We performed in the recent years a row of studies on VET in aircraft industry (cf. ECER 2006, 2007) in Spain, France, the UK and Germany. One unexpected and remarkable outcome was the amount of almost independent systems of certifying qualifications resp. competencies. Besides the national VET-regulations, the European Aviation Safety Agency (http://www.easa.eu.int/ws_prod/index.html) provides a set of modules that must be certified to achieve the licence for aircraft maintenance. Our main industrial partner in these projects, AIRBUS, owns additionally a third system: Each worker, independently of his prior vocational qualification, has to visit additional seminars (provided by the quality department) before he is allowed to work. Now the European Commission comes up with a forth proposal: ECVET. We wondered if this idea of “transfer, accumulation and recognition of learning outcomes” fits to the existing systems. Does ECVET lead to additional paperwork or is it even a chance to combine the other systems of certifying? What could be the common basis for ECVET regarding the different national systems of VET? Concerning the last question we found already a strong hypothesis: The systemic as well as the performed VET in the (only) four countries differ in a kind, that there is no common core. The French system is school-based, the German one dual, the UK provides modules and in Spain no organised training exists in the field of aircraft production. So there is no input that could be taken as a blueprint for the ECVET-units. But analysing the work processes in the four countries we identified core profiles, formulated as sums of Typical Professional Tasks (TPT) (cp. http://www.pilot-aero.net/). These are the starting point of our new project: We will figure out the compatibility of ECEVT and the existing certifying systems. We aim a work-process oriented certificate that is built on mutual confidence due to a performance-oriented constructive scheme. To assure the quality we developed a two-step approach: Work-steps are certified by different persons, but if a candidate reaches at most of the steps of a chosen TPT at least the level “worked under surveillance”, the trainer should give him a complex, holistic work order that deals with most of the steps of the TPT in context. The whole process should be under surveillance of the trainer and an expert-worker. Together they decide if the apprentice passed the evaluation task – if so, he gets a “TPT-certificate”.

Expert-worker workshops to identify and validate the skill requirements challenged by working tasks which represent in total a core profile of vocational tasks. Work process analysis to identify on which level these skill requirements take place in the partner's facilities. Evaluation of the competence development of apprentices or trainees under the question if they reach the skill requirements individually.

A model to assess the competencies by describing the individual work performance is aimed. Trainers and skilled workers should certify their confidence in the work of the apprentices in a qualitative, performance-orientated scheme. Expert workers are asked to evaluate the performance of the apprentices in terms of the quality of their participation in the work process. The expert confirms that a trainee has only observed the respective work step, has worked under (close) instruction, has worked under surveillance or has worked autonomously. This mode of assessment guarantees the instrument’s competence orientation: Confirming that a trainee has worked independently means that he or she has reached a certain level of expertise in all minor aspects of the respective work step. No expert would rate a candidate as “autonomous” when he or she is drilling very well but does not know what to do before or afterwards – and vice versa.