Relaunch of the BIBB Internet portal for trainers www.foraus.de
The BIBB Internet portal for trainers http://www.foraus.de has been in existence for 10 years. A relaunch has now taken place to give it a fresher and clearer look in line with the BIBB Internet portal family. The new design goes beyond mere optical adaptation. A joint modern content management system also ensures that training staff are provided with the very latest news and information.
The Internet portal has more than 10,000 members and is the largest trainer community in Germany. The ongoing increase in the number of members and the number of hits the www.foraus.de site receives on a monthly basis make it clear just how important the portal is to this major vocational education and training stakeholder group.
The services provided by www.foraus.de are mainly aimed at full-time and part-time trainers, at skilled workers in companies fulfilling a training function, at multipliers for the training of VET staff and at heads of training in the areas of company-based, extra-company and inter-company initial and continuing vocational education and training. The information and provision of www.foraus.de also continues to be directed at senior management staff within the vocational training system, at those with human resources and organisational development responsibilities and at persons who are involved with and interested in pedagogical processes and innovative developments within the field of vocational education and training.
foraus.de has three functions.
- Learning: provision of online learning modules;
- Informing: dissemination of current information relating to all aspects of VET and the sphere of activity of training staff;
- Communication: exchange of views between VET experts.
Membership of foraus.de is free of charge and provides trainers with a large number of discussion and research features as well as opportunities to exchange experiences. Online seminars on specific issues and problems arising within the in-company training environment are, for example, regularly on offer. These are conducted as a chaired event within a so-called "virtual classroom". The relaunch has seen the revision or integration of a whole series of features which make it possible to present online-supported information exchange in a clearer and more structured way. The following changes have been instigated.
- Clearer navigation functions facilitate the more rapid identification of information relevant to training, learning modules within the learning centre and continuing training provision.
- The services provided on the homepage in future will not be restricted to the featuring and linking of current main thematic focuses and information. Visitors will also be offered direct access to continuing training databases and to new information provision such as "TrainingDigital" and ELDOC.
- The extensive news and events section has been restructured, and new rubrics have been added. An RSS function is available to facilitate news subscriptions.
- Modern forum software has been introduced to make the community functions in the member area more user friendly and create a state-of-the-art environment.
- Modern digital forms of learning and media are no longer merely described within the learning centre and via learning modules. Web2.0 functionalities are now available for practical deployment in the editing of learning modules and can also be experienced and tried out via participation in online seminars. The learning modules have been transferred to a new user-friendly format in the form of so-called flipbooks, which can be browsed on-screen in the same way as a periodical.
- New contents and keynote topics are being added to the "Topics" section on an ongoing basis. The topics of vocational orientation and the new trainer Aptitude Ordinance (AEVO) are the first themes to be addressed.
- The "Service" section has also undergone revision. Visitors will find links to and information on important documents, legal texts and sources relevant to training as well as being provided with information on continuing and advanced training, learning media, funding programmes and publications.
- The "AF Shop", which offers a clearly structured index of trainer support publications arranged according to topic and also enables trainers to order directly from the publisher, has been directly integrated into foraus.de. (At the same time, and following a consolidation of the various BIBB Internet provision, the "AF Ausbilderförderung" - Trainer Support - web presence" has ceased publication and is now available in the archive for research purposes).
The trainer forum operates in conjunction with a large number of other online portals in Germany. The practical value of the available information to initial and continuing VET issues is assessed. Qualitatively relevant information is uploaded to the foraus.de news area, where it is made available for discussion and in some cases adapted or developed further to enable targeted use within company-based training practice. This enables foraus.de members to be offered a comprehensive information service from a single source.
The "TrainingDigital" topic forum is also a new inclusion. This uses a specified Internet presence to document the results of current funding measures being pursued by the Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) within the field of digital media and makes the perspectives which emerge from this for in-company initial and continuing training available for discussion. The aim is that pilot projects of relevance to VET practice will also at the same time be able to use this presence as a market place for the utilisation and transfer of their work. This represents a direct contribution to the desired aim of the BMBF to secure the results achieved within the scope of its funding measures as well as assisting in the targeted transfer of innovation.
In overall terms, the online services available on foraus.de enable BIBB to provide specific support for the ongoing quality development and improvement in initial and continuing VET practice. This is particularly achieved by providing specified information and continuing training services to the major group of multipliers with responsibility in this field, skilled staff who deliver training.
