« Regards croisés sur les pratiques suisse de reconnaissance et de validation de l’expérience » (Different perspectives on Swiss RVPL practices)
A special issue of the French journal “Education permanente” is intended as an extension of the Certificate of Advanced Studies (CAS) programme “conseil et accompagnement à la reconnaissance et validation des acquis” (Guidance and support in the recognition and validation of prior learning), which is offered through the joint efforts of SFIVET’s R&D Division and Continuing Training Division at both campuses in Lugano and Lausanne.
The CAS programme is intended for VET practitioners and trainers from various backgrounds working in any of the three linguistic regions of Switzerland. Once published, the special issue should serve as a local resource for RVPL practitioners in Switzerland who encounter difficulties implementing recognition or validation of prior learning procedures. The special issue will be a compilation of RVPL practitioner experiences and discussions expressed in individual articles. Their testimonials will be accompanied by thematic analysis by researchers.
The special issue is interesting in that it will present real practices and difficulties encountered on a daily basis by RVPL practitioners. This coverage will enable recurrent RVPL problems and themes to be examined in detail.
The project will be a collective endeavour to achieve the following objectives:
- Use, draw lessons from and share new experiences and knowledge gained in Switzerland
- Contribute to professionalization of RVPL practitioners, consolidation and recognition of RVPL practices
- Contribute to networking between RVPL practitioners to encourage mutual understanding, a common culture and shared values.
Writing workshops will help RVPL practitioners to describe their practices more effectively in writing. We asked them to answer the following questions:
- How do they carry out their activities on a daily basis? What solutions have they found to handle the difficulties that they encounter? How do their experiences develop and how can they be expressed, conveyed and discussed? How have RVPL practices evolved in Switzerland? Etc.
The articles by RVPL practitioners will then be analysed on the basis of doctoral research conducted by D. Salini (to be published at a later time) and S.Cortessis (2010) on RVPL guidance and support phases and the argumentation process in RVPL procedures.