Vocational Excellence and Centers of Vocational Excellence (CoVEs) Policy Approaches and Concepts: Revisiting Landscapes from High-Performers Vocational Education and Training (VET) Providers to Skill Ecosystems

Abstract

In the last years, Vocational Excellence concept has gained good recognition, both at policy and practitioners’ levels, as necessary holistic policy approach in Vocational Education and Training (VET) to frame the concept of Centres of Vocational Excellence (CoVEs). The European Commission (EC) has contributed a lot, for example, via Erasmus plus (+) on dissemination and acknowledgement of both concepts at national, transnational and international levels.  However, CoVEs concept remains partially misunderstood, whilst interpreted and/or implemented in different manners by the community of practitioners and policymakers. In this respect, current national nomenclatures on VET providers for monitoring CoVEs concept evolution matters a lot to follow up such diverse approaches and policy developments. Overall, CoVEs concept is even more associated with and implemented based on high-performer VET provider roles, while the concept might go beyond this, and encompass the broader concept of skills ecosystems. Thus, current evidence and experience inform on momentum for revisiting concepts and proposing updated definitions in Vocational Excellence and CoVEs, building on EC and European Training Foundation (ETF) experiences. This is to inspire further discussions, for example, on updating policy frameworks, evaluations and reviews of international best practices and/or on ways to feed excellence approaches at VET system level.