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The introduction and expansion of Degree Apprenticeships, and higher-level apprenticeships more generally, has had a positive effect on widening access to professional and organisational careers as well as in some fields to progression within professions (Lester & Bravenboer 2020; Lillis & Bravenboer 2022). However, as discussed by Talbot et al (2019) this has been accompanied by a decrease in employer- and individually-negotiated programmes. The reduction in negotiated work-based learning (NWBL) opportunities and decline in heutagogically-based higher education raises questions about what opportunities have been closed down, for whom, and how these might be revisited.

Purpose: This paper examines how the COVID-19 pandemic has accelerated digital developments in apprenticeship and work-based learning in higher education (HE), focusing on practices that have ongoing value. Design/methodology/approach: A literature review was carried out on the theme of HE work-based and work-integrated learning during the pandemic, followed by minimally-structured interviews with UK university staff responsible for apprenticeship and other work-based programmes. Findings: The pandemic has accelerated adoption of online and digital methods to support work-based and apprenticeship learning. There has been progress from emergency measures to more pedagogically consistent ones. A blended approach is becoming common, with the learning and logistical benefits from digital methods ensuring their continuing use. Progress is uneven and there is still a need for improved digital pedagogy and better integration of theoretical and practical learning. Practical implications: More attention is needed to digital pedagogy and to effective use of online methods to support work-based learning with corresponding implications for staff development. There are institutional implications in terms of ensuring that systems and structures support what is, particularly for work-based learners, likely to be a permanent move towards digital, blended and online learning. Originality/value: There has been limited research on the impact of the pandemic on work-based learning, with most of the literature focusing on placements and projects. This paper presents findings at a point when universities are considering how technologically-supported methods will be employed on a more permanent basis.

Purpose: This paper examines architecture as an example of the evolving context of qualifying routes in UK professions. Design/methodology/approach: The background and current state of architectural education, qualifying routes and regulatory frameworks in the UK is presented as a case-study, and compared with practices in professional education and qualifying more generally including the use of Degree Apprenticeships. Findings: Architecture has since the 1960s maintained an entry-route that is premised on periods of full-time academic study plus full-time practice. While a minority part-time version of this route has always existed (and is now being expanded through Degree Apprenticeships), variations seen in other professions such as experienced practitioner entry and accelerated routes from cognate fields have so far been lacking. Pressures for reform are emerging both from external changes affecting the profession and from the high cost of qualifying in relation to median incomes in the sector. Practical implications: There is a need for more flexible and less expensive routes to qualifying as an architect, with substantial scope to use practices from other professions and areas of higher education to recognise existing levels of competence and improve crossover with other design and construction fields. Originality/value: This is the first review of architectural qualifying requirements that has been made in the context of professional entry more generally.

The use of augmented reality (AR) in vocational education and training can still be considered as being in its infancy, although interest in it is growing in response both to its potential for teaching and its adoption as a practical tool in various industry sectors. One example of early-stage AR use is illustrated from a practicum for training apprentices in the chemical industry; this involves the use of various AR objects for learning a simple production operation. Although this application had been conceived of purely in terms of substitution for existing instructional methods, it also gave learners greater control of the learning process and created opportunities for collaborative learning. Pedagogically, AR can be considered as a mildly disruptive technology that favours learner managed learning, a factor that is aligned with its ability to support localised decision-making in industry.

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to describe a revised approach describing occupational competence, with particular reference to its application in two European countries at the level of specific occupational fields and in relation to the models used in national vocational education and training (VET) systems. Design/methodology/approach: An Erasmus+ project involved partners in five countries developing and trialling competence standards, following principles developed from approaches that have recently emerged in some British self-governing professions. Findings: The model used in the project avoids the narrowness that was characteristic of earlier British approaches to occupational competence. It provides a template that can be used for articulating the essentials of practice, including in emerging fields and those that cut across professions and occupations. It is also flexible enough to provide underpinnings for different types of VET system without making assumptions about the way that economies, labour markets and education systems are organised. Practical implications: A number of factors are outlined that improve the applicability of practice-based competence descriptions, including starting from occupational fields rather than job roles, focusing on the ethos and core activities of the field, and using concise and precise descriptions that are not limited to specific roles and contexts. Originality/value: A tested, practice-based model of competence is put forward that can be applied at the level of broad professional or occupational fields, is neutral in respect of national labour markets and educational systems, and offers a means of developing a common "language" of competence at a European level.

