Who are we?

The State Higher Vocational School in Tarnow (SHVS) was called into being as the first state higher vocational school in Poland in 1998. It has the broadest educational offer from 36 HEIs of such type in Poland. It consists of 6 Institutes with 19 Departments:

• Institute of Humanities: Department of English Studies, Department of German Studies, Department of Romance Studies, Department of Polish Studies,
• Institute of Administration end Economics: Department of Administration, Department of Economics
• Institute of Mathematical and Natural Science: Department of Chemistry, Department of Mathematics, Department of Environmental Protection
• Polytechnic Institute: Department of Electrical Engineering, Department of Computer Sciences, Department of Materials Engineering, Department of Electronics and Telecommunications
• Institute of Health: Department of Physical Education, Department of Physiotherapy, Department of Nursing
• Institute of Arts: Department of Design, Department of Graphics.

The School offers nineteen 1^st cycle and three 2^nd cycle degree programmes. There are over 300 academic teachers employed, including around 100 professors and associate  professors. The total number of students exceeds 4000. The internal QA system has been very positively evaluated by the Polish Accreditation Committee.

Why we are participating in the project

TTK University of Applied Sciences and Estonian Rectors Council of Universities of Applied Sciences believe it is important to collaborate on European level with institutions of Professional Higher Education and national associations for PHE to design effective, efficient and replicable interventions to the specific problems faced by PHE in the relations with the world of work. There are 10 universities of applied sciences in Estonia. Estonian UASs vary in sizes and their results of external quality differ. TTK UAS believes that joint trans-national approach to PHE enables to harmonise and improve the quality of the PHE sector in Estonia.

Our role in the project

There are three main reasons of our participation in the project. First of all it will improve the quality of our study offer with close cooperation with the world of work, taking into account European standards.

Secondly, we aim to strengthen the position of professional higher education in Poland in cooperation with Conference of Rectors of State Schools of Higher Vocational Education in Poland (KRePSZ).

Last but not least, too build partnership and mutual cooperation links with professional higher education institutions in our region (Central and Eastern Europe)

Our Team

SHVS will play a double role:

• as a project coordinator, responsible for overall project management and contact with the Polish National Agency
• as a “Polish hub” of project activities (co-developing the data-collection framework, methodology for data-collection, questionnaires, the methodology for identifying improvement strategies to policies for cooperation with the world of work, collecting best practices, developing a set of framework policies, which will recommend standards to improve the HEIs connection with the world of work,  etc)