Internationalisation abroad
Module 2.2. Advanced level
International mobility is one of the key activities in international cooperation. Students and VET staff have many ways to go international and learn from international experiences.
Definition
Staff member proposes and organises new international activities abroad within his of her organisation or takes part in activities organised within a consortium or umbrella organisation in case there are no ongoing projects in the organisation.
This module is for you if…
you have experience in organising activities abroad in collaboration with other colleagues, you have been abroad for your own mobility and you would like to coordinate them or be the contact person in your own organisation.
What you are going to learn…
You will learn how to coordinate or manage mobility or international activities abroad. You will also understand the importance of networking.
After this module you will be able to:
- manage the practical arrangements related to a mobility
- promote the mobility offer
- mentor rookies of student and staff mobilities
- manage other kind of international projects and activities
Training Topics
Here you can continue your training path following the “Abroad direction”. We will focus on the mobilities, either for learners or for staff. We will give you also some new general information on the Erasmus programme and other possibilities to explore internationalisation abroad.
Topic 1: Mobilities – Practical arrangements
As you already know, there are two types of mobility: for learners and for staff. We have prepared for you three presentations which will focus on activities to do before, during and after the mobility.
Topic 2: Promotion of Mobilities within the organisation staff, students and families
Have a look at the presentation we have prepared with activities to do including some useful tips to promote your mobility projects.
Topic 3: Partnerships for cooperation
Another “classical” way to internationalise an organisation is to take part/present a partnership for cooperation project. Discover the main features of a project of this kind and get involved in it!
How can you start? There is a bunch of books on Project management, but we have found this one made by European Project Managers for European Project Managers.
And remember, as soon as you start to move the first steps into the European projects’ world, you will find lots of solutions to all the questions you may have in mind: your partner will provide you lots of tips, tools, handbooks and much more.
Topic 4: International competitions and study trips
In addition to the most common programmes – especially Erasmus ones – there are endless possibilities to boost the internationalisation abroad. The most classical are the study trips and courses abroad for example to study a language in depth or the skills competitions that allow students to compete in their specialty. Skills competitions are now included also in the Erasmus+ Programme. How are they organised? You may have a great example from Finland where several VET centres organize the Taitaja Competition, the largest annual vocational education event in the country.
Topic 5: EU General info
You should remember we have talked about Erasmus+ principles already in the Rookie level. Now you are in the Advanced level and we will provide you with some of the most important information you need to follow your path.
First of all, you need to know that the Erasmus+ Programme is divided into three main Actions:
- KA1: Learning Mobility of Individuals
- KA2: Cooperation among organisations and institutions
- KA3: Support for Policy Reform
but you have also other possibilities under
- Jean Monnet Actions: stimulating teaching and research on the European Union
- Sport
Until 2020 we had only two kinds of accreditations, for example, in the VET sector we had the VET Charter Now we have more accreditations and they are all called “Erasmus accreditation”.
Aim for more co-operation
The aim is always the same: it is a tool for organisations in VET, school and adult education that want to open up to cross-border exchange and cooperation.
Erasmus accreditation is indeed one of the key features of the new Erasmus+ Programme. It’s definitely the most innovative and longsighted aspect introduced in the Key Actions 1 strand. It provides education and training organisations with stable access to mobility opportunities for the entire duration of the programme (2021-2027).
You only need to be accredited once! Then the accreditation will last seven years during which your organisation will be able to access annual call dedicated only to awarded organisations. But be careful, you can also lose the accreditation if during the years you do not comply with the quality criteria.
Such accreditation could be defined as a “quality-assured membership card” for the Programme’s mobility action which is awarded to organisations that demonstrate
- clear operative and strategic internationalisation goals in the mid and long term
- an effective plan to implement high quality mobility activities as part of a wider effort to develop the organisation, it means that mobility actions become part of a wider strategy and not an end in itself
- willingness to ensure continued participation in Key Action 1
- compliance with the quality standards and key principles of the Erasmus+ programme.
To sum up, the award of the Erasmus accreditation confirms that the applicant has set up a plan to implement high quality mobility activities as part of a wider effort to develop their organisation. This plan is called an Erasmus Plan and it is a key part of the application for Erasmus accreditation. Since the very beginning of the new Programme, lots of organizations have been accredited, in all the sectors. Of course, this will also impact the budget distribution.
Talking about the budget you may be interested in knowing what is funded, for example, in a Mobility project.
You still want to know more?
All the main Project Management documents you may need when working at the advanced level can be found at the European Comission’s website.
Of course, there are also some platforms you will need to use:
Beneficiary Module: the system that allows Erasmus+ & European Solidarity Corps beneficiary organisations to access and manage their project information, such as encoding activities and participants, request individual participants’ reports and submit final reports to their National Agencies.
And here you can find more information about the Mobility Tool+ guidebook for beneficiaries
When talking about Mobilities for learners, they have the opportunity to follow language courses online thanks to the OLS – Online linguistic Support
Skills you may need to act in Internationalisation abroad activities
- Language skills
- Communication
- Cultural awareness
- Organisational skills
- Project management skills
- Open-mindedness
- Sense of EU citizenship
- Digital skills
- Cooperation
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The European Commission’s support for the production of this publication does not constitute an endorsement of the contents, which reflect the views only of the authors, and the Commission cannot be held responsible for any use which may be made of the information contained therein.