Sweden

The Swedish Partnership Center, formed in 2017, is a part of the Military Academy located in Halmstad, Sweden. It is a resource with a mandate to promote and guide the implementation of ADL into education, individual training, and collective training in the Swedish Armed Forces. The team works closely together with both industry and the military units within the Armed Forces when building e-learning solutions based upon a strong pedagogical foundation. The Center advocates a blended learning approach and is currently working towards integrating ADL into the arena of computer-aided and live exercises.

Mission

The Swedish Partnership Center’s main focus is to lead the development of net-based learning (ADL) within the Swedish Armed Forces and to do it in the spirit of the supreme commander’s vision:

“A stronger defense – responding to every threat, facing every challenge.”

Striving towards the vision means that the Center needs to work on continuous development of a higher degree of professionalism, leading to a well-developed military profession.

This boils down to five main efforts:

Development of leadership and pedagogy
Development of the ADL learning
Coordination of digital course production
Implementing ADL in multinational exercises
Cooperation on an international level

In order to reach our objectives, the Center concentrates on research and development of leadership and pedagogy together with digitization and development of technology-driven pedagogy. This also creates a need to prepare the coming generations of students, and develop learning situations that are both flexible and cost-effective; and find ways to make it possible to adapt to an increasingly digital world.

The Swedish Partnership Center works on a broad array of projects, some quite extensive. This would not be possible without well-founded cooperation on different levels - from international MODs (e.g. ADL) to national organizations such as the Swedish Police.

The Swedish pedagogical baseline has its foundation in social constructivism, a learning theory that suggests that learning is derived from social interaction and experiences. To support teachers and instructors, the Swedish Partnership Center issues different books in the field of education and training such as:

Introduction to Basic Pedagogy
Handbook Cooperation and Command
Handbook Educational Methodology
Handbook Net-Based Learning

Pedagogy and didactics are integrated parts in the educational system. The handbooks and overall approach allows the individual to form his or her own relationship to pedagogy and didactics. There is also a system under development for professional mentoring (lifelong learning approach) using ADL to make it more visible and encourage reflection.

The end-state for the Swedish Partnership Center is to make net-based learning a natural part of everyday training activities and to motivate students by using the following three keywords:

Simplicity
Availability
Openness

Leadership

LtCol Stefan Borén is the head of the Swedish Armed Forces Development Unit for Leadership and Pedagogy. The main points of contact for the Swedish ADL Partnership Center are Major Tohmas Ax and Major Niclas Ljung. Both Mj Ax and Mj Ljung are members of the NORDEFCO ADL Forum of Experts and also representatives in the NATO Training Group IT&ED (Individual Training and Education Developments).

Mj Ax has more than 12 years of experience in the field of ADL. He has a background as a Flight Engineer and has been a teacher at the Military Academy in Halmstad. Mj Ax holds a degree in Pedagogy from Halmstad University.

Mj Ljung has 17 years of experience as a Project Manager in the Swedish Armed Forces Development Unit for leadership and pedagogy. He has a background in the Swedish Air Force and has been a teacher at the Military Academy in Halmstad. Mj Ljung holds a degree in Concept Development and Experimentation (CD&E).