Europass: Designed to support your career and learning across the EU

Free movement remains one of the cornerstones of the European Union, opening doors to new careers and experiences. But knowing where to start, and how your qualifications translate across the continent, can be tricky.

That’s where Europass comes in. The free online platform, managed by the European Commission, is designed to support your career and learning across the EU. In Ireland, the National Europass Centre is operated by Quality and Qualifications Ireland (QQI), the national qualifications agency for further and higher education.

Ireland’s EU Presidency has put a spotlight on European competitiveness, and jobs and skills are central to that conversation.

“The EU is very interested in making sure that people’s qualifications and skills are recognised across the EU,” explains Naomi Oldenburg, Senior Manager at QQI. “That’s part of what is feeding into competitiveness, and Europass helps people do that.”

Everything on the platform hangs off your profile, a secure space where you record your education, training, work experience and skills as you go. The CV builder turns that into a finished CV in a few clicks, in any of 31 languages, and the cover letter editor works the same way. Both were streamlined recently based on user feedback. Alongside them sits a library for your certificates, transcripts and European Digital Credentials for Learning.

Europass also helps you take stock of what you have. A digital skills self-assessment rates your competence and saves the result to your profile, while language skills are recorded against the Common European Framework, broken down across listening, reading, spoken interaction and writing, so an employer abroad sees exactly where you stand.

Then, the jobs and skills trends tool shows you where those skills are wanted.

“You can search by country in the EU, and it’ll tell you what skills are in demand in a certain country,” says Oldenburg. “You can have a look and see if there’s somewhere that your skills are particularly needed.”

The QQI Europass team.

Recommender tools suggest jobs, study opportunities, and training based on what is already in your profile. A newer suite of resources covers interview skills and preparation.

Then there is the qualifications side. The European Qualifications Framework lets you compare an Irish award (such as your Leaving Certificate or undergraduate degree) to its equivalent elsewhere, while the

Certificate and Diploma Supplements set out the purpose, level and learning outcomes of what you studied. The Europass Mobility document records skills picked up on Erasmus placements and internships.

“They basically present the results of your studies in a way that’s used across Europe. It’s a standard template,” says Oldenburg. “An employer in the Netherlands would be able to look at [your] qualification details and say, ‘Oh yes, that’s equivalent to our qualification,’ so you can come over.”

The same tools work perfectly well without leaving the country too.

“You can look and see what skills are in demand in Ireland and have a look at what courses might be available for you to upskill or reskill,” she says. “All the tools are useful here as well as in Europe.”

The scope is as wide as Europe itself: anyone, from school leavers to people looking for a career change, can use the services on offer.

“It covers everything. Even bartending,” Oldenburg laughs. “Apprenticeships, anything you can think of. A trade, or professions in medicine, volunteering opportunities.”

The real strength, though, is having it all on a single, easy to use platform.

“I haven’t seen anything that has everything in one place,” she says. “There’s a lot of information out there, and if you’re trying to look for it all and access everything on separate websites, it’s a bit of a pain.”

And in an age of dodgy search results and questionable online threads, reliability counts for a lot.

“It’s run by the Commission,” Oldenburg points out. “They’re not in the business of selling your data or anything. They’re not in it for any other reason than just providing people with information and resources and tools that would be useful for them.”

• Find out more at europass.europa.eu/en