Formal, Non-formal and Informal Education in the context of the student organization ESTIEM

Innovation and Sustainability 2020 Sustainable Education and Research in Europe International Scientific Conference Bucharest, Romania, 30th October 2020 Formal, Non-formal and Informal Education in the context of the student organization ESTIEM Maria Serôdio ESTIEM Groene Loper 3, 5612 AE, Eindhoven, The Netherlands maria.serodio@estiem.org ABSTRACT European Students of Industrial Engineering and Management (ESTIEM) is a non-profit organization of Industrial Engineering and Management (IEM) students. It was founded in 1990 and currently provides activities for students in 75 universities all over Europe.

With a mission focused on the personal and professional development of students, ESTIEM aims to impact education through several channels and offers.

This paper intends to present ESTIEM, its foundation, progress and organization, and analyze the offers and developments it provides to the education of IEM students in Europe. To do so, three types of education - Formal, Non-formal and Informal - were defined.

Formal education is related to structured learning in schools or training institutions, with typically a more extrinsic motivation to learn. Non-formal education is also structured but it relates more to community and organizations (out of school), with a typically more intrinsic motivation.

Lastly, Informal education can happen everywhere and in an unstructured and spontaneous way, and can be connected to friends, family, work and other informal environments.

Following this distinction, it was associated to each of these types the current offers ESTIEM has, to achieve an overview on how this association impacts learning in a formal, non-formal and informal way.

KEYWORDS: education, student organization, Europe 1. INTRODUCTION According to the oxford’s dictionary, Education can be defined as “a process of teaching, training and learning, especially in schools, colleges or universities, to improve knowledge and develop skills”.

It can be seen highlighted the role that institutions play in people’s development, however one’s learning can occur in a variety of other places and circumstances. This way, besides the place where the learning process occurs (inside or outside a school setting), these differences concern other relevant factors such as interest, motivation and the person’s social context (Maarschalk, 1988).

All of this translates into the definition of 3 forms of education: Formal, Non-formal and Informal, and there is no doubt of the importance of all of them in current times.

In fact, already in 1996, ministers of education of the OECD (Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development) made an agreement concerning the development of strategies for “lifelong learning for all”, that included all 3 of them. It was reiterated there the importance of Nonformal and Informal education. (OECD) Besides, as also mentioned in the “Recognition of Nonformal and Informal Learning” section of the OECD website, “Policy-makers in many OECD countries, and beyond, are therefore trying to develop strategies to use all the skills, knowledge and competences – wherever they come from – individuals may have at a time when countries are striving to reap the benefits of economic growth, global competitiveness and population development.”

One of the places the above-mentioned education forms can be seen is student associations.

These organizations can provide a propitious environment for students to learn, offers such as events through which they can develop their skills and even influence other Institutions that play a more formal role in their education.

ESTIEM (European Students of Industrial Engineering and Management) is an organization that aims to have an impact on all Formal, Non-formal and Informal Education of not only its associated students, but also of the Industrial Engineering and Management students of Europe, through its sets of offers and partnerships.

This paper is organized in four sections. The introduction and definition of the different types of education, followed by an overview of the ESTIEM network, with its creation and evolution, organization and structure and also projects, events and partners. Finally, it is presented the offers ESTIEM as a student organization provides to its members regarding each type of education.

2. FORMAL, NON-FORMAL AND INFORMAL EDUCATION Several authors define a division between Formal, Non-formal and Informal education. In short, Formal education is associated with schools and training institutions, while Non-formal is related with organizations or communities. Finally, Informal education is connected to informal settings and can occur though interaction with friends and family or in work-related situations (Dib, 1988).

This section aims to summarize the differences between these types of learning.

Formal Education Formal education consists on an education model that is organized, structured and regulated by laws or norms. Generally speaking, this form of education involves an institution, an instructor and the students.

It is characterized by having a curriculum with specific objectives, to be achieved through defined content and methodology. Education is compulsory, the time period when it occurs can vary from institution to institution and culminates in the obtention of a diploma, certificate or degree (Tudor, 2013).

On behalf of the learner, the learning is intentional, that is, it is his or hers objective to obtain that knowledge or those competencies. (OECD) On the scenario of education for university students, ormal education corresponds to the one they receive from their Faculty degree.

Non-Formal Education Non-formal education is related to learning that occurs at institutions, organizations, and situations, in a structured, pre-planned bur more flexible way. In this case, the motivation for learning is usually intrinsic to the learner (Eshach, 2007).

This type of learning is also intentional, as the person attending these forms of education makes it for own reasons. People can use the content they learn through this form also to complement what they learned in a Formal education context. (Tudor, 2013).

