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These guiding principles are a contribution of the European Commission, Cedefop and the thematic working group on professional development of trainers in vocational education and training (VET) to the objective set in the Bruges communique of collecting good practice and developing guiding principles on the changing roles, competences and professional development of VET teachers and trainers. The objectives of the paper are firstly, to attract attention to and increase knowledge of what these key agents between the worlds of education and work are and what makes them 'trainers', and secondly, to discuss existing practice and provide suggestions on how to support in-company trainers so they have opportunities to update their competences throughout their careers. After presenting the general context, the paper discusses the diversity of situations, titles, functions and roles of in-company trainers across member states [of the European Union] and focuses on two groups of specialists who provide training in companies: trainers who perform training tasks as the major part of their occupational role and employees whose occupational role includes a particular training-related function (for example, owners, general managers, supervisors and skilled workers). It also points out the common understanding that at least four groups of competences are important to a different extent for trainers in VET, including those who train in companies: technical/subject-related; company-specific; pedagogical-didactical; and transversal. The paper then identifies examples, areas and approaches in which interventions, or lack of such, have significant influence on in-company trainers so that stakeholders across companies, sectors and countries have reference points to look for further actions. Examples of competence requirements and profiles of VET trainers from Belgium, Finland, Germany and the Netherlands are presented in detail in the annex.

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Boosting the quality and supply of apprenticeships is part of the [European Union's] EU's approach to tackling youth unemployment. This leaflet gives an overview of measures under the recently launched European Alliance for Apprenticeships, to help Member States and other stakeholders achieve this aim.

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The Youth Guarantee is an innovative approach to tackling youth unemployment to ensure that all young people under 25 - whether registered with employment services or not - get a good-quality offer of employment, continued education, an apprenticeship or a traineeship within four months of becoming unemployed or leaving formal education. [European Union] EU countries endorsed the principle of the Youth Guarantee in April 2013. This leaflet explains how the Youth Guarantee works and why it makes a difference.

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Hiring subsidies are an important measure extensively used by European Union Member States to promote employment in disadvantaged worker categories such as young and older people, the long-term unemployed and women. This review maps out the design of such subsidies and identifies good and effective practices in targeting, funding, monitoring and integrating incentives with other policies. It is intended as a source of mutual learning and transfer of good practices between Member States.

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The [European Union] EU is working to reduce youth unemployment and to increase the youth employment rate in line with the wider EU target of achieving a 75 per cent employment rate for the working-age population (20-64 years). This leaflet gives an overview of the latest measures proposed by the EU to help Member States specifically tackle youth unemployment and social exclusion.

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This report analyses the effects of different models of cost-sharing in higher education (the split between public and private contributions to higher education funding) on students and higher education institutions. The study examines trends in participation and completion in third-level education, as well as factors such as system structure, institutional revenue and strategy over the last 15 years in nine case study higher education systems in order to understand better how different models of funding - and changes to these - affect students and institutions.

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The report is presented in two volumes: volume one is a comparative report; and volume two contains the national reports of Austria, Canada, England, Finland, Germany, Hungary, South Korea, Poland, and Portugal. Show less