- 2016Approved/Agreed
- 2017Implementation
- 2018Implementation
- 2019Implementation
- 2020Implementation
- 2021Implementation
- 2022Implementation
Background
As part of the Go4Brussels 2025 strategy and the 2020 Training plan, the Brussels Government and the French Community Commission (COCOF) have set a goal to coordinate employment and vocational training policies within the Brussels-Capital Region. The creation of employment training centres strengthens cross-employment-training policies in connection with the key economic sectors in Brussels.
Objectives
The common umbrella represented by the training and employment centres aims to ‘promote the organisation, development and promotion of employment in a specific sector, in support of the economic and social development of the Brussels territory’. It targets jobseekers, workers and learners and supports companies to find skilled workers.
Description
On 14 July 2016, the Brussels Regional Government and the French-speaking Brussels Government adopted a Note on the creation of training and employment centres (Pôles Formation Emploi, PFE) in the Brussels Region. Since then, the governments of the Brussels Region and COCOF have adopted several structuring principles for the creation, governance and operation of training and employment centres.
Established on a sectoral basis, these centres are the result of a public/private partnership, and bring together:
- sectoral social partners,
- the Brussels public employment service, Actiris, and the Brussels public training services, Bruxelles Formation and the VDAB Brussel.
Additional actors may also be invited to the partnership depending on the sector, including education, SME training, socio-professional integration organisations, or any other type of actor whose presence may be relevant.
In 2019, the following training and employment centres were set up or under development as public-private partnerships:
- technological industry: Technicity.brussels is a partnership between FRM Brussels, Actiris, Bruxelles Formation and VDAB Brussel. The start of activities took place at the end of 2019 at the Anderlecht site. BF Technics and Actiris moved in mid-2019;
- transport and logistics: Logisticity.brussels is a partnership between the sectoral social partners (including the FSTL, Logos, Bus-Car, etc.), Actiris, Bruxelles Formation, and the VDAB Brussel. Partners started to work on it in 2019 and the start of activities is scheduled for 2021 on the Forest site. BF Logistics, Actiris, VDAB Brussel and several schools deployed their actions on site in 2019;
- construction: the future PFE Construcity.brussels will be built on the basis of a partnership between Construcitv, Actiris, Bruxelles Formation, VDAB Brussel, Bruxelles Environnement, Sfpme and Education.
The partners have already set up a branch (in Brussels) with a department responsible for ensuring its functioning for different stakeholders.
In 2020, the following training and employment centre was set up as public-private partnerships:
Digitalcity.brussels: this is a partnership between sectoral social partners (including CEFORA), Actiris, Bruxelles Formation and VDAB Brussels, designed to improve the economic situation of the digital sector by training jobseekers, workers, students and entrepreneurs in the latest IT technology and by anticipating companies' needs in terms of skilled labour. The start of activities took place in early 2020 at the Auderghem site. Digitalcity.brussels is designed to be functional, welcoming and modern, putting forward the image of new technologies and the digital world. On its four floors, Digitalcity.brussels offers a 100-seat auditorium, around fifteen fully-equipped classrooms, a digital media studio and laboratories dedicated to network technologies (CISCO) and skills validation.
Monitoring the sector and the digital jobs and training market is essential to Digitalcity's operations. In contact with experts and players in the digital sector in Brussels, Digitalcity communicates with all its audiences via social networks (Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn) about its activities, as well as via information and awareness-raising events organised within the Centre. This monitoring is also necessary for the development of a vast catalogue of digital training courses for different audiences, and provides both support for companies in recruitment and optimum support for job seekers on the labour market.
In 2021, the following training and employment centres were set up or under development as public-private partnerships:
- Logisticity.brussels: for the transport and logistics sectors, inaugurated in 2021;
- Construcity.brussels: pending the opening of the PFE, the partners have set up a branch (in Brussels) with hotlines for the public. Continuing collaboration between Bruxelles Formation and the Construction Professional Reference Centre.
