Education is characterised by a division of the educational field into various autonomous areas of operation. Each of these areas uses its own jargon. Many processes also have their own terminology, sometimes area-specific (think of digital registration in secondary vocational education, student in secondary vocational education/higher education versus pupil in primary/secondary education), sometimes between areas of operation (think of the exchange of the educational report from primary to secondary education) and sometimes across areas of operation (think of digital examinations). Within ROSA, terminology and jargon are laid down in a joint model of concepts: the ROSA Conceptual Framework.

The ROSA Conceptual Framework describes a specific domain of reality (the ‘universe of discourse’). As far as the ROSA Conceptual Framework is concerned, this is the entire educational domain, both the public/legal side (registrations, funding, absenteeism, etc.) and the public/private part (teaching materials, tests, etc.). This description is done by means of the concepts used within the chosen domain and their relationships to each other. The aim is for the actors within the domain to understand each other and speak one language. The conceptual framework is initially drawn up for use by people and not directly for machine-to-machine purposes. A conceptual framework offers a uniform "analyst language" on the one hand and on the other hand it is the starting point for drawing up models, specifications etc. of concepts that have already been considered and on which there is consensus in order to ultimately apply them in digital data exchanges. In which there must always be room for expansion and context-specific interpretation.