EIDE (Emotional Intelligence and Digital Entrepreneurship in VET) has been implemented between October 2018 and November 2020 by 7 partners (PL, BE, IT, ES, RO, UK)with different backgrounds (business/ICT field, VET providers and social partners/NGO) in order to address one of the most important nowadays priorities - entrepreneurial activity, which, due to its positive effects (fostering innovation, job creation, encouraging competitiveness) is vital for economic growth and economic prosperity.Through its activities and outputs, it proposed an innovative approach of two factors influencing entrepreneurial success: emotional intelligence and digital skills. The project’s main aim was to contribute to the common European efforts of fostering entrepreneurial skills in all fields of education and fill some specific gaps existing between formal education and training systems (especially VET) and the real world. EIDE was highly innovative and ‘pioneering’ by bringing together different and apparently unrelated ‘facets’ of entrepreneurial education. It addressed the needs of 3 main target-groups:*Needs of students within the VET systemStudents enrolled within the pre-university VET system, although the most likely to start a business after acquiring a qualification, seem to be neglected compared to those in theoretical high-schools when it comes to entrepreneurial education. Through EIDE we intended to support them and broaden their area of choices, and break the stereotype that VET education only produces workers. *Needs of VET Providers and VET TeachersEIDE created learning resources for students, teachers and schools so that emotional intelligence and digital entrepreneurship can be integrated within the existing curricula.*Needs of companiesThrough the learning resources created and activities undertaken, EIDE also supported the needs of companies for intrapreneurs – employees with a high degree of business awareness, social interaction skills and business digital skills making them able to work independently and effectively without receiving directions all the time.The objectives of the project, which we successfully reached were:To create, develop and test innovative materials and curriculum framework which allow VET providers equipping VET students with two crucial entrepreneurial success skills: emotional intelligence and digital entrepreneurship skills.*To rise awareness among VET providers and education authorities concerning the potential of digital skills and emotional intelligence skills and their role as business success factors.*To equip at least 30% of the students of the participating organizations with emotional intelligence and digital entrepreneurship skills by the end of the project.In order to reach the above-mentioned objectives, the following outputs have been created:*O 1- EIDE E-learning course for Students- Emotional Intelligence and Digital Entrepreneurship- 12 modules;*O 2 - EIDE Part I - Emotional Intelligence Training for Entrepreneurial Success Manual and Guidelines for VET Teachers and Trainers Part II - Digital Entrepreneurship Manual and Guidelines for VET Teachers and Trainers*O3 - Emotional Intelligence and Digital Entrepreneurship Curriculum Framework* O4 - EIDE Train the trainer online courseThose products were pilot tested and validated by students and teachers over the lifetime of the project. Measures for open access and sustainability were planned and implemented, to ensure the usability of the project beyond project’s lifetime. Those outputs become even more relevant and useful during the coronavirus pandemic when schooling moved online and VET schools were the least prepared for the switch, lacking online training resources, as their activity is usually more practical. Due to their digital, open, easy to use and compatible format (can be used on any devices, including smartphones), they were broadly used and highly appreciated by the beneficiaries.All the outputs are sustainable, transferrable (to other education fields/target groups), scalable and relevant, with open and unrestricted access. The project management and methodology has been tailor-made, involving development of personalized project management, quality assurance and dissemination plans, internal project documentation and monitoring/evaluation tools, with clearly defined preparation, implementation, dissemination and monitoring/evaluation phases. Due to the presence of partners with a high level of experience and multiplication potential, the project benefitted from increased visibility and impact at national and European level, being able to reach very relevant stakeholders such as EU Parliament members and large numbers of companies.EIDE had and will continue to have significant impact at the level of VET learners, VET professional and participating organizations by involving development of unique social and technical skills.

