MEPs ask the Commission and member states to specify plans for implementing micro-credentials, individual learning accounts and environmental sustainability curricula.
In a resolution adopted on Thursday by 519 votes in favour, 59 against and 21 abstentions MEPs want to make sure that the proposed Council recommendations on micro-credentials, individual learning accounts and environmental sustainability studies are followed up by actual measures and legislative efforts to introduce new solutions.
They call on the Commission to come up with a “robust instrument” for motivating member states to implement micro-credentials system for recognition of short learning outcomes and ask to set up national micro-credential registers to guarantee their quality.
Micro-credentials are a recommended European tool to certify and mutually recognize learning outcomes following short courses or trainings, allowing people to build their knowledge, skills and competences taking small steps at a time. Currently recommended as a voluntary instrument in proposed Council recommendations on micro-credentials and individual learning accounts (to be adopted in June 2022), this recommendation is not accompanied by strategies and measures that would motivate the EU countries to work on tangible solutions.
Individual learning accounts are a suggested adult learning initiative to give each EU citizen of working age a budget to spend on training to improve skills of their choice, in order to help them adapt to the rapidly changing labour market.
Speaking of the individual learning accounts that would give everyone entitlement to improving their skills in the labour market, as well as accumulate short term learning experience portfolio, MEPs ask to not limit them narrowly to the needs of the labour market, but instead allow citizens to make individual choices and open up opportunities for self-employment and entrepreneurship.
They also stress that environmental literacy should be included in all levels of educational curricula, to empower citizens to become active proponents of more inclusive and sustainable societies.
“The Council recommendations to develop a European approach to micro-credentials, individual learning accounts and learning for environmental sustainability are a big step towards a coherent European Education Area. If done right, this will be a real improvement for people who want to upskill or reskill to keep pace with the rapid changes in society and an increasingly digitalised labour market. We hope that Council and Commission will support the member states in ensuring inclusive lifelong learning of comparable quality within the whole European Union”, said the rapporteur Sabine Verheyen (EPP,DE).
You can re-watch the plenary debate here.
