Conference Program

Basic skill provision within VET is at the core of the Union of Skills strategy launched in 2025 by the European Commission: for VET students to experience high quality learning, VET teachers are expected to be equipped with high-end inclusion strategies and adaptive capacities, especially in the context of the knowledge economy. The VET population is characterized by high percentages of students finding themselves at a disadvantage, either for their socio-economic, migrant background, or different types of disabilities, constituting fragile sections of the student population.

Furthermore, the complex multi-level governance of the secondary Italian VET systems, with regional prerogative over the IeFP channel – “istruzione e formazione professionale” creates a situation of non-homogeneity as far as teacher training is concerned.

In this context, system evaluation practices often remain centered on output indicators, with limited attention to how assessment routines can generate meaningful quality evidence: starting from a capabilities’ approach (CA) perspective (Sen, 1993) this paper then aims at informing paradigms of quality evaluation in the VET realm, by taking the demand side perspective, which is a seminal, yet under-researched, evaluation lens.

It does so by investigating both VET students’ perception of VET teachers’ inclusion strategies, and their own soft skills, both in didactic and evaluation moments: a seminal evaluation lens for analyzing the quality of VET pathways.

Two research questions are posed:

1. How do IeFP students experience teachers’ inclusion strategies (e.g. migrant background, presence of disabilities)? Specifically, how do they perceive feedback in the learning-training process?

The present research question is answered via interviews with third year students in IeFP courses who attended courses to obtain a level 3 EQF qualification and hence are experiencing a school to work transition, selected from training centres in the Lazio territory, to further inform the construction of a questionnaire on perceptions of inclusiveness (Venetz et al., 2015).

1. How are IeFP students self-evaluating their transversal skills, in the context of the school to work transition they are experiencing?

The 3SQ self-evaluation questionnaire is administered to a reference sample of first year students in IeFP courses in the Lazio Region (Lucisano & du Mérac, 2019). The questionnaire can indeed be specifically useful, in this context, to understand whether soft skills can to a certain extent compensate for initial disadvantages.

Ultimately, as the EQAVET framework is constituted of ten indicators to evaluate the quality of education and training, this study would particularly inform a discussion around indicator n.10, which refers to “Schemes used to promote better access to VET and provide guidance to potential VET learners” (European Commission, 2026). Indeed, from a CA perspective applied to students’ life courses (Wylson-Strydom, 2016) not only “access”, but “success” in the study pathway is considered, stemming from what students give value to along their life courses. Indeed, a reinforcement of inclusion strategies would enable the students to successfully face school to work transitions.