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to review three international frameworks, including the International Standard Classification of Education (ISCED), in relation to one country's higher professional and vocational education system. Design/methodology/approach: The frameworks were examined in the context of English higher work-related education, and areas of mismatch identified. These were investigated to identify the extent to which they were due to weaknesses in the national system or to limiting assumptions contained in the frameworks. Findings: Assumptions based on stages of education are problematic in the context of lifelong higher and professional education, while more open, lifelong-learning oriented assumptions can be too skeletal to aid comparisons between systems of initial vocational education and training. Particular problems are identified with assumptions contained in the ISCED that do not reflect the reality of professional education. Practical implications: International frameworks need to take account of patterns of learning that take place outside of formal institutions and throughout life, but which lead to equivalent outcomes. Nevertheless, it is not adequate to substitute assumptions based only on the level of achievement. Social implications: The assumptions underpinning the ISCED in particular mean that equivalent achievements in different systems can be classified differently, leading to under-reporting of individual achievements, a lack of comparability in international statistics, and potential for policy distortion. Originality/value: The paper builds on the work of Hippach-Schneider et al. by providing additional evidence, from a different national context, for issues relating to the ISCED in the context of higher professional and vocational education, and extends this analysis to the two major European frameworks.

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to discuss the problems of applying competence standards to professional-level work, noting limitations in functional approaches and drawing on developments in professions and on a recent Erasmus+ project to propose a more adequate alternative. Design/methodology/approach: An approach to describing competence based on previously reported developments in some self-governing, principally British professions was used to inform an Erasmus+ project that created competence standards for five higher-level occupations in different European countries. Findings: The original developments in professions and further work through the project both endorse a model of competence that is based on standards of practice, applies holistically to professional or occupational fields rather than focusing on work roles and functions, respects contextual factors in defining competent action, and necessitates situational interpretation and judgement. Practical implications: Descriptions of professional competence need to avoid being overly constrained by assumptions about the roles that practitioners might perform or the context in which practice takes place. They need to reflect the ethos and ethics of the field as well as more transversal aspects of professionalism. Descriptions of this type are likely to reflect factors that are also valued in higher education. Originality/value: The model of competence that is proposed appears to have a good level of validity for high-level professional work, and provides an approach to describing practice that is not limited to particular national contexts.

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to review the use of "competence" as a concept and through the use of occupational competence standards in six European countries. Design/methodology/approach: Partners in an Erasmus+ project in each of the six countries prepared a review of the use of "competence" in their countries using a common template. The authors of this paper reviewed additional literature, summarised the individual country reviews and provided an analysis and commentary. Findings: "Competence" is becoming a widely used concept across Europe, but its interpretation and application both vary. Between them, the countries in the study illustrate the use of separate occupational standards, both as a national strategy and developed by self-governing professions; as well as competence embedded directly in qualification and training specifications. The use of separate standards as a mandatory component in national vocational education and training systems is questioned, while the use of appropriate standards for licensing and qualified status is largely endorsed. Research limitations/implications: The country reviews were conducted principally from the perspective of informing the developments taking place in the project, so were not comprehensive and also differed in emphasis between countries. Practical implications: The study points to the need to avoid promoting any particular model of occupational competence at a European level, as opposed to seeking common ground that will aid mutual recognition of qualifications. It also cautions against the uncritical transfer of models and policies from one national system to another. Originality/value: The paper provides additional evidence against "policy borrowing" without careful consideration of context, and contrasts the use of competence standards as part of a system-wide strategy with their tailored application for specific purposes.

The author, a consultant who has worked on projects in the education, training and professional regulation arena for more than three decades, reflects on factors that make for successful interventions and sustainable project outcomes. Seven key factors are identified: (1) intellectual credibility, both in a substantive and methodological sense; (2) a consistent and explicit ethical perspective; (3) developing a comprehensive rich picture of the practice context; (4) using a 'realisation' or 'co-creation' approach to ensure that the client community has ownership of the project; (5) the development of effective systems architecture; (6) being able to act as a constitutional arbiter to maintain consistency and constancy of purpose; and (7) treating the project as a research process, both internally to build in ongoing review and evolution and externally to provide critique and position it in relation to parallel developments in the field. The importance of methodological fluency is also emphasised to develop approaches that are contextually appropriate, while cautioning against the use of overformalised methods and processes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to discuss the benefits of reclaiming the idea of professional competence and challenges fragmented approaches to academic qualification and professional recognition. It is argued that academic programmes that are integrated with the requirements for professional recognition can resolve the potentially unhelpful differentiation between "theory" and "practice" and between "knowledge" and "competence". Design/methodology/approach: Three contextualised case studies are presented to demonstrate a range of possibilities for developing academic programmes that integrate professional competence in the fields of construction, aviation and management. Findings: It is argued that the examples described provide some evidence that where competence is conceived of as a matter of open on-going professional development, it can be effectively integrated and aligned with the intended outcomes of academic qualifications. Furthermore, that the examples described demonstrate that the idea of professional competence can operate to ground knowledge in practice contexts and ensure that professional values are positioned as a requirement of being qualified. Originality/value: The diversity of the examples provided across three distinct sectors illustrate the potential for wider curriculum development opportunities for higher education practitioners. The need to align professional body recognition with academic qualification for higher and degree apprenticeships may also indicate significant implications for policy in this area. The cases presented provide evidence that academic qualifications can be developed that are at the same time recognised by employers as delivering a professionally competent workforce. This kind of development activity can provide both an incentive for employers to pay for education and training and opening opportunities for career progression for those in work.

