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Report of the student mobility program at the University of Valencia (Spain) (Snizhana Leu)

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REPORT

Participant: Snizhana Leu

Action: student mobility

Location: Universitat de Valencia, Valencia/Spain

Project: Erasmus+ program “Improving teacher education for applied learning in the field of vocational education (ITE-VET) – 574124-EPP-1-2016-1-DE-EPPKA2-CBHE-JP-E+CBHE”

Dates: November, 20 – December, 3, 2017

Institution: Institute of vocational education and training of the National academy of educational science of Ukraine

Location: Kyiv/Ukraine

Preparation and organizational issues

I was informed beforehand om my participation in the following student mobility program and received all the information as soon as our coordinator, Mrs. Oleksandra Borodiyenko, got that from the hosting institution. It was also easy to clarify all the issues directly with Mr Fernando Marhuenda (program and other details) and Mrs Rosa Orti (bank details). Mr Marhuenda sent us a very detailed letter with clear instructions on the routs/addresses for our two-weeks stay in Valencia. The welcome meeting (Tuesday, November, 21st) was informative and well-prepared. We got all the information on the lectures and meetings to attend, access to the library, entertainment and free-time activities.

Studying progress

In general, we were told to attend 3 lectures, all planned meetings and some tutorials (if there was a need in additional information). So, having the possibility to manage my time and efforts according to my needs and interests I attended 7 lectures, 7 meetings and one tutorial (see the List below) and also had plenty of time to work in the library.

The list of attended lectures, meeting and tutorials

Lectures:

Tuesday, November, 21st

  • 30-12.30 – Joan Aparisi (Catalan, Spanish and English) – Educational processes and contexts. Master in Secondary Education. Location: Monteolivete, Room A32.

Wednesday, November, 22nd

  • 00-13.00 – Joan Aparisi (Catalan, Spanish and English) – Education and social participation, community and development inclusion. Degree in Social Education: 5th semester, School of Philosophy, Room A31
  • 00-19.00 – Alicia Ros (Spanish)– Educational processes and contexts. Master in Secondary Education. Location: Monteolivete, Room A32

Thursday, November, 23rd

  • 30-12.30 – Joan Aparisi (Catalan, Spanish and English) – Educational processes and contexts. Master in Secondary Education. Location: Monteolivete, Room A32

Friday, November, 24th

  • 00-11.00 – Joan Aparisi (Catalan, Spanish and English) – Education and social participation, community and development inclusion. Degree in Social Education: 5th semester. School of Philosophy, Room A31

Tuesday, November, 28th

  • 00-18.00 – Fernando Marhuenda (Catalan and Spanish and English and German) – Organization of educational institutions. Degree in Social Education: 1st semester. Location: School of Philosophy, Room: FCE2

Friday, December, 1st

  • 00-18.00 – Fernando Marhuenda (Catalan and Spanish and English and German) – Organization of educational institutions. Degree in Social Education: 1st semester. Location: School of Philosophy, Room: FCE2

Meetings:

Tuesday, November, 21st

  • 00-11.00 – Welcome meeting chaired by Fernando Marhuenda. Room D17, School of Philosophy, 6th floor
  • 00-12.00 – Tour through the library

Monday, November, 27th

  • 00-11.30 – Visit to Continuing VET Center FOREM

Wednesday, November, 29th

  • 00-10.00 – Visit to the International Relations Office to get the checks with amounts for daily allowances sign the appropriate documentation.

Thursday, November, 30th

  • 00-13.30 – Evaluation of the Mobility chaired by Fernando Marhuenda. Room D17, School of Philosophy, 6th floor

Friday, December, 1st

  • 00-11.30 – Visit to Continuing Teacher Center. Location: Calle Paco Pierra, 20 – Valencia
  • 30-13.00 – Visit to Adult Education Center. Location: Calle Paco Pierra, 20 – Valencia

Tutorials:

Wednesday, November, 22nd

  • 00-11.00 – María José ChisvertVET specific features in Spain – Location: School of Philosophy, 6th floor, Office D16

During the Welcome meeting we had the chance to find out all organizational issues, visit the library, have advices for spending free-time and discuss the following questions at the Evaluation of the Mobility: 1) Which input did you receive in your home universities to get ready for this Erasmus stay?; 2) What are the three best things that you bring back with you from this stay? (academic, administrative and private); 3) What has been more stressing, disappointing? (lectures, languages etc.).