Informal Education On the other hand, Informal learning, unlike the two other forms, is not structured or preplanned. In fact, the learner usually does it unintentionally. However, it is highly effective and most likely the most seen among adults (Tudor, 2013).

Informal learning is not organized, has no established learning goals nor learning outcomes, and it never comes from a formed intention on behalf of the learner. In general, it comes from every action and interaction a person does and the situations he or she is exposed to, for example with friends, family and work colleagues (OECD).

Table 1 sums up the characteristics of these 3 forms of education.

Table 1 - Summary of Formal, Non-formal and Informal Education characteristics

3. ESTIEM CONTEXT AND ORGANIZATION Creation and evolution ESTIEM, had its start on the year 1990, when the first statutes were signed in Berlin by 14 Universities, in the biggest event of the association - the Council Meeting.

ESTIEM’s expansion was rather fast. The first big project was initiated in 1991, with the first edition of the ESTIEM Magazine. In terms of international expansion, it started in 1993, when many ESTIEMers (students from ESTIEM) organized a travel to Japan, in order to learn more about Total Quality Management and reported back their findings to their colleagues once they were back to Europe. One year later, in 1994, the Tournament in Management and Engineering Skills (TIMES) was implemented, and still remains until today. It is the biggest IEM case study competition in Europe.

Throughout the years, the association started to englobe more topics on its events. The focus on personal development came in 2005 with the Summer Academy, a two-week event for self-reflection guided by a professor. Four years later, ESTIEM started in a new area, the development of education of students. It was done by providing complementary IEM education to students from topics that their Universities’ had high expertise in, in the Academic Days events, and also by starting the journey towards a better understanding of IEM Curricula, with the Student Guide Project, a compilation of knowledge about the curriculum and Universities of ESTIEM. The big push in the direction of impacting education at a European level was made in 2010, with the creation of an extra position in the ESTIEM Board, the Vice President of Education. This way, there was a person whose focus was on external relations and providing value to IEM students.

Many opportunities have come since then. For all the students, ESTIEM hosted between 2015 and 2017 the European Master Thesis Award and now is partnering with the Dutch company Inchainge to provide students access to the supply chain competition called Global Student Challenge, which stimulates experiential learning on behalf of students through the use of a supply chain simulator. In terms of educational impact, ESTIEM held in 2016 and 2017 the IEM Education Forum, which had the objective of gathering professors, students and companies with the purpose to find ways to improve the current state of the curricula of IEM and the Industry’s proximity to it.

Furthermore, ESTIEM is now partnering with several associations such as EPIEM (European Professors of Industrial Engineering and Management), SEFI (Société Européenne pour la Formation des Ingénieurs), EIIL (European Institute of Industrial Leadership) and the PREFER Project, which provides support in research and event attendance. They also help towards achieving the objective of becoming a big platform where professionals can obtain relevant information on IEM. Organization and structure ESTIEM is an association of associations. That is, it connects local students’ associations from all around Europe, called Local Groups, which are all associated with a University that has Industrial Engineering and Management or a similar degree. The Local Groups are supported by international teams, the so called “Central ESTIEM”, which is responsible for the maintenance of the whole organization and to provide support to the Local Groups. In these central teams there are

some whose mission is to support the whole organization (committees), and others whose function is to provide value and support to IEM students. The association’s official representants are its six board members, who are accountable for everything that happens related to ESTIEM. These two levels, local and central, interact mainly through the organization of events and the central teams. There is a call for available event opportunities sent to the local organizations every three months, and a monthly call for members of the local associations to take part into positions inside the international teams. This way “every Local Group has opportunities to perform events made available by the Central Teams and also to develop their own people Europeanly” (Oliveira et al. 2020).

Currently, ESTIEM is present in over 75 Universities in 26 countries. These Local groups can be seen in Figure 1.

Figure 1 - Distribution of ESTIEM's local associations in Europe. (Oliveira et al. 2020)

Projects, events and partners ESTIEM’s events are divided in four main areas, each with an associated department, which are Academic, Career, Intercultural and Personal.

In the first two are the offers for development of hard-skills necessary to the students, mostly regarding topics related to Industrial Engineering and Management.

The Academic Department focuses on events that pass knowledge on industry and management related topics and on ways to raise the voice of the students regarding their Education and discuss with other students, professors or professionals. It also includes a Lean Six Sigma Green Belt Certification in Quality Management, with scientific revision by Dr. Gregory Watson, and a world-wide value chain competition called Global Student Challenge, which is done in partnership with the company Inchainge, that enables learning through a simulator platform.

On the Career side, there is a need to highlight the Tournament in Management and Engineering Skills (TIMES), a case study competition held since 1994, and currently the biggest IEM case study competition in Europe. Other offers include events related to entrepreneurship, that allow the participants to learn more about opportunities for starting a business and to work on their ideas, and also events that allow the participants to experience the life of IEM related professionals for one week.

