This round table discusses better pathways to practice-based Learning and/or project-based Learning (PBL) in three areas of higher studies (vocational teacher education, business administration and engineering). In all these areas, existing models are promoting cooperation between universities and enterprises via supporting learning that engages students with real work and learning tasks and of social, technical or managerial problems of the world of work and business processes. So far, PBL models have been used in different disciplines without shared quality criteria across European member states. Currently higher educational cooperation between the universities and enterprises follow domain specific models that have in common to strenghten the process skills at the side of the students: • In management training we can find PBL arrangements in which enterprises and universities agree on possible management themes that can be carried out by groups of students as a part of their studies as company action projects. • In the engineering education, some PBL arrangement to socio-technical problem-solving. Via placements of students within enterprises they should learn how to develop new sustainable technical solutions. • In the VET teacher education, PBL refer to arrangements that require workplace placements in which the students have to undertake tasks that prepare them for a in company trainers or learning manager roles. This approach is central for vocational teacher education as familiarisation to teaching/training practices. All PBL-models are currently developed by individual faculty departments for their specific areas of studies and expertise (e.g. engineering) and we can already state at this stage that they miss a transfer of knowledge across different universities in Europe. This round table wants to discuss a common evaluation strategy that can be used as a means to verify success factors and critical issues of current PBL arrangements. The round table will present an evaluation tool that is able to evaluate different European PBL arrangements at universities in the mentioned three domains and in six different European universities and countries. The evaluation process is undertaken jointly by the participating universities, their partner enterprises and by external evaluators. The reasons for starting cooperation across the three areas of studies and related PBL-models are the following. There is current mainstreaming of university curricula on quality standards and of bologna process. Therefore, there is need for specific quality criteria and developmental standards for such models that integrate academic and work based learning.

The research output presented in this round table is based on a running Erasmus central action project: Euronet PBL with six universites from six European countreis. Euronet PBL does background analyses on the PBL models that are being used by the European partners, proceeds to the definition of common criteria, to the evaluation of the models in local workshops, to comparative analyses (that lead to the common framework), to valorisation of the model (with external counterparts) and to dissemination for wider audiences. There will be inputs from all authors on specific aspects like evaluation criteria, methods to analys student stagieres, frameworks, and examples of good practise

Expected outcome: at the European level the discussion of a common framework which provides a basis for knowledge transfer beyond the three areas of studies as well as the participating universities; at the domain-specific level to discuss joint interim results (framework, guidelines, toolbox, exemplary cases and web resources) which provide a basis for the enrichment of the PBL arrangements and cooperation arrangements,