Lectures. The first thing that impressed me was the age range of students in the groups as in Ukraine it is traditionally to see mostly the representatives of 18-23 age group. It is not that much spread to attend the lectures for older people as they are usually busy at work and the idea of Lifelong learning is not that popular or well-soread in Ukraine. The Spanish students are open and sociable but I also noticed the lack of English-communication skills. Must say that in this case the situation in Ukraine seems to be better a little bit.

As for the atmosphere at lectures, it is very cooperative, partnership-based and independent. The teachers do not have that strong and heavy influence on their students’ opinions and are open for accepting their student’s ideas even if they are opposite to their own ones. So, the studying process is student-oriented and promotes the development of critical thinking. That is the issue we have the problem with in Ukraine as the studying process is still, mostly, teacher-oriented – the teacher is the source of information and right ideas. I understand that we were, maybe, lucky to see the examples of positive teachers’ professional activity and not all the teachers work in that way but, anyway, it was very pleasant.

We also were offered to attend the lectures in Spanish. I can't say I got some new information at that lecture – Alicia Ros (Educational processes and contexts) because I didn't understand the language but the general impression of the atmosphere in the auditoria impressed with the students’ attention and involvement into the studying process. The students worked in groups around the tables and were free to use any gadgets they had to conduct the productive work. The teacher actively used different ICTs but the source of information she worked with seemed pretty out-dated (1998). Students worked with different tasks and projects, represented their results, findings and ideas on the studied teaching approaches (thearapeutic, liberate, systematic etc.).

Joan Aparisi's lectures were interesting to attend as he always organised students' activities in very friendly, open, independent but partnership-based way. The information he represented at both courses – Educational processes and contexts and Education and social participation, community and development inclusion – was very practice-oriented and up-to-date. All the time he used comparative and intercultural approaches, expressed the interest to the situation in Ukraine and, of course, conducted his lectures in Spanish-English languages that was very pleasant. For me personally, it was the expression of his respect and attention to the audience of students from Ukraine. It was also obvious that students respect him, his ideas but they are free in their own thoughts at the same time.

Fernando Marhuenda was perfect in managing and conducting the lectures in cooperation with the professor from Germany in German-Spanish-English languages. But the interpretation took too much time so the work could be more efficient. We had the possibility to find out from the students the specifics of their studying – they often got project tasks and have plenty of time to work with their project in the groups. Students also have enough support from their teacher.

Visits. The visit to Continuing VET Centre FOREM and Adult Education Centre were impressive for me personally as I saw the practical realization of LLL ideas with my own eyes. There were the groups of adults of different ages. They were open for communication and told us some specifics of their learning as: absence of marks, interest-based learning, cooperative learning activity etc. It was obvious they liked that, they liked to attend the lessons, they liked what they learned, they liked how they were taught. One lady said “We didn’t have the possibility to study when we were young. We worked hard to keep our families. And now we have time for ourselves and happy to study what we are really interested in”. That was wonderful to hear that, see their happy faces. That inspires!

One more interesting visit was to the Continuing Teacher Center CEFIRE that stands for innovation continuous development educational development. After the round-table meting we had the chance to see the classrooms and a library. We found out about the education of Spain, specific features of teacher education and further professional development. The Secondary and VET Teachers can get Bachelor Degree, normally, for4 years and a Master Degree for 1 year. MD is compulsory to be achieved via intramural form of study only.

Teachers are not officially obliged to develop and/or upgrade their professional skills for example by means of legislation etc. but their salary depends not only on years of their professional activity but also their efforts and results of professional development. So, every specialist is self-motivated and can improve his/her professional level through school (he/she forks at) or at the Teacher training centre like CEFIRE.

  • School traineeship consists of an Annual Training Program that provides different modalities on the ways of getting training, creating resources and their following reflection.
  • CEFIRE centre provides advice/counselling and assessment by means of courses, workshops, conferences, resources and devices.

The main objective for CEFIRE is to improve the quality of education, thus the main challenges are defined as the following: ○ teaching key competences; ○ dealing with discipline problems and violence; ○ children with special needs; ○ immigrants’ integration; ○ including ICT in lessons; ○ CLIL; ○ internationalization of schools.

