ECER weblog and discussion space

For those readers unfamiliar with ECER, the European Conference on Educational research is the largest - I think - European conference on education. Last week the annual conference met in Dublin.

The conference is divided into strands, each convened by a network. The network of which I am a member of VETNET, focused on vocational education and training. There were some 1500 delegate registered at the conference, of whom perhaps 130 were part of VETNET.

Here, as promised, are a few quick impressions.

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Extended text for this entry:

First the logistics. beautiful city Dublin may be, but a bit of a nightmare for getting around. the transport system - if it can be called that - is close to collapse. Services are at best variable and prices sky high.

Now on to the conference. This can only be impressionistic. VETNET runs a number of parallel strands and sessions so whatever I say is only based on those sessions I attended.

First, the VETNET organisation. Personally, I thought it was the best VETNET session I had attended - and I have been going to the conference for the last six years. Sure, there are many things we could do better - but as a forum for exchanging ideas it remains unparalleled in Europe.

A few striking things about the sessions I attended. there seemed a strange preoccupation this year with systems and systems reform. OK - this is important - but at times I thought we were in danger of forgetting about learners and learning. I especially missed the focus on work based learning which had been present in previous years' conferences.

Having said this, I thought the discussions on non formal learning were much better thought out than in previous conferences.

Secondly, there was more active reflection on the role of the EU in supporting European research in VET. EU funding is an important source of support. However, there remains a danger that in chasing funding we follow the priorities of the European Commission and fail to properly develop a community of VET research, capable of deciding itself on what the priorities should be.

There ware a series of interesting discussions on how we can make the link between different projects and areas of work - both in similar and adjacent areas. Obviously this would require much better use of the VETNET web site, which has previously functioned largely as a repository for conference papers. As a whole, VET researchers - although they can use computers, are not really that net savvy and tend to be a little suspicious of the techies toys. This year I felt a genuine interest, if still sceptic that computer enhanced communication could really work.

Finally, the social programme was great. many thanks to Ludger and Barry for all their work in organising the conference and Ines and Christian for their support. Also to Mike for his work on the web site.

I am posting this both to my own blog site, the Wales Wide Web and the VETNET site which has a collective blog. Be interesting to see if anyone responds.