QWATRA - Training for Travellers  

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WHAT IS QWATRA?

On 1 November 2000, EFECOT started with the Qwatra Project. The Qwatra project, with the support of the European Commission, DG Education and Culture (Leonardo da Vinci programme) aims to improve the access to vocational training courses for occupational travellers and to create an E.U.-network of content providers that provide vocational courses for occupational travellers, based on the national qualifications and taking into account their specific needs.

These objectives will be realised by setting up a database in which all vocational courses for travellers in Europe will be described, mentioning a corresponding distribution channel strategy. Special attention will be given to the way courses will lead to official qualifications. The database will be exploited by EFECOT and will be one of the key elements of the multilingual information acces point. Next to the database, two training courses will be developed. An ODL course preparing for the European Computer Driving Licence (in English, French, Dutch and German) and an ODL course about Business Regulations for fairground businesses in The Netherlands (Dutch), Belgium (Dutch) and Germany (German). The aim is to insert more courses in the Qwatra ODL structure after the life of the project. These courses can be either national developments or cross-national developments. As the network of vocational training providers will grow, an integrated European education framework can be created.

Over the last years, a number of projects have focused on vocational training for occupational travellers. Most of these concerned the development of specific vocational learning packages (e.g. HOT-EU, Fairground, ROTEER). Others, like TRAFE, Reisweb and BeKoSch, aimed to develop new ODL approaches and to experiment with the potential of learning technology.

One of the major problems encountered with all of the projects mentioned above was the lack of a general structure disseminating information on the available vocational courses to occupational travellers. Once developed, it was difficult to Îmarketâ these courses. Secondly, the content providers involved in the development of the courseware did not have the opportunity to continue the mutually enriching interaction in a systematic way. This was rather left to personal bonds and friendships. Thirdly, dissemination on a European level proved to be very difficult when trying to broaden the scope of national initiatives.

The Qwatra project aims to build further on the results obtained within these previous projects and to provide a solution to the lack of a general structure/platform/network, both for learners and for tutors.

Justification of the project

Europeâs occupational travellers (e.g. bargees, fairground and circus communities) are under growing pressure to constantly adapt their business pratices to the technological and societal evolutions. As a consequence, the importance of vocational education has increased tremendously over the last years. However, due to their travelling lifestyle, occupational travellers are often unable to follow regular vocational programmes. Several schools for vocational education have therefore experimented with succes more open and flexible forms of education provision, but they lack a clear dissemination channel to attract occupational traveller communities to their courses for this target group (both initial vocational education and life long learning). The Qwatra project aims to answer to these questions.

Partners in the Qwatra project:

- Institut Jozef Stefan (Slovenia)

- CINOP (The Netherlands)

- Universitat Oberta de Catalunya (Spain)

- Advanced Projects & Products (Belgium)

- Berufsbildende Schulen Schönebeck (Germany)

- ROC Aventus (The Netherlands)

- C.R.D.P. Languedoc-Roussillon (France)

- Harlow College (United Kingdom)

- EFECOT (Belgium)