There are 11 Territorial CEFIRE centres providing 7 Specific CEFIRE services for VET, STEM, inclusive and/or infant education, humanistic & social issues, multilinguism and artistic skills development. CEFIRE cooperates with 645 Schools (19%) and 12.300 teachers (18%) of 12 Municipalities. There are only 16 Advisors and they are employed for the period of three years and then have to go back to their teaching activity.

The visit to Visit to Adult Education Centre represented us the possibilities for people of all ages to gain and/or develop their knowledge and skills. For me personally that also confirms that LLL is not only on-the-paper type of education. It also demonstrated the problem of early school-leaving but the efforts that Spain does to solve that problem are really inspiring. Not only having the Centres for adult education is good for the labour and/or education market but they are efficient and friendly training services providers for the population. Lots of people are de-motivated before they start/continue studying as they often do not believe in themselves but the specialists of the Centre help them to get back to the professional activity, update and/or upgrade their knowledge and skills.

That particular Adult Education Centre aims to provide our adult students with more ways to improve their knowledge and skills, facilitate their personal development and boost their employment prospects. It is a public school of the autonomic government of Valencia for long life learning for people over the age of 18 who need to • learn and improve their abilities in: general culture, literacy, numeracy, languages, computing, etc.; • get the GCSE (General Certificate of Secondary Education); • take preparatory courses for the entrance examination which allows access to intermediate & higher Vocational Training or University (for people older than 25, 40 and 45).

Lots of activities and content are ICT-based. There are different blogs in English and Spanish, Blog: FPA Font de Sant Lluís, Moodle Platform. Adult students also can take part in theatre plays (e.g. The Three Wishes, The butler did it..). They write the script , create the costumes, the special effects and perform it. Then record and edit, create Dvolver movies etc.

The Centre also provides extra-curricular activities for students: • 2007-10, 2012/13, 2015/16 Trips to London, 2011/12 Trip to Dublin, 2014/15 to Edinburgh 2016; • Visits to museums, art exhibitions, movie sessions, theatre plays,etc.

Tutorials. On November, 22 we had a tutorial with Maria Jose Chisvert – the professional guidance expert and discussed different issues of • VET system, • grant schemes for the unemployed, • formal and informal education, • certification procedures and •qualifications in Spain (see the Findings part of the report).

Library. We visited the library right after the Welcome meeting and then had the possibility to work there when we had time. I liked that it is open till late, the book-listing system is very simple (there are numbers on every book) and you can work with any book you want without registartion and or waiting specifics. It is like at home – you come to the bookshelf, chose the one you need, look it through to see if it is the appropriate one and then take it to the table or put that back to the shelf. I really liked that! The only thing that books on VET issues are mostly not very much up-to-date and, of course, most of them are in Spanish.

Findings

Since the 1978 Constitution Spain is decentralising its administration, by distributing powers between the State and 17 Autonomous Communities that means there are 17 different educational systems in the country. The central Government provides general organization of the system, establishes common standards for the curriculum, defines minimum requirements for schools and supports international cooperation in education. The autonomous regions develop methodology, contents, timetable; authorise, construct and equip schools; provide grants and scholarships and support teacher training. Schools adapt the curriculum to the needs of specific student groups.

There are different types of schools (concerning funding): State schools (totally funded): laical and free; Schools run privately but funded by the State; Private schools.

To become a Primary Teacher a person needs to have 4 years degree for general content issues and/or specialization ones for - Infant Education (0-6 years), - Primary Education (6-12 years), - Foreign language (English), - Music, - Physical Education, - Special Education, - Speech and Hearning therapy.

Qualifications demanded to become a primary or secondary school teacher in Spain are the following: - A Grade in the subject the teacher is going to teach; - Master’s in Education (Primary, Secondary or Vocational Training) or Teacher Training Certificate; - English (B2 from the CEFR); - Valencian Language (C1 from the CEFR).

In the Valencian Community the Yearly training plan is developed and tailored for each School by the coordinator; basically deals with teacher training in: • School management • ICT • New methodologies • Programs: School Educational Project (PEC) • Languages • Materials Development

Types of adult schools in Valencia. Schools in Valencia can be divided into 3 categories: state schools – laical and free, publicly subsidized; schools publicly subsidized by the city council; schools publicly subsidized by the diputación. All non-university state education is free.

