Special
reviews were provided by national experts to assess each country's research
activities in VET/HRD (see Overview, aspect
7). The following analysis draws attention to one of the key concerns
addressed in these reviews: the effectiveness of research activities. For
this purpose, the review texts have been analysed to identify issues related
to the effectiveness of VET/HRD research. These may refer to either problems
encountered or solutions pursued, or to both. Three major types of issues
can be distinguished across the country reviews:
-
Infrastructure
of research (incl. coordination within the research field; role of university
research; continuity of research);
-
Resources
for research (incl. funding for research from national sources/ EU sources;
evaluation of research funding/ output);
-
Interrelation
between research and policies (incl. linkage with national policies/ EU
policies).
In the
following analysis, the most prominent type of issue (from among these
three types) has been selected for each country (see map below, legend
on the right). It should be noted though that nearly half of the reviews
address more than one type of issue, partly with only marginal difference
in emphasis between them. The map therefore is intended to highlight country
examples for the issues addressed rather than to identify exclusive cases
of prominence,
|
DK
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FI
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NO
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SE
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AT
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BE
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BG
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CZ
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EE
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DE
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FR
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HU
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LT
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LV
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IE
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UK
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PL
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RO
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SI
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SK
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CY
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ES
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IT
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MT
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PT
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| |
Prominent
issues related to the effectiveness of research |
|
I
|
(A)
Mainly infrastructure of research |
|
I
|
(B)
Mainly resources for research |
|
I
|
(C)
Mainly interrelation between research and policies |
|
Issues
with regard to the interrelation between research and policies (C) appear
to be most prominent in the majority of reviews across all regions (BE,
BG, CY, DE, ES, FI, FR, HU, IE, LV, UK). Linkages both with national policies
and with EU policies are commonly addressed, for instance, how to evaluate
the effects of VET/HRD research on political decision making in education
(FI); the role of evaluation research for programme reviews and national
development plans (IE).
Also frequent is the prominence found in relation to issues concerned with
the infrastructure of research (A), again across all regions (AT, DK, EE,
LT, MT, NO, SE, SI). A favourite theme in this group is the coordination
of research within the VET/HRD field, for instance on the following lines:
Cooperation of the players could bring more communication and more strength
of research; the establishment of a yearly VET research conference, and
more inclusion in European and international activities could be steps
in that direction (AT).
Issues related to the resources for research (B) seem to be most prominent
in a number of country reviews from Central-Eastern and Southern Europe
(CZ, IT, PL, PT, RO, SK). Points raised in this context include the evaluation
of research activities, for instance: In relation to increased research
funding more emphasis is being placed on the evaluation of project quality
– as part of both ex ante and ex post evaluation (CZ); the following
criteria are applied for the evaluation of research: productivity and quality
of the work, internationalisation, impact, use of external resources, management
of the resources (IT).
NOTE:
The Profile of national research is based on a comparative analysis of
selected activities in 25 European countries (see Overview).
This data has been compiled from the national reports prepared by the Cedefop
ReferNet in 2006 and subsequently published by Cedefop (see Introduction
and Reference). |