Brussels, Belgium | September 30 – October 2, 2025
EVBB successfully concluded its highly anticipated EU Policy Camp 2025, which attracted over 150 professionals, policymakers, educators, and community stakeholders to the heart of Europe. With the theme “Open Schooling” the three-day event in Brussels promoted a vision for a more inclusive, collaborative, and community-oriented vocational education and training sector.
Redefining VET: The Power of Open Schooling
The Policy Camp focused on Open Schooling, a transformative strategy that rethinks vocational education and training institutions as dynamic centers of co-creation. The central goal is to prepare students for the future. Vocational education and training must break down institutional barriers and collaborate with the outside world.
Open Schooling in VET means:
- Deep Community Integration: Engaging directly with families, municipalities, NGOs, local companies, and research institutions.
- Real-World Relevance: Responding directly to local social, economic, and environmental challenges.
- Inclusion as a Priority: Ensuring VET systems are accessible and meaningful for all learners, particularly those at risk of exclusion.
The tone was set by the keynote speech “Reimagining VET: From Policy Vision to Practice, Successful Open Schooling in Action,” delivered by Sofoklis Sotiriou, head of research and development at Ellinogermaniki Agogi, who presented successful models already at the forefront of this collaborative approach.
EU Policy and Financial Frameworks for a New VET Era
One of the central themes of the Policy Camp was that of future EU policies and the financial landscape that will support this transformation of VET. Jacqueline Pacaud (DG EAC, European Commission) outlined the Erasmus+ program (2028-2034), ensuring that VET remains a central pillar of EU mobility and cooperation. In addition, Andrei Frank (Policy and Advocacy Coordinator at the Lifelong Learning Platform) gave an in-depth presentation on how the next multiannual financial framework (MFF) will affect investment and strategic support for vocational education and training institutions.
These expert presentations set the stage for the panel discussion “Breaking down walls: why VET needs an open school,” which featured an interesting debate among policymakers on how to make VET systems more resilient and relevant. Another strategic panel, “United Voices for VET,” brought together the leaders of the largest European VET networks, including EVBB, EVTA, EFVET, and EuProVET, to develop a strategy to strengthen a unified voice for VET at the European level.
Co-Creation and Practical Innovation in Action
The Policy Camp was not only a time for discussion, but also for action. The program included practical sessions aimed at providing participants with concrete tools for implementation.
- The Co-Creation Labs focused on action-oriented topics, such as “Innovating vocational education and training programs: designing inclusive and future-oriented learning activities,” in which participants developed new learning models.
- The workshop “Imagining vocational education and training as a community center,” led by Olena Bekh (ETF), challenged stakeholders to use design thinking principles to imagine the Open VET campus of tomorrow.
- The Good Practice Spotlights provided inspiration in the field, with successful practices of Open Schooling and inclusion presented by organizations such as KPEDU, 135 BPM, ESCITE, CPIP Romania, Fab Lab Fabulous St. Pauli, and UNISER.
