Download Romania - Kutsekoda

Overview of the implementation
of NQF in Romania
Mihai Iacob – junior researcher
INSTITUTE OF EDUCATIONAL SCIENCES,
Bucharest
10.11.2009, Tallinn, Estonia
Romania at a glance
•Population: 22 million
•Surface: 237.000 km²
•Government: Semi-presidential republic
•Currency: New Leu (RON); forecast
adoption of Euro: 2014
•Economic growth rate: -8% in 2009
•Political status: government deposed;
presidential election on 22nd of November
Partner institutions in NCP-VET-CO
 Institute of Educational Sciences, Bucharest (ISE)
 National Adult Training Board (NATB) – National
Agency for Qualifications
 National Center for the Development of Vocational
Education and Training (NCDVET)
ISE
 National research body on education
 Current structure:
 Dept. of Counselling and lifelong learning
 Dept. of Curriculum
 Dept. of Theory of education
 Dept. of Educational management
 Dept. of Educational policies
 As of the 1st of January 2010 the structure will
undergo considerable changes
NATB
 Autonomous authority
 1 president nominated by prime minister at the
proposal of the ministry of labor and the ministry of
education
 Tripartite structure: public administration, trade
unions, employers associations
 Departments: a) Methodology and QA; b) Standards
and Assessment; c) Programmes and Innovation
NCDVET
 The Center was established with the aim of
coordinating the reform within the VET sector
 Main attributions:
•
•
•
•
•
Policies and strategies on VET
VET qualifications
VET curriculum
Coordination of the personnel involved in VET
Involvement in specific projects
 In the 2007-2013 timeframe, it will be an
intermediary body in the management ESF, on
matters related to its field of expertise
NQF in Romania
 The National Qualifications Framework contributes
to assuring the quality of vocational training system, being
based on national standards, used equally to training and
evaluation of competences, regardless the context in which
they were acquired.
 Standards are elaborated by specialists, then they are
subject to analysis, on content and methodology, being then
validated by sectoral committees.
 Sectoral committees are social dialogue structures. They
have, generally, a multipartite structure (social partners,
government, professional associations, chambers of
commerce, training providers).
NQF in Romania
Sectoral committees have the following attributions:
 Participate in the development of the normative framework on the





training, the evaluation and certification of competences
Promote the competence based training and evaluation system
Develop and update, under the coordination of the NATB, the
qualifications relevant for each domain;
Validate qualifications and associated standards;
Identify specialists in order to do the occupational analysis, to define
competences and qualifications, and for evaluation and certification;
Encourage participation of organizations and individuals to continuous
vocational training and to technical and vocational education.
Instruments used in
building qualifications for VET
Occupational analysis for the identification of
occupational area
2. Occupational Standard (OS) – a document which
describes the competences units related to one
occupation;
1.
1.
used for prior learning validation, but also for qualification
within formal CVT and apprenticeship
3. Training Standard (TS) – a document which
describes the learning outcomes related to a
qualification linked with one or more occupations
1.
2.
developed for IVET
applied within IVET, but also within formal CVT
Qualifications in HE



University studies organised in 3 cycles: Bachelor
degree, Master degree, Doctorate studies according
to Bologna Process and follow-up documents;
Institution responsible: National Agency for
Qualifications in Higher Education and Partnership
with the Economic and Social Environment – ACPART
Designing and implementing the National Register of
Qualifications for HE (NRQ-HE) by means of the
submission of the standardized forms and their
methodological guide to all accredited/authorised
state and private universities to be completed
Problems met
 Identification and organization of the representative stakeholders from




each of the 23 sectors of activity (nominated by the National Authority
for Qualifications)
Juridical statute of the sectoral committees
Identification of a large number of sectoral experts to be involved
The need of quality assurance in sectoral committees involvement
(occupational analyses, occupational standards development and
validation, qualifications’ development)
The sectoral committees financing system as a consequence of:



their very important role in NQF development and sustainability
the great volume of occupational analyses and standards waited by sectors
to be developed and validated
absence of constant sources of funds for spaces, administrative costs,
logistic arrangements and experts’ payment
Solved problems
 Creation of 23 sectoral committees composed by
representative organizations at the national and sectoral level:
trade unions, employers associations, chambers of commerce,
professional associations, regulating authorities, training
providers
 Reorganization of the Sectoral Committees based on a special
law (268/2009) as institutions for social dialogue and for
public interest with well defined attributions in the field of
qualifications and financed by state for administrative costs
and services costs
 Training of 114 sectoral committee experts (19 sectoral
committees from 23)
 Help for the sectoral committees activities by offering
equipment and technical assistance
Challenges for a NQA
 Changing the name of National Adult Training Board (NATB)






into National Authority for Qualifications (NAQ)
Implementation of the quality assurance system in the NAQ
activities
Continuous human resources development
Financing new projects, new activities, new experiences,
quality assurance and sustainability
Having a joint approach, together with other institutions
involved in developing qualifications (NCDVET, ACPART)
A weak institutional capacity of NATB in human and logistic
resources for the new attributions as NAQ
Lack of experience in what means to be a National Authority
for Qualifications
Thank you for your attention!