The road to becoming a higher education institution

SFIVET has reached another important milestone on its way to becoming a higher education institution: in November 2019, the Federal Council submitted the draft Federal Act on the Swiss Federal Institute for Vocational Education and Training and the accompanying Federal Council Dispatch to the Swiss Parliament. SFIVET aims to be accredited as a higher education institution by 2022. The new Federal Act provides SFIVET with a legal basis in the form of a separate organisational decree.

So far, SFIVET has been governed by only a few articles of the Vocational and Professional Education and Training Act. This meets neither the requirements of the legality principle of the Federal Constitution nor the federal government’s corporate governance standards. The new Federal Act contains general provisions on SFIVET’s tasks, cooperation, teacher’s qualifications and other qualifications, structure, human resources law, funding, federal supervision, penalties and handling of personal data.

In parallel to this development, SFIVET continued the preparatory work for institutional accreditation. At the end of 2019, it submitted its application for accreditation to the Swiss Accreditation Council. Other priorities included the creation of a new quality control strategy and the allocation of research tasks to lecturers to close the gap between research and teaching. The new participation regulations introduced by SFIVET in 2019 are another important step towards institutional accreditation.

The new Federal Act and accreditation as a higher education institution will optimally position SFIVET as the Confederation’s expert organisation within the Swiss higher education sector, which will further the interests of the Swiss system of vocational and professional education and training.