In early 2022, a project manager was appointed to continue implementing the project Construcity.brussels. In anticipation of the opening of this training and employment centre, the partners have already set up a branch in the centre of Brussels with permanent offices for the different audiences.
The training and employment centres are running their activities on a regular basis.
Bodies responsible
- Bruxelles Formation (Brussels Institute for Vocational Training)
- Brussels Public Employment Service (Actiris)
- VDAB Brussel
- Training Service for Small and Medium-sized Enterprises (SFPME)
- Sectoral social partners
Target groups
Learners
- Young people (15-29 years old)
- Young people not in employment, education or training (NEETs)
- Adult learners
- Unemployed and jobseekers
- Persons in employment, including those at risk of unemployment
- Low-skilled/qualified persons
Entities providing VET
- Companies
Thematic categories
Governance of VET and lifelong learning
This thematic category looks at existing legal frameworks providing for strategic, operational – including quality assurance – and financing arrangements for VET and lifelong learning (LLL). It examines how VET and LLL-related policies are placed in broad national socioeconomic contexts and coordinate with other strategies and policies, such as economic, social and employment, growth and innovation, recovery and resilience.
This thematic category covers partnerships and collaboration networks of VET stakeholders – especially the social partners – to shape and implement VET in a country, including looking at how their roles and responsibilities for VET at national, regional and local levels are shared and distributed, ensuring an appropriate degree of autonomy for VET providers to adapt their offer.
The thematic category also includes efforts to create national, regional and sectoral skills intelligence systems (skills anticipation and graduate tracking) and using skills intelligence for making decisions about VET and LLL on quality, inclusiveness and flexibility.
This thematic sub-category refers both to formal mechanisms of stakeholder engagement in VET governance and to informal cooperation among stakeholders, which motivate shared responsibility for quality VET. Formal engagement is usually based on legally established institutional procedures that clearly define the role and responsibilities for relevant stakeholders in designing, implementing and improving VET. It also refers to establishing and increasing the degree of autonomy of VET providers for agile and flexible VET provision.
In terms of informal cooperation, the sub-category covers targeted actions by different stakeholders to promote or implement VET. This cooperation often leads to creating sustainable partnerships and making commitments for targeted actions, in line with the national context and regulation, e.g. national alliances for apprenticeships, pacts for youth or partnerships between schools and employers. It can also include initiatives and projects run by the social partners or sectoral organisations or networks of voluntary experts and executives, retired or on sabbatical, to support their peers in the fields of VET and apprenticeships, as part of the EAfA.
Modernising VET infrastructure
This thematic category looks at how VET schools and companies providing VET are supported to update and upgrade their physical infrastructure for teaching and learning, including digital and green technologies, so that learners in all VET programmes and specialities have access to state-of-the-art equipment and are able to acquire relevant and up-to-date vocational and technical skills and competences. Modernising infrastructure in remote and rural areas increases the inclusiveness of VET and LLL.
This thematic sub-category refers to measures for modernising physical infrastructure, equipment and technology needed to acquire vocational skills in VET schools and institutions that provide CVET or adult learning, including VET school workshops and labs.
This thematic sub-category focuses on establishing and upgrading to state-of-the-art digital infrastructure, equipment and technology, such as computers, hardware, connectivity and good broadband speed that should ensure quality and inclusive VET provision, especially in blended and virtual modes. It also includes specific measures to remove the digital divide, e.g. supporting geographically remote or rural areas to ensure social inclusion through access to such infrastructure for learning and teaching. It also includes support measures for learners from socially disadvantaged backgrounds to acquire the necessary equipment.
Modernising VET offer and delivery
This thematic category looks at what and how individuals learn, how learning content and learning outcomes in initial and continuing VET are defined, adapted and updated. First and foremost, it examines how VET standards, curricula, programmes and training courses are updated and modernised or new ones created. Updated and renewed VET content ensures that learners acquire a balanced mix of competences that address modern demands, and are more closely aligned with the realities of the labour market, including key competences, digital competences and skills for green transition and sustainability, both sector-specific and across sectors. Using learning outcomes as a basis is important to facilitate this modernisation, including modularisation of VET programmes. Updating and developing teaching and learning materials to support the above is also part of the category.
