The epistemological, social and policy implications of the concept of lifelong learning have been widely scrutinized and recognized over the last twenty years (Field, Schmidt-Hertha, and Waxenegger 2015; Jarvis 2011; Maruyama 2020; Oliver 2020). Lifelong learning has been on policy agenda of the European Union for decades. In this perspective, the principles of human dignity, autonomy, active citizenship, personal self-attainment, social inclusion and employability linked to the lifelong learning have represented a strategic lever for the economic growth, the social stability and the redress of structural inequalities of racially minorized target of people (Knight 2008).

The differencing conceptualizations of lifelong learning (included the identification of the non-formal and informal learning) have led to a wide variety of validation and recognition practices for different target groups across the European area. At the same time, it is somewhat unclear which factors facilitate or inhibit the implementation of these processes. An aspect that has become more urgent due to the new immigration waves, as well as the recent spread of the Coronavirus (COVID-19). Amidst growing concerns and unprecedented events, the pandemic significantly reduced learning opportunities for the most fragile and disadvantaged people, like migrants and refugees and clearly showed the inefficacy of existing practices in the university context (Thomas and Arday 2021).

While the literature includes a wide range of definitions of lifelong learning, as well as different practices of recognition and valorization of prior and informal learning each having different strategies for using evidence of learning, limited is a sound scientific evidence that these practices have a positive effect on target groups of individuals. The existing body of literature on recognition of migrants’ and refugees’ learning (i.e., qualifications and/or competencies elsewhere acquired) is generally considered extensive in terms of principles and practices (UNESCO 2019). However, despite the policy recognition of the importance of recognition practices, it has to be noted that this broad field of research shows scant effects (or sometimes ineffective implementations) in the European higher education contexts. If on the one hand, The Lisbon Recognition Convention states that all countries should develop procedures to assess whether refugees and displaced persons fulfill the relevant requirements for access to higher education or to employment activities, even in cases in which the qualifications cannot be proven through documentary evidence; on the other hand, higher education institutions have the autonomy to organize the inflow of third country nationals and to decide on the program of this group of lateral entrants. However, any structure in terms of recognition of qualifications and competences acquired elsewhere is lacking for third country nationals who wish to continue their studies in Europe after they have already made their way into higher education outside Europe. It is clear that there is no proper tool to enable universities to effectively scale up the qualifications and competences of third country nationals acquired elsewhere. Moreover, no systematic analysis has been conducted on evidence gathered from previous studies on recognition practices for migrant and refugee students at university.

The present study moves from the following research questions:

• How is realized the process of recognition of refugees’ and migrants’ previous learning across the EU higher education institutions?
• What are the main practices used for of recognition of refugees’ and migrants’ previous learning?
• What are the characteristics of the research studies exploring recognition of refugees’ and migrants’ previous learning?

In this perspective, thestudy aims to fill this gap providing an updated overview of validation and recognition practices for students with a migratory background within the EU area.

The literature review study followed the Petticrew and Roberts (2006) guide of systematic review in the social sciences. To reach a wider range of studies the terms of validation of prior learning, recognition of prior learning, as well as synonyms like validation of competences, recognition of competences, were used. After checking preliminary hints, these terms were combined with migrants & refugees, higher education, Europe (EU, European area). The search was run in March 2021 and the key terms were used to retrieve literature within the following four databases: • ERIC; • PsychINFO; • SocINDEX; • Sage ILLUMINA; A further search with Google scholar (grey literature) was performed to ensure a broad panel of studies. All publications (N. 30.821) were exported to Mendeley Data. After removing duplicates, title and abstracts scans were conducted using the following inclusion criteria: • The study was published in a scientific, peer-reviewed journal (English language). • The study reported a research work (i.e., quantitative, qualitative, mixed approach). • The study was conducted in the European context of higher education. • The study was published in the last 5 years (2015-2020). After the title and abstract scan only 23 studies responded at the inclusion criteria and were considered for the further analysis. The full-text versions of these publications were therefore read and analyzed considering the following information: • General information: author, publication year, title, national context. • Research design and instruments. • Recognition practice and instruments. • Target population (gender, nationality of migrants/refugees, age, etc.) Information was recorded using a data extraction form was filled by two different members of the research team.

No systematic recognition practices (or instruments) used (and shared) by the higher education institutions to allow the enrolment or an effective inclusion of migrants and refugees have been found in this review. Despite the widespread recognition of the social desirability and usefulness of recognition of previous learning of students with a migratory background, it is hard to detect a systematic practice in the selected articles (RQ1). The explanation of the process, and therefore, the sharing of the criticalities related to the implementation of recognition of migrants and refugees learning are not reported. The perspective of the research studies in this review is local (case study): only the articles with a document analysis (Abamosa, Hilt, and Westrheim 2019) and a literature review (Jungblut, Vukasovic, and Steinhardt 2020; Souto-Outero et al. 2015) have a broad, international perspective. The last articles, instead, appear slightly aligned with the national or the trans-national educational policy requirements and orientations. It is no possible to identify the main practices used for recognition of migrants’ and refugees’ previous learning (RQ2). The results of this first literature review show that the most studies were based on small-scale, qualitative research design. This raises some concerns not only in terms of the quality research but also in terms of dissemination of good practices among university and administrative staff involved in the process of validation and recognition of migrants’ and refugees’ learning (RQ3). Therefore, the time has come to invest on large-scale quantitative studies investigating the factors that enable or hinder the recognition of migrants’ and refugees’ competencies. More comparative research, in this vein, should open further research streams as they contribute to a better understanding of the multiple aspects (in terms of policy and practice) that need to be considered when implementing the recognition of migrants’ and refugees’ competencies.

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