During the coordination group meeting as part of the Erasmus+ Development of Soft Skills in Higher Education Institutions of Armenia and Georgia in line with the requirements of the 21st Century Labour Market (DeSIRe) project, approaches to the development and implementation of micro-credential programmes were discussed, with particular emphasis on their applicability in the context of transferable skills development.
The DeSIRe project envisages transformation of transferable skills courses into programmes leading to micro-credentials. To support this process, ANQA shared the practice from the Erasmus+ MICRO-GEAR project as part of a cross-project exchange, with a particular focus on approaches to the development, certification and quality assurance of micro-credentials. It should be noted that the application of the developed documents requires further approval, as well as clarification of the relevant legal and institutional arrangements for their system-wide implementation.
The practice includes the entire process of development, quality assurance, certification and recognition of micro-credentials, based on the ESG, thereby ensuring their comparability and reliability. The discussions addressed the opportunities for the introduction of micro-credentials into the higher education systems of Armenia and Georgia, the existing legal frameworks and institutional mechanisms, as well as the applicability of the QA frameworks.
Particular emphasis was placed on the establishment of a clear certification process, the development of external review mechanisms and integration of micro-credentials into programme sustainability models to ensure continuity beyond the project completion.
The event highlighted the importance of cross-project cooperation as an effective platform for the exchange of practices, alignment of approaches and development of comparable solutions at the regional level.