"“Dual ECOsystems – EU Alliances for ICT” project is promoted by a consortium of 7 partners from 4 different EU countries.The project partners, within the regional/statal Dual System in which they operate, have more or less informally created virtuous local ""ecosystems"" in the ICT sector to ensure effective local cooperation between the VET actors involved in the delivery of Dual training programmes, for the success of all (student/worker, companies, VET institutions).Such ecosystems normally involve:•VET institutions•Companies, Chambers and companies’ representation bodies•Workers' associations / Trade Unions•Universities •Accreditation and Certification bodiesThe project starts from the premise that within the partnership the partners have identified some cases of apparent good practices, that are success factors in the different Dual Systems of the countries involved, which guarantee the proper functioning of the ecosystems, in terms of: high quality of VET paths; raising the employability rate; effective work-based learning system; efficient skills certification system.“DUAL ECO” project will let partners observe and share good practices adopted in the 4 local “ecosystems”, confront together on them and evaluate which good practices have the potentiality to be transferred at European level; then, the partners will conduct an experimentation on some selected good practices, importing them into their local ecosystems and applying to existing VET Dual programmes, in order to evaluate the transferability of each good practice at a larger scale.To achieve this goal, the project will be articulated in 5 Short-term joint staff learning and training events:•one for each country involved (Italy, Spain, Germany, United Kingdom) – for staff of partners organizations (managers, teachers/trainers, tutors, researchers) - organized as Study Visits, combining on-site visits to relevant organizations, presentations, discussions, workshops and/or training courses. These activities will be aimed at studying the good practices implemented by each ecosystem, at sharing ideas and confronting on the models in place;•one in Italy - for staff of partners organizations (managers, teachers/trainers, tutors, researchers) – organized as Training in participatory technique, managed by professional facilitators, that will combine peer discussions and workshops.This activity will let the partners exchange the good practices and confront among them on lessons learnt through the four study visits. At this stage, the partner organizations must learn from each other in order to create a “Dual ECOsystems” model, including a set of good practices that can be transferred at EU level, taking into account the different national contexts.The model will be reported in an Handbook, drafted by the partner organizations and containing “good practices and methods for effective Dual ECOsystems”.Each local ecosystem selects the good practices to import. To evaluate their transferability, the good practices chosen will be applied in each partner “ecosystem” on a local Dual VET ICT programme (involving associated partners from the countries):•In Italy on “Junior System Administrator - IFTS in Apprendistato” (level IV EQF) – duration 1-year course, at Engim Lombardia – starting in October/November 2022•In Spain on “Specialization VET Programme on Cybersecurity” (level VI EQF) – duration 1-year course, at Maristak - starting in September 2022•In Germany on 2nd-year training of “Higher Education Apprenticeships Programme” on ICT (level VII EQF), at ITB Bremen – starting in September 2022•In United Kingdom on 1st-year training of “Higher Education Apprenticeships Programme” on ICT (level V EQF), at Belfast Metropolitan College – starting in September 2022Once set the good practices to be evaluated, the partnership will agree on general and specific “evaluation indicators”.Each local ecosystem will run an on-going evaluation on the effectiveness of the good practices applied.At the end of the programmes, a “Final evaluation on the effectiveness of the good practices applied” will be held by each local ecosystem.On the basis of the evaluation outcomes, each local ecosystem will draft a brief report on “Evaluation on the transferability of the good practices applied”, in order to improve the final version of the Handbook.The latest release of the Handbook can be shared in all UE national context for the application of good and transferable practices of the model developed (Dissemination of the project results)."

