The activities proposed by the teacher during a session alternate between teaching theoretical concepts, sharing experiences and discussing current issues related to the course content. In concrete terms, the teacher offers the students press articles related to the theoretical concepts studied. On this basis, discussions are initiated with personal stories. The teacher then tries to encourage the students to make links with the concepts studied in the course.
During the penultimate session of the course, the teacher set up a role-play of 1h30 consisting in defining and defending a project of investment in continuing education in a company by mobilizing the course content. During the preparation phase, which lasts about 30 minutes, the different groups of students freely choose a context and a training project, this choice is often influenced by their own professional experience. Each group takes on the role of a specific actor (employee, training manager, training provider) and develops an economic argument to defend its training project. All the elements necessary for the preparation of the intervention are recorded in a pre-formatted table, to be completed, which guides the reflection. The objective for each group is to develop an argument to convince the other actors to invest in training. The teacher moves between the groups and encourages discussion. Each group then defends its project for 5-10 minutes, which leads to a discussion with the whole class. The other groups play the role of contradictors by taking the point of view of the actors not chosen by the group that intervenes. During the preparation time, the group that presents its training investment project is encouraged to decentralize its thinking in order to anticipate the arguments that will be put forward by the opposing groups. The teacher makes sure that the interventions are balanced and that any aspects that may have been forgotten or overlooked are brought up.
This role-playing game not only allows students to confront the theoretical developments developed in class with a case study inspired by real-life professional experience, but also to sharpen their listening and consensus-building skills within the group as well as to anticipate the arguments that could be opposed by the other actors involved in the decision to invest or not in training in a company. The final goal is to present a well-constructed and robust project.
The evaluation of the course consists of the writing of a personal file of about ten pages on a theoretical deepening of a theme approached in the course or on a case study on the training policy of a company.