The last two departments allow students to develop themselves personally and to increase their intercultural awareness.

Furthermore, there are two events worth mentioning due to their size and impact. The Council Meetings, which happen twice a year and gather around 250 students of ESTIEM, to take democratic decision on relevant aspects to the network and have a chance to benchmark improvement opportunities for their struggles or ideas. The other is the ESTIEM IEM Conference, which is a one-week event with students, Universities, Companies, professors and professionals. It aims to be the biggest networking event provided by ESTIEM, where all the participants meet around one or more IEM related topics.

ESTIEM has a total of around 180 events per year, that provide very different learning experiences to the students. It is also currently partnering with over 18 organizations, from companies to universities, professional associations, and other non-profit organizations. They provide ESTIEM with opportunities of event attendance, support on research and new projects.

Some of the current partners can be seem in Figure 2.

Figure 2 - ESTIEM's partners

4. TYPES OF EDUCATION IN ESTIEM Informal Education In ESTIEM, Informal Learning is a quite important form of education, since it happens in most actions and interactions students experience in activities inside the network, both at a local and international level.

Some examples of Informal learning that happen inside ESTIEM, and the respective effects, can be seen on Table 2.

Table 2 - Informal Education in ESTIEM

Non-formal Education Non-formal Education is the strongest form of education inside ESTIEM. Many services we offer are mainly Non-formal Education.

In general, Non-formal Education inside ESTIEM can be divided in two parts. The first part focuses on all IEM students in the network to offer activities beneficial for their development.

The knowledge is usually provided by professionals.

The second group are people from inside the network who are working actively for ESTIEM or its Local Groups. For them, ESTIEM provides the knowledge or skills they need to fulfill their tasks with capacity for building events. Here the knowledge is often transferred from one more experienced member to the next.

Table 3 describes some of the offers on Non-formal Education provided by professionals.

Table 3 – Non-formal Education in ESTIEM provided by Professionals

These areas are divided in IEM related, Career Support and Personal Development related activities.

IEM related topics and offers inside ESTIEM are very important. The focus is on IEM students so it should offer IEM related Non-formal Education. These activities are based on knowledge transferred from professionals to the participants.

ESTIEM covers, at the moment, two IEM related fields permanently: with Lean Six Sigma the Quality Management area and with BusinessBooster the Entrepreneurship.

Both Vision and Academic Days also cover IEM topics, the first being more related to industry and the second to strategic and management topics. The topics of these events change each time, so that students can attend the topics they find more interesting.

It is important also to highlight the big focus on Personal Development, with topics conscious leadership, intercultural competences, language development and soft skills.

In terms of the offer provided by other students, the capacity building events are summed up in Table 4.

Table 4 – Non-formal Education in ESTIEM provided by Students

Formal Education The area of Formal education has gained greater relevance in the last years. ESTIEM wants to influence the Formal education more and more to improve the educational condition of IEM student throughout Europe.

To do it, ESTIEM partnered with the European Academy for Industrial Management (AIM), the biggest group of Deans of Faculties of Industrial Engineering in Europe. They develop research and apply to several Erasmus+ Grants yearly. Together with ESTIEM, the IE3 Project, a joint 3-year project for the construction of a new IEM master’s degree, is taking place.

ESTIEM also aims to gather the opinion of students, regarding relevant topics such as their university curricula, through online discussions with students from different countries. Then students can benchmark with each other and take actions upon it in their own universities. Locally some Local Groups are in close contact with the university to improve their curricula.

Furthermore, there are several research projects in place, namely a European IEM curricula analysis. This ongoing project aims to provide professors, universities, and professionals with a European benchmark of the curricula distribution in the different areas that compose IEM, according to the framework developed.

5. CONCLUSIONS This paper presents how ESTIEM, as a non-profit organization that aims for the development of Industrial Engineering and Management students, contributes to their education in the 3 defined forms: Formal, Non-formal and Informal.

Informal learning happens from the interaction with other students and through the work in teams in an international environment, while Non-formal education is mostly related to the events ESTIEM provides.

In fact, most of ESTIEM’s offer is centered on Non-formal education that aims to complement the curricula of students in the best possible way. The knowledge usually comes from professionals for service-oriented activities and students for capacity building events.

Finally, regarding Formal Education, ESTIEM aims to support and improve it, not provide it itself. The support happens through interactions in the IEM research and development by taking part in discussions, activities and projects with stakeholders interested in this field. ESTIEM takes here the role of representative of IEM Students towards universities and companies in the field of IEM research, development, and education

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