The growing demand for skilled employees within the European Software Sector cannot be met by current education and training programmes. Europe needs an innovative new Software Skills Strategy that can fast-track the upskilling and reskilling of Europe’s workforce to address this ever-increasing skills gap. Technology innovation has changed the paradigm of the way software and IT infrastructure are being designed, delivered and managed (vide: automation, instant availability of services, growing software support functions), allowing for shorter and more efficient education cycles. Vocational education is considered as an applicable format, which enables better alignment with industry and employers real time needs and more flexible learning pathways.The European Software Skills Alliance led by DIGITALEUROPE brings together key Industry and Education stakeholders from across the domain to design and implement a highly innovative, effective and sustainable Software Skills Strategy for Europe that will ensure the skills needs of the rapidly expanding and evolving Software Sector can be met in the short, medium and long term. The Alliance will work together to develop, implement and disseminate a new Software Skills Strategy that will tackle the current and future skills shortages in the European Software Sector, enabling continuous development, innovation and competitiveness within the industry.The project includes:- the establishment of a long-term partnership between The European Software Skills Alliance members; - the design of an innovative and sustainable Software Skills Strategy;- development, testing and roll-out of VET training curricula for VET and higher VET;- VET training programmes and qualifications in line with latest market needs and consistently linked with EU instruments and tools enabling professional skills and career development in general and empowering ICT Professionalism and digital competences in particular.

AI-based decision support systems are increasingly deployed in industry, in the public and private sectors, and in policy-making. As our society is facing a dramatic increase in inequalities and intersectional discrimination, we need to prevent AI systems to amplify this phenomenon but rather mitigate it. To trust these systems, domain experts and stakeholders need to trust the decisions. Fairness stands as one of the main principles of Trustworthy AI promoted at EU level. How these principles, in particular fairness, translate into technical, functional social, and lawful requirements in the AI system design is still an open question. Similarly we don’t know how to test if a system is compliant with these principles and repair it in case it is not. AEQUITAS proposes the design of a controlled experimentation environment for developers and users to create controlled experiments for - assessing the bias in AI systems, e.g., identifying potential causes of bias in data, algorithms, and interpretation of results, - providing, when possible, effective methods and engineering guidelines to repair, remove, and mitigate bias, - provide fairness-by-design guidelines, methodologies, and software engineering techniques to design new bias-free systems The experimentation environment generates synthetic data sets with different features influencing fairness for a test in laboratories. Real use cases in health care, human resources and social disadvantaged group challenges further test the experimentation platform showcasing the effectiveness of the solution proposed. The experimentation playground will be integrated on the AI-on-demand platform to boost its uptake, but a stand-alone release will enable on-premise privacy-preserving test of AI-systems fairness. AEQUITAS relies on a strong consortium featuring AI experts, domain experts in the use case sectors as well as social scientists and associations defending rights of minorities and discriminated groups.

BackgroundHydrogen is a key pillar of the EU’s strategy to achieve its 2050 decarbonisation goals, with an estimated 24% of hydrogen contributing to the total energy demand by 2050, 560Mt CO2 abatement per year, 820 bn euro annual revenue generation, and a 15% reduction in local emissions. The rapid development of the European Hydrogen Value Chain over the coming years is expected to generate approximately 1 million highly skilled jobs by 2030, and up to 5.4 million by 2050. This growth presents a significant economic and environmental opportunity for Europe, but it also creates considerable labour market challenges. ObjectivesThe primary objective of this project is to design and implement a highly innovative, effective, and sustainable Hydrogen Skills Strategy for Europe that will ensure the skills needs of the rapidly expanding and evolving Hydrogen Value Chain can be met in the short, medium, and long term. This blueprint will address the skills need of workers in Declining Sectors and Transition Regions to provide them with upskilling and reskilling opportunities that will enable them to access new employment opportunities within the Hydrogen sector. Participants GreenSkills4H2 is an Alliance of Hydrogen sector partners led by Karlsruher Institut für Technologie (KIT), Hydrogen Europe and Hydrogen Europe Research, bringing together key Industry and Education stakeholders from across the sector. ActivitiesThe project includes the establishment of a long-term partnership between Industry and Education; the design of an innovative and sustainable Hydrogen Skills Strategy; the development, testing and roll-out of VET curricula and training programmes in line with latest market needs and consistently linked with EU instruments and tools; continuous skills and career development that empowers technical professionalism in both green and digital competences; and the widespread dissemination and rollout of the VET training to maximise European impact.

Background The growing demand for skilled employees within the Artificial Intelligence (AI) cannot be met by current education and training programmes. Europe needs an innovative European AI Strategy that can fast-track the upskilling and of the EU’s workforce to meet this ever-increasing demand.ObjectiveThe project will support the implementation of the Pact for Skills by developing a sectoral skills strategy on AI. This strategy aims to lead to systemic and structural impact on reducing skills shortages, gaps, and mismatches, as well as ensure appropriate quality and levels of skillsParticipants The ARISA project configurating the European AI Skills Alliance, sets up a consortium of 16 partners and 4 associated partners led by DIGITALEUROPE, brings together key Industry and Education stakeholders from across the domain.Activities The ARISA consortium will work together to develop, implement and disseminate an AI European Strategy that will tackle the current and future skills shortages in the AI Sector, enabling continuous development, innovation and competitiveness within the industry. Methodology The project will be implemented in 9 work packages as follows: WP 1 – Project managementWP 2 - Needs analysisWP 3 – AI Skills StrategyWP 4 - Development of an innovative curricula and training program WP 5 - Development of a certification systemWP 6 – Piloting in different EU countriesWP 7 – Dissemination and communicationWP 8 – Long term sustainabilityWP 9 – Quality assuranceExpected results and impact The project includes the establishment of a long-term partnership for an innovative European Artificial Intelligence Skills Alliance; the design of an innovative and sustainable short term and long term Strategy; the development, testing and roll-out of VET and HE training curricula in 8 pilot sites (5 universities and 3 VET providers), the adaptation of programmes and qualifications in line with latest market needs and consistently linked withaaaa

<< Objectives >>Development and improve of digital skills and IT knowledge for disabled adults though several training programs as the way to achieve the socio-occupational inclusionKnowing the current situation of business network in Italy and Spain regarding the labor integration of disabled people, pointing best practices, identifying market niche in Tech Industry, inclusive use of technologies in Assessment process and working-from-home jobs<< Implementation >>1.Disabled adults training, with low digital knowledge, in basic digital skills to use in individual, social and working environments2.Training for disabled adults, with medium digital skills in Java Programming3.Analysis of Italian and Spanish business networks, regarding the working inclusion of disable people and their digitalization4.Awareness workshops with companies5.Delivering final results<< Results >>Improvement of digital skills in all disabled adults participantsImprovement of employability for all disabled adults participantsLabor inclusion for some of the participantsTransforming the business network by the awareness and training in diversityDiscovering new opportunities and transnational best practices we can implement in both countries in order to the working inclusion