ECVET - Application to mobility projects

Why
EQF acts as a transnational device to describe the qualifications. Member States, individuals and employers will be able to use the EQF to better understand and compare the qualifications levels of different countries and different education and training systems. The EQF will make national qualifications more readable across Europe.

What
The core of the EQF are eight reference levels describing what a learner knows, understands and is able to do - learning outcomes - regardless of the system awarding the qualification. The reference levels:
- enable a correspondence between the labour market and the training offer
- promote the validation of non-formal and informal learning
- enable much easier comparison between national qualifications.

Who
EQF is addressed to
- vocational training centres
- social partners.

Where
EQF
- promotes workers' and learners' mobility in order to improve the employability
- can integrate and improve the development of EUROPASS devices.

How
- Member States should relate their national qualifications systems to the EQF by 2012, in particular by referencing in a transparent manner their qualifications levels to those set out in the Recommendation of the European Parliament and of the Council, where appropriate by developing national qualifications frameworks in accordance with national legislation and practice
- Member States should adopt measures, so that, by 2012, all new qualification certificates, diplomas and EUROPASS documents contain a clear reference to the appropriate EQF level

Political mandate
In the document E.C. - D.G. Education & Culture, (Brussels 1st April 2005), the EQF is defined as a meta-framework since it enables the comparison between qualifications regardless of the national framework.
The Recommendation of the European Parliament and of the Council (23 April 2008) establishes the European Qualifications Framework for lifelong learning