"SIMPLY INCLUDED aims to raise awareness for the need of social inclusion of migrants in(to) companies and VET and to deal with diversity in a positive way. Moreover, it will promote the idea of more inclusive work placements and enhance the willingness of companies to employ migrants and refugees, as migrants should be seen as future skilled employees. Therefore, migrants need to be empowered to promote themselves and their strengths in a proactive and individualised way which will help them to integrate into the labour market.The project builds upon the former project SIMPLE which aimed to promote the use of peer learning techniques for fostering integration of newly arrived refugees into VET. During SIMPLE we found that migrants are often not reaching their own full potential but find themselves in a harsh competition with EU born citizens. Manuela Geleng, head of the ""European Commission’s employment and social policy Refugee task-force"" points out that in terms of employment refugees need in average 15 years to catch up with EU citizens. In order to provide equal access to the labour market for everybody we need to help migrants become self-effective to attain vocational education and training and employment according to their skills. SIMPLY INCLUDED will empower and sensitize migrants to recognize their own skills and competences and enable them to compete with EU born citizens which will lead to an active participation in the labour market and a more inclusive labour market. Furthermore, migrants will learn how to promote themselves in the digital application process by using digital tools.The project will provide pedagogical tools and materials for teachers which will equip them with multicultural education methods, especially creative, critical and active cooperative learning methods preventing social exclusion of migrants in VET and later on the labour market. Companies will learn and receive information about the potential of migrants and gain a better understanding of the importance of promoting inclusive work teams. The project will finally create empathy in society and promote social inclusion. The project is designed for three different target groups: 1)Refugees and migrants2)Teachers of VET who work with migrants3)Companies and instructorsAll three groups will be involved in different activities of the project by being part of the national focus groups to contribute to the creation of the IO’s; by participating in the joint staff training C1; by being beneficiaries of the IO’s. SIMPLY INCLUDED contains the production of three intellectual outputs which will be jointly developed, produced and tested by young migrants, teachers and companies and made available to the public. Two out of three outputs will focus on video production and new technologies since it will allow an easy access for migrants who are familiar with the use of social media and smartphones instead of text-intensive outputs. IO1: a multimedia video collection. The videos will contain personal stories of migrants and companies and concentrate on the positive aspects of storytelling to transfer a strong message which will create empathy within the topic of social inclusion of migrants. It will enhance the willingness of companies to employ and work with migrants and empower migrants themselves to participate actively in the labour market. The results of IO1 will be used to implement a social media campaign for social inclusion. IO2: a toolkit for VET teachers. It will focus on the creative, critical and active cooperative learning methodology and on multicultural education and enable the teachers to prevent social exclusion of migrants in VET and later on the labour marketIO3: a videokit. It helps the users to approach the process of discovering their own potential and to present it to others by using digital tools such as an application video. The project will focus on multicultural education by using creative, critical and active cooperative learning methodology which has not been used much in VET and this transfer of non-formal methodologies into formal education constitutes the project's innovative aspect.The desired impact on the large scale will be an increased awareness within society for the importance and need of social inclusion of migrants in(to) the labour market and VET. This impact will be aspired for direct and indirect beneficiaries. Beyond increased awareness and acceptance, the target group of migrants will also become self-effective and learn how to promote their skills, especially their soft skills, in a new and efficient manner by using digital competences. This will lead to a larger variety of applications in VET and an increased quality of active participation in the labour market. These impacts will help to turn Europe into a more inclusive working and living habitat."

The digital transformation is radically changing the market and the nature of work. Future jobs will require a wide and cross-sectorial set of basic, soft and technical skills that current VET systems are not able to provide today. Automotive sector plays a key-role in Europe and this role in growing continuously. Automotive workers must be prepared in facing emerging needs coming from competitiveness. Several reports and studies on Industry 4.0 highlighted that there are many gaps in levels of competences and certification of workers. In the automotive sector the critical point lies in the fact that it is not clear which will be competences required in 3/5 years, which will be job-profiles needed by companies. That could slow down or even block the transformation underlied in Industry 4.0 with relative negative impacts (decreased competitiveness of automotive sector, considerable growth of unemployment). Some attempts in anticipating skill needs have been already carried out. But here the project aims to tackle the problem from a