Modernizing VET Offer with International Funds

Modernizing VET Offer with International Funds

Regional Challenge Fund (RCF)

In the first call of the Regional Challenge Fund financed by the German Development Bank (KfW) and implemented by Western Balkans 6 Chamber Investment Forum (WB6 CIF), two S4J partner providers have succeeded to acquire funding (vocational “Gjergj Canco” school in Tirana and vocational “Kristo Isak” school in Berat). The RCF supports projects that are jointly implemented by vocational training institutes and partnering enterprises that engage, or plan to engage, in cooperative training activities. In the case of vocational “Gjergj Canco” school (Funding 460,333 Euro), the project will support the school by providing two modern labs in Multimedia and Programming, provide teaching infrastructure (computers and software), assisting apprenticeship placements in companies and training of instructors, providing technical training for teachers. In the case of vocational “Kristo Isak” school (Funding 293,000 Euro), the project will support two directions: Hospitality-Tourism and Social and Health Services, with a focus on increasing cooperation with the private sector for teachers’ training and improvement of school infrastructure.

Lately, vocational “Salih Ceka” school in Elbasan has been selected to benefit additional funds by RCF. The application prepared by the school and the proposed consortium mainly envisages investments in infrastructure, staff development, curriculum enrichment and software through student projects, with a fund of around 500,000 Euro. Within January, RCF will hold the first meetings to continue with the process of project implementation.

InnoVET

Vocational “Gjergj Canco” school was selected by the project “InnoVET – Innovation through internationalization in VET” as their only Albanian partner organization until March 2024. The project will support teachers and school staff to participate in international exchanges focused in promoting innovation in vocational training through internationalization. The project headquarters are in the vocational school in Thun, Switzerland, and its other partners are vocational schools or colleges from EU countries.

Through this collaboration, the school will participate in the development of strategies towards innovation and internationalization in VET, will strengthen and exchange of knowledge and practice in the field of innovation and internationalization in VET, will organize meetings with project partners for the sake of research, benchmarking, cross-audits, gap-analysis and working on school and company development, will commit, evaluate and participate in the elaboration and dissemination of the project result, will cooperate to implement innovative practices leading to high quality teaching. Vocational “Gjergj Canco” school was selected by the project due to its potential to contribute in the development of vocational schools in Albania and beyond.