This briefing paper aims at describing a common understanding within the VISKA project partnership (www.viskaproject.eu) regarding the definition of Transversal Skills and to develop a means for identifying and assessing these transversal skills in a validation process for low-qualified adults and migrants. As a later activity in the project assessment criteria will be further developed in Work Package 3 based on this briefing paper and used in the field-trials in some partner countries. The set of skills composing the framework for Transversal Skills in the context of the VISKA project are presented in a table on page 4. It is acknowledged that there are other considerations such as the European Commission’s eight key competence framework which could have relevance within national and European systems but which are beyond the scope of this paper.
The VISKA partnership decided to use the term Validation of Prior Learning (VPL) instead of Validation of Non-formal and Informal Learning (VNFIL) since the term VPL is broader and includes all types of learning; formal, non-formal and informal. In the case of migrants, there is a need to take all types of learning into account in the validation process, including documents of formal learning which may not be valued directly as such in the receiving countries National Qualification Frameworks.