1.5 million war refugees from Ukraine were in Poland, and considering 1.35 million Ukrainians who lived in Poland before the war, the number of migrants from Ukraine totalled 2.9 million people. As Duszczyk and Kaczmarczyk (2022) note, the scale and pace of migration is the fastest in modern European history. What is striking is the economic activity of migrants and war refuges - 95 percent of migrants before the war were professionally active and among forced migrants, a third were working while more than 55 per cent did not have a job but intended to find employment Kubiciel–Lodzińska et al. (2023). The article aims to answer the following research questions: a) to what extent VET reforms introduced in the last 10 years are sufficient to integrate migrants and war refugees into the labour market in Poland; b) what are the gaps and potential areas of improvement in the VET policy in terms of migrant integration; c) what were the employer's responses and contribution to VET and migrant integration. The article will draw on policy documents and literature analysis as well as 14 interviews conducted with policymakers, representatives of trade unions, employers’ associations and VET school principals.

Duszczyk, M., & Kaczmarczyk, P. (2022). The war in Ukraine and migration to Poland: Outlook and challenges. Intereconomics, 57(3), 164-170. Kubiciel–Lodzińska, S., Golebiowska, K., Pachocka, M., & Dąbrowska, A. (2023). Comparing pre‐war and forced Ukrainian migrants in Poland: Challenges for the labour market and prospects for integration. International Migration. Markowitsch, J., Dębowski, H. (2022). Education systems and qualifications frameworks, [in:] Tutlys, V., Markowitsch, J., Pavlin, S., Winterton, J. (eds.). Skill Formation in Central and Eastern Europe, Berlin, Germany: Peter Lang Verla. DOI: 10.3726/b19799 Reegård, K., & Debowski, H. (2020). Exit, voice or loyalty? VET stakeholders’ response to large scale skilled emigration from Poland. International journal for research in vocational education and training, 7(3), 325-343.

The changing role of vocational education and training and employers’ involvement in migrant integration in Sweden will be discussed in the context of the automotive industry. The automotive industry has a significant role not only in global and national economies but also in the formation of the labour force by (re)training workers. While historically the automobile industry has attracted mostly low-skilled migrants for the assembly lines, in the present times, an additional need for high-skilled and often STEM-educated migrant workers is noted. By performing a systematic literature review, the present study explored the relationships between migrant labour and the car industry sector outlined in the research literature. The study followed a thematic analysis and reached findings that were summarised in four themes. Firstly, two profiles of the migrant worker were identified, corresponding to what is often discussed as low- and high-skilled workers. Secondly, the working conditions for the migrant labour force were prominent in the literature, while they varied based on the profile of the migrant worker. Thirdly, from a historical perspective, strikes were shown to affect migrants´ working conditions and rights, while fourthly, the business practice of offshoring was shown to influence migrant workforce conditions and status. In conclusion, the complexity of the issue under research, the scarcity of research and the contextuality of the cases presented limited this literature review.

Akhtar, S. (2015). Immigrant Island cities in Industrial Detroit. Journal of Urban History, 41(2), 175–192. https://doi.org/10.1177/0096144214563509 Broberg, Å., Herrera, L.M. (2024). Education for Access to the Swedish Labour Market and Society: A Historical Comparison of Practices for the Integration of Immigrants in the 1960s and Early 2000s. In: Teräs, M., Osman, A., Eliasson, E. (eds) Migration, Education and Employment. Education, Equity, Economy, vol 10. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-41919-5_6 Gay, V. (2014). Lutter pour partir ou pour rester? Travail et Emploi, (137), 37–50. https://doi.org/10.4000/travailemploi.6193 Gay, V. (2015). Grèves Saintes ou grèves ouvrières? Genèses, n° 98(1), 110–130. https://doi.org/10.3917/gen.098.0110 Jenkins, R. (2004). Social identity. Routledge. International Labour Organization (ILO). (2020). The future of work in the automotive industry: The need to invest in people’s capabilities and decent and sustainable work. Issues paper for the Technical Meeting on the Future of Work in the Automotive Industry (Geneva, 15–19 February 2021). International Labour Office, Sectoral Policies Department, Geneva. Koskela, K. (2019). Intersecting experiences: Class, gender, ethnicity and race in the lives of highly skilled migrants in Finland. Nordic Journal of Migration Research, 9(3), 311–328. https://doi.org/10.2478/njmr-2019- 0024

Vocational education and training (VET) is a multidisciplinary and multifaceted applied research field. Research is driven by practical, social, political, and scientific interests. The aim of the workshop discussion is to give continuity to earlier discussions aimed to further elaborate an analytical framework on VET research. The framework aims to integrate current VET research, to identify research gaps and to develop a proposal on future research. A first draft of the framework has been discussed during the first VET Skills Week 2016, organized by the European Commission, and further developed at the Crossing Boundaries Conference 2017 in Rostock, and the second VET Skills Week 2017. Likewise, a discussion was also held as part of the sessions of the 2018 and 2019 and 2022 and 2023 ECER conferences.