new perspective; The problem that this project aims to face is that information provided are still at a general and undefined level that doesn’t allow to pinpoint detailed and specific training contents. Two simultaneous needs come to light: - To know in details key-soft skills and new jobs needed from companies in order to realise Industry 4.0 changes. - To understand which are the specific needs for an effective re-training of workers to be done in advance respect to real necessity. Specific objects: - To develop and test a method able to clarify and describe in details 4.0 key competences and job-profiles used by companies belonging to clusters involved. - To deternine conscious choices about re-training and career steps for workers involved - To create OERs useful to develop key-competences for workers and strategic for Industry 4.0 transformation of supply chain involved Project target group is 200 qualified workers, vulnerable but “re-trainable” respect to 4.0. They can keep or increase their employability level by expanding their set of skills. The project will be implemented by a strategic partnership involving: - a group of European organisations in charge to manage clusters and network of automotive companies (AIC, NAA, Dekra) led by the applicant IAM - a group of VET providers ((Dekra Akademie, HETEL, KZN Solutions) running in automotive sector - two specialised VET providers (ilmiolavoro e Steinbeis) with expertise on Industry 4.0 implications of competences and human capitals of companies Partnership will be completed with Associated Partners as automotive companies, other VET providers and automotive clusters and important stakeholders like Research Institutes, associations of companies, Trade Unions (CISL and IGM METAL) able to involve automotive other automotive companies and workers. Intellectual Outputs expected: IO1 European Automotive Technology & Skill Foresight 4.0.: it contains description of key-soft competences in Automotive 4.0. IO2 European Automotive 4.0 cross-skills open education resources: it is a set of OERs useful for automotive qualified workers to develop 4.0 cross skills. expected activities are: 1) foresight of key-cross competences in Automotive 4.0 through the use of innovative methodology Technology & Skill Roadmap. 2) development of career guidance and 4.0 OERs tools. 3) test and evaluation of career guidance paths and updating by using 4.0 OERs on online platform. The methodology is based on a system process who draw an evolutive loop. That, moving from Technology & skills 4.0 foresight, help workers and companies in taking 4.0 training decision and in implementing 4.0 re-training actions. The project provides positive impacts first of all on automotive qualified workers who will develop their sustainability/employability according 4.0. Secondly it provides positive impacts for clusters that will be able to realise 4.0 transformation and for VET providers who will increase their ability to promote employability according 4.0 revolution.

<< Background >>Over the last years, the European Commission has been promoting awareness-raising about environmental and climate change challenges. In particular the topic of circular economy is part of a broad and articulated international path towards a more sustainable world and has a key role in achieving some of the 17 SDGs of the 2030 Agenda of the United Nations.According to the key players at the political level, issues affecting our planet need a prompt and effective response. Circular economy is getting more and more relevance among EU strategies and it needs to be tackled not only at economical and environmental level, but with an integrated European action that takes into account several dimensions, including the educational one.In order to spread this important and complex concept among citizens, the whole system of education and training plays a crucial role.Before starting to write the project proposal, the partnership conducted a feasibility study in order to understand the needs of the target groups as well as their own needs. According to secondary data analysis (strategic documents, global reports) and interviews with VET teachers from different EU countries, the current situation of circular economy and entrepreneurship competences in the VET field has the following challenges:-Students still have a narrow perception of concepts like circular economy, green capital and green entrepreneurship. Most students still understand entrepreneurship just as the ability to start and run a business. Despite the efforts of the EU and Member States, a broader understanding of these concepts is still missing.-Whereas climate change and sustainable development are social and economic challenges, which affect all sectors and need to be addressed by different professions, VET schools still lack knowledge and skills to integrate these concepts into their subjects.-Teaching entrepreneurship in VET schools often depends on the proactivity of individual institutions and teachers. Experiential learning in teaching entrepreneurship is still neglected. Comprehensive and holistic didactic materials for teachers are still rare.-Structured project-based collaboration between companies and VET education institutions to foster green entrepreneurship competencies of students is still missing or at least it is not so well implemented in the project countries.