Print version Recommend this page Press release
34/ 2006
Bonn, 21.09.2006
The retail sector: using multimedia learning to achieve occupational success!
Joint press release by BIBB, the Association of German Retailers (HDE) and the services sector trade union ver.di
In future, motivated workers who have who have completed the two-year training occupation as "Sales Assistant for Retail Services" will be able to take advantage of modern, multimedia learning aids as they seek to continue their training. These media afford those interested the opportunity of pursuing self-directed learning to progress to the three-year training as "Management Assistant for Retail Services" by providing the required access and permeability. This enables young people to continue their vocational education and training independently of time and place or to receive multimedia support in their third year of training. The learning elements are contained on five CD ROM's and comprise multi-layered learning and work activity situations based within a virtual learning environment and closely related to practice. This represents a continuation of the innovations put in place when training in the retail occupations underwent a fundamental process of modernisation in 2004 and provides significant support to training practice.
The CD ROM's have been designed and produced by the Federal Institute for Vocational Education and Training (BIBB) in conjunction with the Association of German Retailers (HDE) and the Unified Service Sector Trade Union ver.di and were presented to experts in the field at a joint specialist conference in Bonn. The National Agency for Vocational Education and Training in the Retail Sector (zbb), ModernLearning and the Retail Sector Training Centre in Frankfurt/Oder were also involved in the development process. The learning elements cover the majority of the third year training content for the training occupation of "Management Assistant for Retail Services". This enables those interested to acquire the company and vocational school based content within a self-directed process of multimedia learning. This facilitates both preparation for the final examination for "Management Assistant for Retail Services" and admission to the external examination. A further aim is for the learning elements to support appropriate training courses offered by commercial training centres and vocational schools.
The learning elements
- retail processes,
- advice, goods and sales,
- commercial management and control,
- IT applications and
- personnel
are oriented towards the compulsory and optional qualifications contained within the modernised training. Further learning elements relating to inventory control analysis, procurement based merchandise planning and marketing will be added by the middle of 2007.
Prof. Reinhold Weiß, Deputy President and Director of Research at BIBB, feels that the development of the learning elements represents an "important milestone". "The experience we have gained thus far will provide a crucial impetus for the future structure of training and for the opportunities of practice related qualification with the aid of computer based training courses (CBT). In this respect, the project may be accorded a level of significance which extends far beyond the field of retail occupations."
Horst Zöller from the headquarters of the Rewe retail group and Chairman of the Association of German Retailers (HDE) / Federation of German Wholesale and Foreign Trade (BGA) Educational Committee, stresses "companies are taking learning via CBT on board much more quickly than we anticipated" and goes on: "the opportunity of becoming actively involved in the learning process and using various senses such as seeing and hearing to acquire something new is something with which employees are very comfortable and which is perceived as furthering competences."
Jens Vojta from ver.di views the CD ROM's which have been developed as the product of an "active social partnership": "The development of these learning elements represents a good improvement in terms of content within the restructured VET system and goes some way to alleviating the inequality between the two and three year training courses."
The German language documentation from the specialist conference "Multimedia vocational education and training in the retail sector. New opportunities?", jointly held by BIBB, HDE and ver.di, provides further information and "insights" into the learning elements. This documentation is available from the BIBB website at www.bibb.de/pub/dokumentationen .
Points of contact for further information on this subject:
- Hannelore Paulini-Schlottau (BIBB), Tel.: 0228 / 107-2423, e-mail: paulini-schlottau@bibb.de
- Werner Gerwin (BIBB), Tel.: 0228 / 107-1417, e-mail: gerwin@bibb.de
- Wilfried Malcher (HDE), e-mail: malcher@hde.de , Internet: http://www.hde.de/
- Ulrich Dalibor (ver.di), e-mail: ulrich.dalibor@verdi.de , Internet: http://www.verdi.de/
