"The project aimed to pilot the implementation of the European Credit Transfer System for VET (ECVET) in the national HE&VET system of Russia and Uzbekistan by creating a long-term platform of collaboration between leading HEIs engaged in the training of VET teachers for post-secondary non-tertiary education level. The key idea of the project was to focus on the transfer and adaptation of the ECVET technical framework by utilizing the expertise of three HEIs from Programme Countries, in order to explore the applicability of ECVET in Russia and Uzbekistan for creating a compatible and comparable VET system that serves both horizontally (within VET) and vertically (from VET to HE) at national and transnational level. The basic ECVET technical features such as learning outcomes, credit transfer, etc. were tested and adapted to legislative rules of the Partners Countries; results of the project were submitted to national Ministries of Education for policy development and further implementation. The project is related to the main priorities of the state program “Development of Education"" of the Russian Federation for 2013–2020 and the Resolution (2015, #52) of the Cabinet of Ministers of Uzbekistan ""On measures for further development of employability of VET graduates”. Beneficiaries of the project are HE & VET institutions, teachers & managers, VET facilitators (instructors, trainers) & VET learners, Industry, Education Policy Makers and the educational community and society at large in Russia and Uzbekistan. The piloting of ECVET is considered a key measure for facilitating the flexibility and internationalization of VET in Russia and Uzbekistan - while at the same time contributing to the development of a common educational area encompassing both the HE&VET field between Europe and neighbouring countries. The global impact of our project is modernisation, accessibility and internationalization of the HE & VET area in Russia and Uzbekistan."

Pro-VET will introduce a systematic approach to, and an open platform for, initial and continuous professional development of VET teachers, trainers and mentors in both school and work-based settings for Serbia and Russia. Pro-VET will address the challenges of the educational quality, relevance, delivery, and management of the VET systems and help to build confidence in the industry on the development of the VET systems. Pro-VET will provide opportunities for pedagogical skill development and increased work-life relevance and collaboration with proven European approaches and methodologies in VET in Serbian and Russian languages.Pro-VET will build and capacitate a VET-Educators’ Training Network (VET-ETN) on the basis of 8 partner insitutions in Serbia and Russia that will strengthen European approaches in systems of VET and HE connected with VET teacher training in their respective countries. The capacity building actions will upgrade the ICT skills and facilities of teacher trainers as well as expose the trainers to European pedagogical practices and policies in VET. VET-ETN will facilitate admittance to these knowledge and skills for Serbian and Russian speaking world via an open access e-learning platform. The key activity of VET-ETN is the provision of in-service training opportunities for VET teachers. VET-ETN is capacitated with a process to develop new courses to target group needs and has MoU agreements with min. of 60 partners of VET providers, qualification agencies and companies. Pro-VET aims to engender policy learning via the introduction of transferable practices in VET policy and approaches that can be adapted to the partner countries’ VET systems. The policy learning consists of policy dialogue with ministries and VET sector, benchmarking and analysis of data from trained VET teachers (450 take part in the in-service training courses). It will result in national roadmaps for VET evolution and a Position Paper presented in National Conferences.

IIn Kazakhstan and Russia the term “employability” is not listed in official documentation, such as legal regulations, reforms etc; not formulated as an strategic goal of the universities; not framed as an concept including a set of competences, skills and attitudes and no practical instruction or recommendations on how to implement it is given. Universities in KZ and PF are obliged to include certain key competence modules into the study programs which are predefined by the Ministries of Education, but normally do not pursue a holistic competence model integrated into the educational program and are running as a common thread through the university. Consequently, the topic of employability is not incorporated into the strategy of the universities and hence doesn`t have the appropriate high priority as defined in the Bologna Declaration. Following the finding of the problem analysis the core aim of the project is to place the issue of employability on universities` agenda and to develop concepts taking into account all the variety and peculiarity of the each partner university.Main steps to pursue the aim and obtain the project outputs and results:• Development of an individual competence model and definition of employability in every PC HEI taking into account country specific and institutional peculiarities • Conceptualization and establishment of Centers for Competence and Employment Development (CCED) at PC HEI with offerings to different internal and external target groups • Provision of tested of trainings, modules, tools and instrument oriented to different target groups• Promotion of the CCED as well as the competence and employability approach inside and outside the universities. • Elaboration of a manual with practical recommendations to transfer the concrete experiences of the partner by using cases and guiding questions. By pursuing these objectives the situation in the PC can be changed on the institutional and also in the mid-term perspective regional and national level, since* individual concepts for holistic competence development will be adapted to the external and internal specifics. * a definition and aim description of “Employability” as well as didactic concepts and concrete formats of measures and instruments will be suggested. * CCED as a regional expert for competence development can be positioned.