Continual Vocational Education and Training in France – A good practice example
France has understood the significance of Continual Vocational Education and Training (CVET) for economic growth, equity and participation of disadvantaged groups in the labour market early on, as early as the 1970s. As the system of support progressed, it was filling more and more gaps and focusing primarily on individual right of training. What helped in this process were two main differences between the French system and many others (including Serbia, whose system is this article taking as a comparison): regions as important actors in the process and social partners. Regional Councils have had a strong role, as well as their own separate budgets for CVET since the early 1980s. What this system was beneficial for is strengthening of the focus on regional economic needs, that differ from one region to another, as well as maintaining competences for the implementation of VET. As for the social partners (trade unions and employers’ organizations), they have primarily managed funds and participated in creating policies, which meant a strong sense of inclusion in the process and responsibility for the quality of provision.
What 2018 brought to this system was a renewed approach, mirrored in the melodiously named France Competence. On the institutional level, this will be a centralized system in charge of funds and quality of provision. This signifies a transition to a simplified governance system, better overview of the national needs and a single body that gathers and unifies all four major stakeholders in CVET: State, unions, employers and regions. The decision makers remain the same, yet they are cooperating in a different, more unified manner. What can be drawn as a parallel with the Serbian system is a fairly recent establishment of Publicly recognized organizers of activities (Serbian: JPOA, Javno priznati organizatori aktivnosti), which is the effort made for the first time to have a unified recognition of informal provision and a unified and defined quality check of informal organizers of activities, performed by a centralized body. What is also a similarity is a fact that market itself is responsible for the demand and offer of training courses. If the demand for the courses is higher, they will be sustainable.
Where the main difference lies, is the individual level of the French reform, namely, Personal Training Account that each individual has, with a fixed amount that can be either spent or transferred to another year. Employers are also allowed to add to that amount and the application for the mobile devices is under way, for an easy access to information. And in this lies the crucial difference in this approach, and what promises to be a good practice example: placing the individual at the heart of the system, a right to training brought to a whole new level of approachability and individual choice for advancing one’s career. Even though it remains to be seen how this will be perceived, putting one’s education for career advancement in one’s own hands and giving them the means to do so, is for sure a step in the right direction of personal responsibility on the labour market.