The thematic category continues to focus on strengthening high-quality and inclusive apprenticeships and work-based learning in real-life work environments and in line with the European framework for quality and effective apprenticeships. It looks at expanding apprenticeship to continuing vocational training and at developing VET programmes at EQF levels 5-8 for better permeability and lifelong learning and to support the need for higher vocational skills.
This thematic category also focuses on VET delivery through a mix of open, digital and participative learning environments, including workplaces conducive to learning, which are flexible, more adaptable to the ways individuals learn, and provide more access and outreach to various groups of learners, diversifying modes of learning and exploiting the potential of digital learning solutions and blended learning to complement face-to-face learning.
Centres of vocational excellence that connect VET to innovation and skill ecosystems and facilitate stronger cooperation with business and research also fall into this category.
This thematic sub-category focuses on developing and updating all kinds of learning resources and materials, both for learners and for teachers and trainers (e.g. teachers handbooks or manuals), to embrace current and evolving content and modes of learning. These activities target all kinds of formats: hard copy and digital publications, learning websites and platforms, tools for learner self-assessment of progress, ICT-based simulators, virtual and augmented reality, etc.
This thematic sub-category refers to acquisition of key competences and basic skills for all, from an early age and throughout their life, including those acquired as part of qualifications and curricula. Key competences include knowledge, skills and attitudes needed by all for personal fulfilment and development, employability and lifelong learning, social inclusion, active citizenship and sustainable awareness. Key competences include literacy; multilingual; science, technology, engineering and mathematical (STEM); digital; personal, social and learning to learn; active citizenship, entrepreneurship, cultural awareness and expression (Council of the European Union, 2018).
Supporting lifelong learning culture and increasing participation
Lifelong learning refers to all learning (formal, non-formal or informal) taking place at all stages in life and resulting in an improvement or update in knowledge, skills, competences and attitudes or in participation in society from a personal, civic, cultural, social or employment-related perspective (Erasmus+, Glossary of terms, https://erasmus-plus.ec.europa.eu/programme-guide/part-d/glossary-common-terms). A systemic approach to CVET is crucial to ensure adaptability to evolving demands.
This broad thematic category looks at ways of creating opportunities and ensuring access to re-skilling and upskilling pathways, allowing individuals to progress smoothly in their learning throughout their lives with better permeability between general and vocational education and training, and better integration and compatibility between initial and continuing VET and with higher education. Individuals should be supported in acquiring and updating their skills and competences and navigating easily through education and training systems. Strategies and campaigns that promote VET and LLL as an attractive and high-quality pathway, providing quality lifelong guidance and tailored support to design learning and career paths, and various incentives (financial and non-financial) to attract and support participation in VET and LLL fall into this thematic category as well.
This thematic category also includes many initiatives on making VET inclusive and ensuring equal education and training opportunities for various groups of learners, regardless of their personal and economic background and place of residence – especially those at risk of disadvantage or exclusion, such as persons with disabilities, the low-skilled and low-qualified, minorities, migrants, refugees and others.
This thematic sub-category refers to providing the possibility for individuals who are already in the labour market/in employment to reskill and/or acquire higher levels of skills, and to ensuring targeted information resources on the benefits of CVET and lifelong learning. It also covers the availability of CVET programmes adaptable to labour market, sectoral or individual up- and reskilling needs. The sub-category includes working with respective stakeholders to develop digital learning solutions supporting access to CVET opportunities and awarding CVET credentials and certificates.
European priorities in VET
VET Recommendation
- VET agile in adapting to labour market challenges
- VET as a driver for innovation and growth preparing for digital and green transitions and occupations in high demand
Osnabrück Declaration
- Resilience and excellence through quality, inclusive and flexible VET