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European Digital Credentials for learning
European Digital Credentials for learning are statements issued by an organisation to a learner, documenting their learning.
European Digital Credentials for learning include diplomas, transcripts of records and a wide variety of other types of certificates of learning achievement. They are multilingual and signed with a unique electronic seal (that is the digital equivalent of an institution’s rubber stamp). This allows education and training institutions to easily authenticate, validate and recognise credentials of any size, shape or form.
What are European Digital Credentials for learning?
European Digital Credentials for learning can describe and certify:
- qualifications (e.g. professional certificates, university diplomas and other learning achievements),
- activities (e.g. participation in classes and non-formal learning events),
- assessments (e.g. transcripts of records), and
- entitlements (e.g. right to enrol in learning opportunities, or to undertake an occupation.
The built-in instant and automatic authentication and verification checks support recognition and help reduce administrative burdens by immediately showing if a credential has been tampered with or whether it was issued by an unauthorised organisation. European Digital Credentials for learning have the same legal validity as paper-based credentials and are recognised throughout the European Education Area.
Benefits of digital credentials
The European Digital Credentials for learning offers many benefits for citizens, employers, and organisations.
- can build an online portfolio to track all of their learning while being in full control of their data
- can easily reuse their credentials to get a job or apply for further training all across Europe
- can present and have their credentials verified at any point in their career, even if the institution who issued them closes, or if the data used to create them is lost
- can dramatically reduce the time and cost of verifying credentials and processing job applications
- can better understand the credentials of candidates, especially from other Member States as they will be translated in their own language
- can trust tamper-proof credentials
Education and training providers
- can reduce their administrative burden and the costs for issuing credentials, while also accelerating issuing procedures by going digital
- can better understand the credentials of learners, especially from other Member States as they will be translated to their own language
They are portable digital documents that use open standards and that are fully aligned with familiar EU frameworks and instruments such as:
- the European Qualifications Framework for Lifelong Learning (EQF),
- the European Classification of Skills, Competences, Qualifications and Occupations (ESCO),
- the diploma supplement and more.