The European Qualifications Framework (EQF) was introduced in 2008 as a "meta-framework" or common reference point for national qualifications frameworks in Europe, a function for which, with some caveats, it has been pragmatically successful. It has also been used with variable success to support the development or referencing of sectoral qualifications frameworks, although questions remain about how these interlink with national frameworks. Use of the EQF as a tool for allocating levels to individual qualifications or to aid qualification development has been conspicuously less successful, due both to these applications requiring more detail than is present in the EQF and in some cases to developers' lack of fluency in working with qualification frameworks in general. Testing the EQF via a range of international projects also points to some flaws in the detail of the framework itself, particularly in the way that it represents competence and to a lesser extent knowledge.

Competence frameworks and standards are increasingly used by professions in the UK, driven by pressures for professional accountability, and particularly by the trend towards assessing practice before fully-qualified status is granted. A review of 40 UK frameworks indicated that most are concerned primarily with the ability to undertake work activities and roles to an appropriate standard: i.e. they reflect a predominantly external or activity-based approach to competence. The better frameworks recognise that competence standards cannot provide prescriptions for practice, reflecting the need for practitioners to act intelligently and ethically, and to make judgements in complex and unpredictable situations. They also support valid, robust and consistent assessment, and are capable of being adopted in different practice contexts while remaining sufficiently precise. The overall standard of competence frameworks is, however, variable, with some being little more than adapted course curricula or simple lists of activities that rely on a high level of tacit agreement about what is needed in practice. The "project" of developing professional competence frameworks is a work in progress, with much to be learned from the best examples of the type.

In addition to the familiar occupational standards that underpin National Vocational Qualifications, the UK has a parallel if less complete system of competence or practice standards that are developed and controlled by professional bodies. While there is a certain amount of overlap between the two types of standard, recent research points to a distinct professional, as opposed to occupational, perspective on work competence. This can be characterised as focusing on ethics, professionalism and key standards rather than the detail of roles and functions; being designed to apply across the profession rather than having a core-and-options structure; and providing confidence in practitioners' abilities to act as a member of the profession rather than in a bounded occupational role. These factors are illustrated by reference to practices in professions with which the author has worked, suggesting that there is a spectrum of approaches from this archetypally professional one to a more utilitarian, occupationally oriented one.

The TRAVORS projects, supported by the European Union's Lifelong Learning Programme, ran between 2008 and 2012. Their object was to develop training programmes for disability employment practitioners across nine countries based on proven approaches both to vocational rehabilitation and to skills training. The second of the two projects aimed to trial and establish a European practitioner qualification, pitched at Level 5 of the European Qualifications Framework and emphasising skills-based training and workplace assessment. While the trials proved successful, they highlighted a generally poor level of understanding of assessment and certification based on workplace proficiency. The project resulted in a common "curriculum", a detailed qualification specification and a strengthened set of processes to guide implementation in different countries. However, the qualification can be considered a work-in-progress and wider uptake--sufficient to support sustainable central governance--needs to be achieved if a genuinely international certificate is to emerge.

The workplace is becoming acknowledged, if not without some contention, as a site of knowledge production that can have equal validity with academic and other research-oriented contexts. One way of investigating practice-based knowledge generation is through doctoral work that is based on research and development in the workplace. Examination of a selection of outputs from a doctorate geared specifically to work-based candidates confirms the workplace as a site of valid knowledge production, and also indicates that real-life projects concerned with development and change rather than explicitly with research can, if pursued with intellectual rigour and critical reflection, be a powerful source of new knowledge. (Contains 4 tables and 1 note.)

The growth and evolution of professional doctorates in Australia, the UK and other parts of the English-speaking world has been widely reported and discussed. Recently, forms of doctorate have emerged that are not geared to specific professions or disciplines, and that are used by senior practitioners as vehicles for professional development and for addressing complex work issues. These transdisciplinary, candidate-centred, research-and-development programmes can collectively be referred to as work-based doctorates. Although stemming from more than one tradition, they are evolving towards a set of common practices that reflect the transdisciplinary model of work-based learning used in some UK and Australian universities. Evidence is beginning to indicate that these doctorates have significant value in terms of organisational benefit and individual professional development, and, although they still occupy disputed territory within the university, they are capable of being conceptualised and implemented in a way that is intellectually rigorous and robust.

