On January 18, 2024, a regional thematic meeting Challenges in communication and cooperation between stakeholders in the implementation of practical classes for related trades (JMO model of education) was held in Rijeka, in which teachers from vocational schools and mentors from employers participated. The topic of the meeting was challenges in communication and cooperation between stakeholders in the implementation of practical classes in education for related trades, and the goal of the meeting was to identify challenges faced by leaders of practical classes and mentors in craft workshops, and through moderated discussions to find possible solutions to the identified challenges. As the president of the Chamber of Crafts of the Primorje-Gorski Kotar County, Ph.D. Emil Priskić emphasized in his opening address that events like this are extremely important for the connection and cooperation of all stakeholders, because this is the only way to achieve better professional education and a quality workforce.
Some of the topics for discussion among the participants were:
roles, responsibilities and mutual expectations of individual stakeholders in apprenticeships (students, parents, teachers, mentors),
solving the challenges of the problem – examples of situations from practice,
examples of good practice,
joint proposals for improving cooperation.
On the basis of group work and mutual discussion on the mentioned topics, the participants of the thematic meeting reached the following conclusions:
- it is important to work on the establishment of open and concrete communication between schools and trades, and it is important to involve parents as well, because the attitude of students towards work and learning also depends on parents,
- the big challenge is to work on securing a sufficient number of licensed workshops and motivating craftsmen to take students on apprenticeships in their workshops,
- An extremely important element that needs to be discussed is the continuity of practical classes, and the participants concluded that it is necessary to work towards ensuring a minimum of one week of continuous practical classes,
- education, information campaigns and advisory support to all stakeholders, especially craftsmen, is essential for the quality of the implementation of practical classes.
- At the end of the meeting, all participants concluded that the key lesson of the workshop was how to solve something, and not to wait for an answer as to who will solve certain problems.
The regional thematic meeting was held as part of project activities within the Erasmus+ project Joint Mentorship: Better Cooperation for Better VET, which is implemented by the Croatian Chamber of Crafts. Thematic meetings are part of the activities aimed at improving cooperation between stakeholders in vocational education, i.e. establishing long-term regional and local partnerships between vocational schools and craftsmen who conduct work-based learning in their workshops, given that partnership cooperation is the basis of quality vocational education.
