State of implementation

With regard to the behaviour of this non-regulated distance training offer, it is appropriate to provide the following information in accordance with the consolidated data below.

Following on from previous reports, the enrolment in the program from September 2021 to September 2023 is 24,190. Throughout this period, the average age of students is consolidated around the range of 35-45 years, having increased the percentage of students over 55 years of age from 12.7% in 2021 to 19.8% in 2023. Women account for 59.30% of the total average enrolment in the reference period.

At the time of reporting, from January to September 2023, the enrolment amounted to 6240, of which 60.23% were women. Of the 14 training areas included in the Mentor course catalogue, the areas with the highest enrolment are Administration and Management; Health and Informatics and Management.

If we consider that in Spain women make up 48.8% of the rural population of municipalities with less than 5000 inhabitants, in view of the coverage achieved with the creation of new classrooms, it should be noted that the Aula Mentor program makes a significant contribution to equal opportunities in the face of the permanent training of women in rural areas. The condition of open, non-formal and distance training, without prior access requirements, the possibility of freezing enrolment and reactivating it according to the interests and circumstances of the person enrolled in a Mentor course, facilitates conciliation and a certain reallocation of the uses of time made by women and men in rural areas. In addition, the Program, as a distance learning program, contributes to the development of digital competence in order to make safe and critical use of digital technologies and for participation in all areas of life, thus promoting the reduction of the digital divide.

Among the training offered by Aula Mentor, the one that allows the accreditation of professional competences is of special interest to women in rural areas, given the vertical segregation that is still detected and that explains that women continue to be the majority in positions for which no qualification is required. In this regard, in the period between January and July 2023, 665 people have carried out a training itinerary that allows them to have competency units accredited in procedures of accreditation of professional competences (PEAC). Of these, 453 are women and 210 men. Therefore, most of them are women who take accredited Mentor courses with the intention of having their qualification officially validated and, with it, have a point of reference from which to rejoin training to configure pathways for improving skills or, if not, enter into processes of improving employment.

To encourage registration in this procedure, the 100 Vocational Guidance Units that were activated in January 2023, as a particular type of Classroom Mentor, have served in the period between January and July 2023, 10,259 people, 60% of whom are women. The procedure for accreditation of professional competences has been reported to 5,421 people. The Units are not accreditation centers. According to Royal Decree 659/2023, of 18 July, which develops the organization of the Vocational Training System, this is a recognized competence to the public centers that provide vocational training in the educational system, the public integrated vocational training centers and the National Reference Centers are authorized to develop the different phases of the procedure in the terms established in this royal decree. Also to the concerted private integrated vocational training centres authorized by the competent administration in each territorial area. However, 2,466 of the 5,421 persons assisted by the Vocational Guidance Units have been registered in a procedure for the accreditation of professional skills acquired through work experience or non-formal training, more than half of whom are women.

The evaluation of the functioning of these Units shows the realization of more than 577 (between January and July 2023) collective actions of information and guidance on the procedure of accreditation of professional competences in the municipalities and areas of influence where they are located.

These collective actions include those aimed at other public bodies such as adult education centres; social services; municipal training and employment institutes; networks of local development agents; municipal rural women ' s centres; other public guidance services (Andalucía Orienta type), etc. Among those aimed at other entities, the following stand out: associations of small and medium-sized enterprises in the territory; sectoral business associations, with special need of accreditation of competences, with inclusion and employment projects financed with public funds; professional schools of private management and financed with public funds; associations of provincial and local implementation such as Red Cross, Caritas, Action against Hunger, Fundación Secretariado Gitano, etc. To develop training and job placement programs in collaboration with local governments and public bodies.

Generally considered, the actions developed by the Professional Guidance Units to promote a greater knowledge of the advantages of officially accrediting the qualification that is possessed and, in addition, to support the registration in the accreditation procedure, show; firstly, that the service they provide is filling an institutional gap and responding to the needs of the population in the territory. Secondly, it should be noted that the Career Guidance Units operate according to a proactive, community and intersectoral intervention model that, despite the recent implementation of this type of Classroom Mentor, shows highly satisfactory results. This is possible because their action is professionalized: a) the entities have understood that the specific service of professional orientation has to be provided by qualified technicians and this is shown by the profiles of the professionals who are in charge of the Units and b), from the Ministry of Education and Professional Training, because these technicians selected by the entities have been trained so that the operation of the Units responds to a model and protocol of action, both individual and collective, with shared criteria regarding the scope, quality and requirements of contextualization of the interventions to be developed, as expected of the resource.