-A cross-curricular approach to circular economy and entrepreneurship is still not 100% perceived and implemented in the countries participating in this project. Very often green entrepreneurship is still meant as a separate subject instead of as a transversal competence to be implemented across all disciplines.As a consequence, partner organisations share the same concerns: VET students seem to have only a very general and abstract idea about circular economy, green capital and entrepreneurship. They do not catch the importance of these concepts and are not able to take concrete actions in order to really play a crucial role in the society by implementing them, meant in terms of being creative, proactive, able to see reality with an open mind and catching potential business opportunities in line with the principles of circular economy and taking into account environmental and climate-change challenges. Growing Green project puts a special emphasis on linking the concept of circular economy with the need to boost entrepreneurial competences for future European citizens. The starting point is to raise awareness about environmental and climate-change challenges and circular economy topics among VET students, by practically reinforcing at the same time their entrepreneurship competences through workplace learning.With GROWING GREEN we want to “bring education to life through practical experiential learning models and experience of real-world entrepreneurs” in order to give students hands-on experiences of green entrepreneurship and a clear understanding of what green entrepreneurship means.<< Objectives >>Growing Green project aims at enhancing awareness raising about circular economy and at developing related green-entrepreneurship competences, in line with the European strategy on these topics.The general objective of the project is to reinforce green entrepreneurship competences (according to the EntreComp definition of entrepreneurship) among VET students. We will implement an experiential workplace-based model of teaching green entrepreneurship to VET organisations in order to boost quality and frequency of cooperation between VET institutions and local businesses of different sectors. The specific objectives of the project are the following: -To introduce a new practical green entrepreneurship model by working on real cases in business and industry;-To deliver new green-oriented entrepreneurship training materials for teachers and students to support work-based learning about green entrepreneurship;-To equip VET teachers with skills for mentoring and guiding students towards green entrepreneurship;-To support cooperation between VET institutions offering courses in different economic sectors and local businesses with the aim of offering more experience for developing green-oriented entrepreneurial competencies of VET students;-To strengthen cooperation between VET and businesses for creative solutions and product development by joint work between students, teachers and local businesses.Moreover, by cooperating at the transnational level, the consortium is expected to get the following benefits:-Access to a bigger set of knowledge and experiences in different countries about circular economy.-Exchange on methods and contents about the integration of circular economy in the VET curriculum.-Different expertise and points of view, which will enrich the design and development of materials and project outcomes, also through co-creation of PRs.-Creation of a network of partners interested in the topics of circular economy and sustainability, which can lead to new potential projects/activities in the future.-Increased work satisfaction of the staff involved in the project by working with peers and by visiting schools and companies from different countries, which is always an enriching and open mind-experience.The transnational dimension of the project represents an essential prerequisite for strengthening and promoting among the partners the implementation of this experiential workplace-based model of teaching green entrepreneurship. It is a shared belief of the partners that a common model, coming from cooperation among organisations with different backgrounds, expertise and experiences (VET schools, entrepreneurship providers, organisations expert on circular economy and recognition of skills, companies), will have an additional value in terms of potential and impacts, and can easily be extended to other organisations in other countries. The basic idea is to build a model that, inspired by the European recommendations on circular economy, green capital and entrepreneurship and implemented and tested in different contexts, can be easily used and replicated all around Europe, by raising the awareness about environmental and climate-change challenges and at same time stimulating people in being proactive and undertaking related initiatives.<< Implementation >>Growing Green project, in order to materialise its objectives and achieve planned results, comprises a set of tasks for each project result, an international learning activity, 5 multiplier events, supported by management and monitoring activities and by a well-defined sharing and promotion strategy that will ensure the use of results even after the project has ended.In particular:The 1st step of Growing Green project aims at defining the Growing Green Entrepreneur, a manual based on an experiential approach of teaching green entrepreneurship in cooperation with local business. In order to achieve this results, co-creation activities, analysis of existing contents and production of training materials will be implemented by partners. The 2nd step of the Growing Green project will produce the Growing Green Gamification, which combines gamification with green principles. In order to achieve this result, co-creation activities for project partners will be organized as well as an online conference for the collection of success stories implemented by external VET schools. Finally, associated companies will be called to propose challenges for the game. Partners will meet in Slovenia in M16 (Growing Green Capacity Building- step n. 3) in order to finalise, experiment and validate The Growing Green Entrepreneur and the Growing Green Gamification previously designed and to envisage the work to start and evaluate the pilot, assess key results