Abstract:

The European Commission has recently approved an innovative project that is going to develop and establish a regional network a vocational education and training centers in Romania, by transferring knowledge, good practices and state of the art advanced video communication solutions from Norway. The results will improve the inter-institutional partnership between existing vocational training centers and a regional university in Targu-Mures, by stimulating and improving the quality, accessibility and supply of vocational education and training services for further development of human resources. The objective is to renovate the teaching infrastructure used by specialists in vocational education, and improve vocational training quality and making it more adaptable to the Romanian labor market. The later includes dissemination of a new model for organizing and delivering professional vocational training comprising of competence transfer, competence export, network building, and schools association development within a regional development perspective. The training delivery utilizes state of the art ICT solutions and video services.

The paper gives an overview of the ongoing research and development work, done in partnership with Sør-Trøndelag University College in Trondheim, Norway. It address experiences that may be transferred to other European countries. This includes design of digital classroom infrastructure, the required knowledge transfer, the practical organization of training delivery, design and establishment of a state of the art vocational training ICT and video infrastructure based up on good practices from Scandinavia, and effective development and deployment of large scale instructor training.
A high definition video network is constructed in the Central and Western parts of Romania, and organizations in 4 different towns may utilize the infrastructure to provide vocational education and training within the year 2011. The European EEA Program has recently approved this project. University Petrus Maior (UPM) in Tirgu Mures, will during the first phase be the hub in the video network. It is an innovative project that aims to develop and establish a regional network of vocational education and training centres in Central and Western parts of Romania by transferring knowledge, good practices and state of the art advanced video communication solutions from Sør-Trøndelag University College in Trondheim, Norway. The vocational schools are located in the towns Oradea (University Agora), Alba Iulia (Universitatea 1 Decembrie 1918) and Sighisoara (Colegiul National Mircea Eliade). The distances from the hub (University Petrus Maior) and to the sites are from 60 - 225 km. The plan is to teach at least 1200 students and provide instructor training to at least 30 instructors within 2011.
The article will present and transfer experiences targeting selection of technical solutions and establishing training solutions that identify good practices that underpin the capacity for innovation, as well as expansion of capacity, in vocational training.

Regional organizations may utilize the new training environment to offer and receive a broad range of specialized courses, including transnational exchange of competence transfer. Our experiences indicate that the network is enhancing attractiveness of, access to, and participation in vocational education and training.

Keywords:

vocational training, video, videoconferencing, e-learning, blended learning.