Analysing online job vacancies is a promising approach to identify emerging jobs and skill needs, as it offers rich real-time information about the skills employers seek. Cedefop has developed a pan-European system for collecting this information from job portals and analysing it. While modern technology has made it easier to process huge quantities of information, analysis needs to be based on sound expert judgement.

Postsecondary workforce development is one of the major innovations of the modern community college. In a workforce approach, curriculum is driven by the needs of local industry, course delivery systems are sufficiently flexible to meet the diverse needs of students and industry, and students experience a mixture of work-based and classroom learning. These features combine to help students succeed at the postsecondary level and gain important training with less than a four-year degree. This paper describes how community colleges came to be a major resource for the nation’s workforce development requirements and discusses the ways this role continues to evolve to meet the needs of students, employers, and local communities. The authors conclude by identifying major trends that will inform the future of workforce development in the American community college.

This publication is the sixth in a series produced as part of the Cedefop project The changing nature and role of VET (2016-18). Based on analysis of developments from 1995 to 2015, the report provides important insights into developments and change processes related to vocationally oriented education and training at higher levels (levels 5 to 8 of the European qualifications framework). Building on detailed national case studies, the report demonstrates the expansion and diversification of vocationally oriented education and training offered at higher levels in European countries and the variations in how countries use the higher levels: there is evidence for strengthening vocational principles at higher levels in various ways as well as for strengthening academic principles. It also covers current debates and potential future challenges, including juggling labour market demands and wider societal values, finding the right balance between academic and vocational principles, and achieving parity of esteem between academically oriented and vocationally oriented qualifications at higher levels, by improving awareness and visibility of the latter.

This research brief summarises responses from public sector bodies to the apprenticeship target and future plans for delivery. The public sector apprenticeship target was introduced in 2017. Public sector bodies with 250 or more staff in England have a target to employ an average of at least 2.3% of their staff as new apprentice starts annually over the period 1 April 2017 to 31 March 2021.

Building on individual country Spotlights, this publication brings together the main features and data of VET in the EU, Iceland and Norway. While countries share goals and challenges, their VET systems are diverse, shaped by socioeconomic contexts and traditions. Information on VET’s main features, its role and status, are a prerequisite to understanding developments and learning from another country. This compilation addresses all those who need a quick overview of essential features of VET in Europe. Clarifying the place of VET in countries’ overall education and training systems, it presents main accession and progression routes for learners; types and levels of qualifications they lead to; types of programmes, delivery modes, work-based learning ratio and duration. The approach and terminology used for the systems charts and descriptions aim for a balance between national and international readers’ understanding and for some comparisons between systems. This publication is a useful starting point for work by policy makers, social partners, experts and researchers. It provides orientation to a range of other actors involved in VET-related activities: VET providers, teachers and trainers; guidance, qualifications and validation staff; and other readers who want to familiarise themselves with VET systems across and beyond Europe.

In this report, we look at the adult skills landscape – by examining who invests in, and who participates in, job-related training and education. We consider how these trends have changed over time and to what extent adult skills affect social mobility. We uncover evidence that people from the lowest socio-economic backgrounds are the least likely to receive adult skills investment. First, there is growing evidence to suggest that those whose parents were working class are less likely to do training than if their parents were middle class – even though they are doing the same type of job. Second, employers are more likely to invest in those with higher skills while better-off individuals are also more likely to fund their own training. This results in widening existing skills gaps as people from working class backgrounds are less likely to have higher skills – and are less likely to earn high wages – than their peers from better off backgrounds.Only state-funded training targets support to those from lower socio-economic backgrounds, but this makes up a tiny proportion of all training courses undertaken (around 7 per cent). The gender training gap, at the headline level has been closed.Indeed, women may be more likely to participate in training – largely because a higher proportion of women than men work in the public sector, where the provision of training is higher than in the private sector. We also found mixed evidence of the returns to investment in adult skills. Research consistently suggests that the highest qualifications tend to lead to the highest returns, that academic qualifications lead to higher returns than vocational ones at the same level, and that qualifications gained later in life tend to secure lower returns than the same qualifications earlier on. Adult skills provide second chances to individuals, but those who benefit most are overwhelmingly those who already have higher levels of adult skills.

Professional apprenticeship programs can help address the skills gap facing most companies, provide greater opportunity to people who are underrepresented across industries in the innovation economy, and reskill those whose jobs have been—or will be—disrupted by technology. Bridging the Gap Between Talent and Opportunity: An Apprenticeship Playbook for Professional Jobs explores why professional organizations should consider apprenticeship programs for their workforce needs, and details how to get started.

The Flexibility and Innovation in Apprenticeship Technical Training (FIATT) project funded ten pilots. Each pilot experimented with alternate delivery technical training. The majority of these involved a combination of in-person instruction and online courses. Other pilots experimented with upfront training, mobile labs and/or simulator training. The FIATT pilots shared goals linked to common apprenticeship challenges, emphasizing the applicability and importance of the initiative to: (1) help apprentices progress and complete their training; (2) reduce wait-lists, time away from the workplace and the number of weeks on Employment Insurance (EI); (3) create access to hands-on training, especially for rural and Northern apprentices, through simulators and mobile training units; (4) engage apprentice learners, instructors, employers and/or underrepresented groups in online training; and (5) support apprentice learning and skills development.

In 2019, COAG agreed a vision for vocational education and training (VET) to position the sector as responsive, dynamic and trusted. To deliver on this vision, COAG tasked Skills Council with developing a VET Reform Roadmap (the Roadmap). Skills Council has asked senior officials in all jurisdictions to work together to develop a Roadmap for consideration by Ministers and endorsement by COAG by the middle of 2020. Skills officials have developed a consultation draft of the Roadmap. This draft is a working document of the Skills Senior Officials’ Network: it has not been reviewed or endorsed by governments or COAG.