In the Leonardo project ‘WBL-TOI Manual’ (‘Work-Based Learning – Transfer of Innovations Manual’), special focus has been placed on planning work-based learning. The tools and methods, which reveal and share the tacit knowledge associated with the good practices and the transfer process, have been developed and described in the Manual. The process to transfer good work-based learning (WBL) practices has been drawn up using the European Quality Assurance Reference Framework (EQARF) as a framework. During the project, the Manual has been piloted and validated in practical situations between partners and other vocational education and training (VET) organizations.
Why a WBL-TOI Manual?
Under Community programmes, numerous good practices of work-based learning have been created within VET, but the results are only being marginally exploited. Although the results are known and published in compendium volumes or databases, they are only marginally exploited both nationally and transnationally. The problem is that good practices are considered to be very much dependent on their context. Therefore, successful transfer from one organization to another seems to be challenging, time-consuming and quite isolated from other processes within organizations.
Who are we targeting?
The main target group of this Manual consists of VET providers, colleges, training centers, enterprises, branch organizations, employment services, etc. Those supporting the process of transferring good practices can benefit from this Manual. The common feature for organizations is a need to improve their WBL planning practices by transferring good practices developed elsewhere into their own organization.
This Manual uses the concept of VET providers, which were mainly vocational schools during the development phase of this Manual. Finally, although not all recommendations will suit all VET providers, we have the impression that this Manual is also, to a certain extent, useful for non-school situations. In some cases, it might need some modifications, but as the Manual presents fairly general suggestions, this appears feasible to us.
Why planning?
The planning phase is a very important phase of any process. It is not possible to implement successfully without proper planning. As it not possible to achieve a high quality WBL implementation, we have to put a lot of emphasis on the planning phase, including all kinds of support tools. In this Manual, the concept of planning includes an overview of the whole transfer of innovation process. In other words, during the planning phase you have to take into consideration the whole transfer process.
Benefits of the Manual
The Manual will help VET providers to select good WBL planning practices and to transfer them either into their own or some other organization. The Manual will reflect the needs to improve WBL, guide users in selection of good practices, help and support the transfer process of good practices and pursue added value.
By using this Manual you can:
- get help with transferring innovations
- find examples of good work-based learning practices
- find support for the transfer process
- provide ways of transferring good practices (GPs)
- find tools
- find justification and provide evidence of the added value of WBL
- save time
How to use the Manual?
There are different ways to use this Manual depending on your needs.
- If you want to implement a new good WBL planning practice in your organization, you can follow the Manual step by step and get support
- You can use some features, some tools and/or some parts of the Manual
- You can deepen your knowledge about the transfer of good WBL practices
- You can get tips for supplementing the EQARF into your development processes
You can use the Manual as:
- a tool
- a guide
- a European experience
The structure of the WBL-TOI Manual reflects the phases of the transfer of innovations (TOI) process.
Section "Concepts and framework" presents the key concepts and the framework used by the project development team.
Section "Planning the transfer" focuses on practical guidelines during the planning phase of work-based learning. This chapter also describes how to plan the transfer of good WBL practices, how to identify good WBL practices and how to handle the change process.
Section "Tools and methods" includes tools and methods, which can be used to support the transfer process.
Section "Quality assurance of the transfer process" then includes aspects relating to quality assurance, which is an important part of the whole TOI process.