and create some tools for the integration of the products created into VET schools offers. This activity will be necessary for partners to implement the pilot in their countries in the most effective way.The 4th step of the Growing Green project foresees the pilot implementation in the four countries and the collection of all the projects implemented by 160 VET learners with the collaboration of 60 VET teachers, entrepreneurial providers and local companies. Finally, 4 Growing Green workshops will be organised to promote project results in the different countries in order to guarantee the uptake of the Growing Green materials and methodologies by other VET providers as well as the presentation of projects implemented by VET students in collaboration with teachers, entrepreneurial providers and local companies, with the final aim of guaranteeing sustainability of the project itself.A final online conference will be organized for all VET students, VET teachers, companies and project partners to share and promote the projects and prototypes realized in the different schools and exchange key findings/success stories/challenges encountered.Sharing and promotion activities will be fundamental to assure the involvement of target groups and to boost the project impact in the longer period. The partners will implement a multi-media campaign to reach the different target groups. Management and monitoring activities will be extremely important to assure the smooth implementation of all activities. All face-to-face meetings will involve knowledge sharing activities and exchange of practices, co-creation activities to shape the project results or peer review of project results, review of project milestones, project intangible results and costs, visits to associated partners. Additional online meetings will be organised.All activities will be implemented in the most sustainable way considering both the environmental and social aspects as part of the Growing Green approach.<< Results >>The main expected concrete results of GROWING GREEN project are:-The Growing Green Entrepreneur: a teachers Manual, a sustainable collection of materials, tools, activities and process roadmap for Growing Green experiential approach.-The Growing Green Gamification: a practical game built up combining training methodologies with green concepts.-The Growing Green framework: a set of tools and instruments to evaluate, assess key results of the pilot and integrate the Growing Green approach into the educational offer of VET schools.-The Growing Green Compendium of prototypes collecting projects and prototypes prepared by VET students participating to the pilot.Other project tangible results include:- N° 9 partner organizations actively participating to 10 transnational meetings.- N° 5 monitoring reports drafted.- N° 1 learning activity organized, which sees the participation of 17 staff members of the involved organizations.- at least 10000 stakeholders reached through sharing and promotion activities.- at least N° 60 VET teachers and N°160 youth participating to the pilot.- at least N° 120 people participating to the multiplier events on site and at least N° 300 people online. Project management results:-Effective project sustainability (social and environmental) efforts achieved: conditions provided through the application of equal opportunities for all, Inclusion and Diversity Plan, projects results adapted to VET learners at risk of exclusion, sustainability principles applied to project meetings and to the C1, etc.-Successful implementation of the project and impact achieved: conditions provided through the professional cooperation partnership establishment, careful planning, human and financial resources allocation, Project Management Handbook, Quality Management Plan, quality and monitoring sessions, etc.-Successful project sharing and promotion efforts and solid provision of project sustainability: conditions provided through the Sharing and Promotion Plan, outstanding outreach provided through planned activities and networks available, etc.-European dimension of project results and cooperation between the organizations involved directly and/or indirectly: due professional cooperation partnership establishment, addressing common hot topics, providing relevant and adequate, etc.Outcomes for participants in the project activities include:VET students:-with a comprehensive knowledge about the concepts of circular economy and green entrepreneurship.- with improved entrepreneurial mindset and an higher possibility of employability thanks to the relevant skills acquired and the practical experience gained in working with companies.- with reinforced open up mindset for transnational cooperation and participation to work-based projects.VET teachers:- with better capability to work on green oriented entrepreneurship with companies and entrepreneurial providerswith a greater network at international level- with an increased awareness of green entrepreneurship as a way of working simultaneously on customer, technical and business perspectives.- Entrepreneurial providers with a better knowledge on circular economy and green-oriented business and a better capability to work with VET teachers and studentsCompanies with an increased capacity to work internationally and willingness to include green principles in their businessOther outcomes:- Higher motivation of VET schools reached by sharing and promotion activities for teaching green-oriented entrepreneurship by connecting the world of business to the VET through the project and workplace teaching model. - Better awareness of experiential implementation of green-oriented entrepreneurship competences among VET schools (students, teachers, other players and staff resources inside the institution), decision makers and PA.- Application of the new green entrepreneurship model in the countries involved.