National and transnational qualifications frameworks are an increasingly present feature of the education and training landscape. The United Kingdom can be regarded as one of the pioneers of qualifications frameworks, with partial frameworks appearing from the mid-1980s onwards. However, approaches in England if not in the whole of the UK have remained fragmented compared with the best examples from other countries. The recently-introduced Qualifications and Credit Framework (QCF) introduces partial innovations particularly in enabling credit for smaller achievements and allowing employers and practitioner communities to contribute content into the framework. However, the framework is largely limited to vocational qualifications outside of universities; it is not particularly well integrated with the higher education, professional, and at present, school sectors; and it lacks responsiveness to innovations in qualification design. The QCF has been described as a "strong" or regulated framework, although a more apposite term might be "brittle."

Since the 1980s there has been significant growth in the engagement of higher education with workforce development, with among other things the emergence of a distinct if varied area of provision commonly referred to as work-based learning. Recent examination of practice and literature indicates a growing sophistication in the way that work-based learning is being theorised and facilitated in higher education, with its gradual emergence as a distinct field of practice and study supported by relevant pedagogies and concepts of curriculum. Tensions continue to exist between the demands and opportunities provided by the workplace and the need to develop capable practice, support personal development and maintain academic validity; however, universities are beginning to engage with these issues at a deeper level than that suggested by simple notions of employer engagement and skills development, and the evidence indicates that well-designed work-based programmes are both effective and robust.

In the UK fully qualified status in professional occupations is normally awarded by a professional association or registration body. Both the requirements and the routes for qualifying vary between professions, although the majority include an academic component combined with or followed by a period of assessed practice. In recent years there have been pressures on professions to broaden their entry routes while at the same time becoming more rigorous in the way that they sign off practitioners as fit to practise. A small-scale study undertaken in 2007 investigated how different professions operate entry routes and qualifying processes. The findings indicate a trend towards increased flexibility, more thorough assessment of the practising phase, and some movement away from defined routes towards frameworks with robust exit criteria. The pace of change is nevertheless uneven, and there is scope for professions to learn from one another and from recent developments in higher education. (Contains 1 table.)

The Conservation Technician Qualification (CTQ) is a recent development to meet the needs of a group of workers in the cultural heritage field. While following some of the principles underpinning UK National Vocational Qualifications, it is employer-initiated and owned, awarded by a professional institute, and wholly workplace-based. A short trial in 2007-08 with an initial group of five employers and 18 candidates proved highly successful, and the qualification is now being taken forward with further organisations and candidates. Out of necessity the CTQ was developed as a national initiative independent of government education and training bodies, and it raises questions about the flexibility of public qualification systems to respond quickly and efficiently to the needs of small and distinct occupational groupings. (Contains 2 tables and 2 figures.)

Purpose: This paper sets out to examine whether the process of accrediting prior experiential learning (APEL) as used in UK universities is the most appropriate approach for providing academic recognition for work-based projects and learning. Design/methodology/approach: Work-based projects that had already been assessed in the context of a professional qualification were re-examined to identify how they might be used towards a master's degree and what if any additional work the candidates would need to complete. Findings: The study finds that in most cases it appeared that the candidates would be able in principle to gain a full master's degree based on their existing work and associated reflection and writing-up, without the need to carry out additional investigation or projects. Research limitations/implications: The findings are based on a small sample of individuals from a specific field (the conservation of cultural heritage), and while the findings are clear and appear to have wider applicability they can only be regarded as pointers for practical trialling and further investigation. Practical implications: The findings suggest that the current approach to APEL used in UK universities needs to be expanded so that awards can be made substantially on the basis of already-completed workplace projects. A trial of this approach is proposed using candidates from the cultural heritage sector. Originality/value: The paper proposes a basis for changes to credit practice that will provide better scope for individuals to use and build on workplace activities in gaining academic awards. (Contains 3 tables and 1 figure.)

Professional doctorates now form an established alternative to the PhD, both in the UK and Australia. Recent developments have seen the emergence of what some commentators call second-generation doctorates, more closely geared to the needs of professional practitioners. The current culmination of this development is represented by what might be termed practitioner doctorates, based on development projects which result in substantial organizational or professional change and (to paraphrase the widely used criterion for a PhD thesis) a significant contribution to practice. These programmes pose a challenge to traditional notions of doctoral work based on research. They can, however, be conceptualized in a way that is both robust academically and represents a high level of adequacy for the complex and far-reaching problems encountered in contemporary society.

Data from a survey of 26 British training providers, 19 land-based colleges, 56 new workers in agriculture, and 29 employers revealed difficulties understanding the language of National Vocational Qualifications and Scottish Vocational Qualifications, concerns about their validity and reliability, and ambiguity surrounding their essential purpose. (SK)