E-Portfolio to Promote the Virtual Learning Group Communities on the Grid

Abstract

In Vocational and Educational Training, new trends are to social learning and more precisely to informal learning. In such settings, the article introduces a process - the e-Qualification - to manage informal learning on the “Learning Grid”. It argues that this process must occur in a social context such as Virtual Communities. On the one hand, it describes their necessary characteristics and proprieties, which lead to the creation of a new kind of virtual community: the Virtual Learning Grid Community. On the other hand, e-qualification cannot occur without the help of a kind of user’s profile, which is called e-Portfolio. Moreover, the e-Portfolio is also a process, which is used to manage the Virtual Learning Grid Communities. The e-Qualification and the Virtual Learning Grid Communities’ management will probably rely on the co-operation of different distributed, autonomous, goal-oriented entities, which are Mobile Peer-to-Peer Agents. Furthermore, the authors hope that implementing these services will decrease the lacks of informal learning treatment on the Grid and will become the bases for new services on the Learning Grid.