Luxembourg Office for Official Publications of the European Communities
Abstract
This paper is a cooperation between researchers from three areas of vocational education and training (VET) and lifelong learning research. It aims to identify several new and emerging issues that will be crucially relevant to VET research in the post-Lisbon decade. The paper begins by exploring the main drivers currently influencing European VET systems and draws up four scenarios for 2010-20, each of which may be a plausible outcome for future European governance, and by extension, VET governance. The contributors then explore the nature of uncertainty in the demand and supply sides of European and local labour markets, suggesting that research into the impact of these uncertainties will need to examine how individuals adapt to new situations, as well as the impact on the nature and structure of VET supply. The paper also attempts a forward looking analysis of innovative teaching and learning in VET - developing twin themes of supporting expert learners and a scholarship of teaching and learning in VET. There will clearly remain important and urgent items of unfinished business in European and national VET policy and implementation in 2010. This paper argues strongly that these are still important for Europe's future economic, social and environmental ambitions, that the achievement of currently agreed priorities will remain a vital political issue, and that research should have an important role in overcoming identified barriers and achieving success in these respects. The paper identifies several issues that remain underresearched. These include meeting the learning needs of older workers and diverse migrant communities. Finally, the paper identifies five new issues that VET research should concentrate on. Since so much policy and research attention at European level focused on the period from 2000 to 2010, this paper intends to make a contribution to opening the debate on European VET research priorities in the decade that will follow
