REFINE - Recognising Formal, Infomal and Non-formal Education

The aims of Refine are: to test the tools for a European methodological framework for the recognition of non-formal and informal learning (as recommended by the Transfine project funded under the first Joint Action call); to foster trans-national and trans-sectoral collaboration; to build mutual trust in the practices and procedures.

The primary target groups are practitioners, managers and policy makers at institutional, regional, national and European level; the indirect target groups are those with no or few formal qualifications but with skills acquired outside the academy. Refine has 17 partners - universities, vocational training, adult education and youth organisations and involves 12 countries, 5 of which bring experience from the Transfine project. Each country co-ordinator has between 2 and 8 associate partners, a total of 60 organisations including employers and social partners, each of which will act as a kind of laboratory to test tools for recognising non-formal and informal learning with 4-5 real candidates. The results of these tests will be compared: how they have been used in the different settings and different countries, the common elements, the necessary variations for different national and sector contexts, how they can be improved. There will be a virtual meeting place on the web and 2 live meetings in autumn 2004 and autumn 2005, the latter will also be a dissemination event.