Structure of the Adult People Education in Valencia (regulated education)

- 1st. stage: Programs of Teaching people to read and write and initiation to the basic Education (similar to Primary school) 3 Levels: Alfa, Neo and Base

- 2nd. stage: Programs to obtain the General Certificate of Secondary Education Two levels: GES I and/or GES II

The Centres for Adult People Education provide:

  • Basic education of • Stage I: Basic Education (Base), • Stage II: - 1st level: GES I - 2nd level: GES II,
  • Subject Stage I on • Humanities: Spanish Language, Valencian Language (Speaking skills), History, World of Work, Sciences: Mathematics, Biology;
  • Stage II GES I for • Mathematics, Technology, Biology, • Valencian Language, Spanish, English, •History & Geography, World of Work, • Optional Subject: Scientific Culture; GES II General Certificate of Secondary Education (GCSE) for • Mathematics, Technology, Biology, • Valencian Language, Spanish, English, •History & Geography, World of Work, • Optional Subject: Business & Entrepreneurship;
  • Preparatory courses for the entrance examination which allows access to Higher Vocational Training;
  • Valencian language (A2, B1, B2, C1 & C2 from the CEFR);
  • English language (A1, A2 & B1 from the CEFR);
  • Computing: • Digital literacy in ICT • Uses and development of social networks and website environments • Optimizing mobile usage;

The VET system has some sub-structure elements, two administrations – educational and labour ones – those use and provide different powers. The formal education is not very popular, especially for the ones with bad marks, thus non-formal education is being emphasized and developed lately by means of system unification. After the crisis in 2009 the system has changed via accreditation – the system of professional certification. Now every person with 2-3-year experience can certify his/her skills and in that way to increase the chances for more efficient participation at labour market. Most people do not have formal qualification and work without proper education. It is not well known by society because the calls for examinations are very small and provide certification for limited range of occupations. It is very useful in recently regulated professions (e.g. in health sector). Why? Because the normative require to certify his knowledge. The call shave priority to avoid the problem – for the research group the vulnerability of some groups must also be considered. The qualification level of most these groups is the first. And they do not accede to calls because they do not leave because there is not Register of occupations.

The integrated VET centres develop regulated training, non-regulated training and the accreditation of competences. Almost all depend on the government – better infrastructure, stable over time and stable teachers. The educational agents still do not see the need to unify both systems. Today the administration is rethinking professional training. The Law on Qualification of 2002 already spoke of the need to unify both systems. But real agents, especially of the formal education system, know they have the biggest piece of cake and they are afraid to lose it.

In the sector of formal education, the transition is very important – orientation to continue studying. There are cabinets in the centres with a person skilled in VET guidance, especially in the secondary schools. In primary school with the support of the town hall service – lack of knowledge of professional orientation aimed at occupation. There is another social-labour orientation service of a social-labour nature that is financed from the Employment Administration. This year they try to develop exclusively from the administration, it is public. Most people think that the official professional guidance is not useful as if a person is unemployed he/she goes to the Unemployed Service – the control system the accountability one. It seems as if the administration believe that a person doesn’t work because he/she doesn’t try. Professional guidance has lost social legitimacy. The current government seems to have realized by means of letting the assistance in the delegitimized service voluntary, people have stopped coming to the system of professional guidance. People actively attend short-time training courses for the unemployed. Currently the training can be already certified: certificates of professionalism. Although they are long-lasting and adjust with difficulty to the reality of the people who work. But the Catalogue of qualifications (the Catalogue is the same for both subsystems – the key to initiate the unification). Professional training was not regulated until recently had its own content programs.

The catalogue of qualifications has units of qualifications that can be certified. Units of competence (UC) with significance in employment. Each UC has an associated training module. The companies are not particularly concerned about formal qualification because most of them are small or family businesses – that is the problem.

Conclusions and recomendations. In general, I expected that student mobility programe to be organised in another way – more intensive one. There was a lack of activities for our group of students. Of course, it is interesting to have a chance to be involved in the real studying process but the language issue is very crucial for that type of activity and just being present at the lecture without any understanding is not efficient and/or interesting. It can be useful only for watching the ways and methods the teacher used for conducting the studying process activities but not more. But despite that fact the program gave a chance to see different, I mean, another approaches in education. Thus, it would be great to provide ToT for teachers of Ukraine on the issues of student-oriented teaching and practice-based education. It would be also great to organise lectures/seminars/workshops/lessons for students on culture and/or language issues to get the country specific and feel its “character” hic et nunc. 

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