European Business Baccalaureate Diploma for All Erasmus Project

Project Title

European Business Baccalaureate Diploma for All

Project Key Action

This project related with these key action: Cooperation for innovation and the exchange of good practices

Project Action Type

This project related with this action type : Strategic Partnerships for vocational education and training

Project Call Year

This project’s Call Year is 2014

Project Topics

This project is related with these Project Topics: Recognition, transparency, certification; Recognition (non-formal and informal learning/credits)

Project Summary

European Business Baccalaureate Diploma (EBBD) is a diploma, which was developed within previous Comenius-project in 2010-2013. The need for this kind of diploma was born because of the objective in many EU-countries, that the whole generation should get upper secondary education. In vocational education and training (VET) this has caused that the level of students’ skills and competences differ greatly. Therefore, companies and the institutions of higher education find it difficult to recruit VET students. In this situation, the best students have felt the need to stand out and demonstrate their skills and competences on an excellent level.

The main objective was to improve VET students’ employability and possibilities to further studies. To support this the project aimed to enhance the attractiveness and relevance of VET to meet labour market needs, to support transparency and recognition in EU, disseminate best practices of assessing key-competences and the use of learning outcomes in curricula, enlarge the target group to adults and thereby validate non-formal and informal learning and to simplify the accreditation process.

Eight partners are vocational colleges in business and administration and six of these have also adult education. University in UK educates vocational teachers, has broad expertise on VET and was the product evaluator. EfVET is an international association of providers of vocational education and training. The association EBBD e.V. was established in Germany for co-operation of secondary level Business Education in Europe and manages the accreditation process of the EBBD diploma as well as ensures the sustainability of project results.

To communicate efficiently the project had 6 transnational project meetings, 20 skype meetings, smaller work groups, emails, individual phone calls and google sites page, where all the project’s key documents are stored. For reporting the partners have sent one Interim Report, summaries of their multiplier events and cost documents. Dissemination and exploitation plan for the project was developed and partners have also written National Dissemination Plans. The project also developed a web-based customer management system.

The EBBD curriculum was modified to include adults, which brought the recognition and validation of non-formal and informal learning. We also implemented the descriptions of learning outcomes on an outstanding level of competence, which have labour market relevance in Europe and qualify for higher education.

We produced training materials and held seven national dissemination events, one international dissemination event and two international round tables. All this has promoted use of competence based learning outcomes in curricula and assessment and recognition of non-formal and informal learning in Europe and also internationally.

The project partners in Finland, the Netherlands and Germany will start teacher exchange in 2017-2018 and teachers are able to share ideas, test and develop teaching material. Some regional educational authorities have made EBBD as a common standard and they have assisted the implementation of EBBD.

The project actively disseminated EBBD among VET schools, institutions of higher education as well as chambers of commerce, companies and governments widely in Europe and also internationally. Project created Facebook page and renewed website. The partners wrote 10 articles about EBBD+ project developments to EfVET Newsletter and articles to newspapers and magazines. The dissemination has improved recognition and sustainability of EBBD label. Around 20 new schools were accredited to provide EBBD which improves schools’ internationalization and branding and thereby competitiveness.

EBBD has also identified skills shortages in curriculums and increased interest for CLIL implementation. The number of EBBD graduates has increased because of the active dissemination and larger number of accredited schools and there is already evidence that EBBD graduates have easier access to higher education and quality employment.

The accreditation process has been simplified. It is web-based and has been tested to be efficient for the verifier and user friendly for the applicant.
In the longer-term transparency of students’ skills and competences in Europe are enhanced by common EBBD curriculum since EBBD schools have a strong community where the know-how can be transferred. This promotes teaches exchanges and student mobility. The simplified accreditation process will further enlarge the network of EBBD schools and thereby increase the students’ possibilities for better employment and further studies.

EU Grant (Eur)

Funding of the project from EU: 310272 Eur

Project Coordinator

Helsinki Business College Oy & Country: FI

Project Partners

• Berufsbildende Schule Wirtschaft 1 Ludwigshafen
• University of Worcester
• Rudolf-Rempel-Berufskolleg, kaufmännische Schule der Stadt Bielefeld
• International Business College BHAK 12
• European Business Baccalaureate Diploma (EBBD) e.V.
• Andrássy György Katolikus Közgazdasági Szakgimnázium és Gimnázium
• Stichting ROC Summa College