Since 2008 the key stakeholder in the Inland Waterway Transport (IWT) sector are cooperating towards the harmonisation and modernisation of professional qualifications in inland navigation. These stakeholders consists of: European Commission (DG Move), River Commissions (Central Commission for the Navigation of the Rhine (CCNR), International Sava River Basin Commission and the Danube Commission), EU Social Partners (European Skippers Organisation (ESO), European Barge Union (EBU) and European Transport Workers’ Federation (ETF) as well as the European IWT education and training (e&t) institutes (EDINNA). Following the activities in the FP7 project PLATINA, the European Commission installed in 2012 a Common Expert Group on Professional Qualifications in Inland Navigation (CEG) co-chaired by the CCNR, in order to start the revision of the 96/50/EC in place. This resulted in 2016 in a proposal from the European Commission for a directive on the Recognition of Professional Qualifications in Inland Navigation. One key item of this directive is the fact that the competences crew members on board of inland vessels should possess are laid down in an Annex, based on a series of research activities executed. The second key item is the fact that the students that will pass an exam in line with the new directive, will receive a Union certificate, increasing labour mobility throughout the EU. On the 27 December 2017, Directive 2017/2397 of the European Parliament and of the Council on the recognition of professional qualifications in IWT and repealing Council Directives 91/672/EEC and 96/50/EC has been published in the Official Journal of the EU. For this reason, the time has come to support the implementation of the competence based IWT e&t system throughout the EU. COMPETING will develop curricula and lesson materials, as well as a Quality Assurance and Quality Control (QA/QC) system, to ensure the highest level of quality concerning the implementation of future proof IWT e&t

In times when intelligent learning has been accelerated by the COVID-19 pandemic and there is a massive shift towards the online environment in global learning, the position of any sector depends on how much they embrace digitalisation. Consequently, how education and training will cope with the requirements of the present and how they will prepare in order to be futureproof are issues that can be addressed only if relevant institutions react and unite in partnerships able to put together their knowledge, their experience and resources.Therefore, aiming at improved capacity and efficiency of E&T institutions to provide digital training, 6 partners in as many EU countries (Romania, Bulgaria, Croatia, Netherlands, Latvia and Estonia) saw rather the opportunity than the setbacks of this challenging period and decided to work together for improved digital training and assessment of waterborne transport personnel through an increased level of digital competences of VET teachers/ trainers, realising that current needs and challenges in terms of capacity of educators to deliver digital education are quite common and the joint solution is developing the right tools and adapting the proper digital solutions with the support of technology providers as Associated Partners and stakeholders. Through a more efficient uptake of digital technologies for teaching and learning in a consolidated manner and not just in certain corners of the EU, high quality results of the educational process can be maintained even if the traditional “in classroom” environment cannot be used 100% of the time. As the theoretical part of the training is almost completely available in digital format, the focus of DERIN project will be for the practical training, or at least a certain percentage of it, to be shifted in the digital environment using the right tools, considering the vast diversity available and the fast pace the technology advances in the industry. The partnership consists of a VET school, three maritime and inland waterway training centres on their own or as part of maritime academies/ technical universities, a worldwide operating educational and research institution and a higher education institution. Coordinated by CERONAV, the partners will select the relevant learning modules adaptable to innovative multimedia tools, applications and resources, will test and familiarize themselves with the mentioned tools followed by the development of corresponding multimedia learning materials (curriculum, teaching methods, procedures, role-play scenarios, videos etc.) as a toolkit for practical training including also guidelines for trainers. For a highly relevant outcome, three learning teaching training activities will take place. A special training activity for students will allow trainers to include feedback from the end-users and trainees to gain knowledge and competence for the new working environment. As use of simulators in maritime and inland navigation education and training is an essential component for developing trainees’ competencies necessary for the job, a special attention will be given to developing innovative and easily accessible course modules via open educational resources on the internet. Specially designed to boost capacity of VET teachers and trainers, focussing on their digital competencies and capacity to upskill for innovative online resources and tools, their usage and design, the project will develop a toolkit for teachers/ trainers including newly developed materials. To take a step further and have a larger scope, policy recommendation and guidelines will be developed to focus on the impact and legacy of the project targeted towards sector’s stakeholders at the local, regional, national and European level concerned with maritime and inland waterway transport and the successful design and implementation of e-learning programme.The large sector of waterborne transport has to be taken into consideration, with all its implications in EU economy as training is always fundamental in an industry so well regulated and standardized at international level. Dissemination activities will be rolled out in order to raise awareness, increase knowledge, influence attitude and finally change behaviour of interested and relevant parties including at least one Multiplier Event in each of the six partner countries. Quality monitoring and control activities will ensure high standard outcomes and sustainable results to be transferred in different education areas and, with the support of Associated Partners to reach larger territories.

<< Objectives >>Currently, there is no formal structure and or culture in the inland waterway transport (IWT) sector for upskilling. 1System 4IWT aims to build a learning system that will act as a solution for ensuring and enduring continuity of education & training for IWT students and workers and generate a „personalized learning experience”. The project will focus on developing commons resources, that meet the needs of nowadays trends and challenges for (incoming) staff (boatmen) in the IWT sector.<< Implementation >>This project will design the system architecture for interconnecting education & training institutions e-learning platforms with the Inland Navigation eLearning System (INeS) which has been developed in previously EU funded projects, in order to exchange and share digital learning material and to provide information about individual learning progress to users in organized learning settings or to individual users in form of badges or microcredentials using open standards.<< Results >>The partners want to: - create a resilient, easily accessible and future-proof education & training system for the inland waterway transport sector (by creating new content and building a platform); - achieve a process of structured cooperation, focusing on formulating and developing needs and learning outcomes, between the fields of education, industry and social partners (by means of a community of practice); - contribute to a strong brand to further improve the positioning of the sector.

RELAR project aims to create a crisis-proof resilient maritime VET ecosystem by enabling remote learning and examination using Augmented Reality, AR. It addresses the key challenges of maritime and port education ecosystem caused by structural change due to new digital technologies. It focusses on the adoption of AR tools to improve learning outcomes.The consortium is formed by European VET and HEI organizations. It will tackle the deficiencies unearthed by the COVID-19 crisis by focusing on expertise and knowledge transfer of industrial organizations. It will improve security, safety and efficiency by empowering frontline connected workers with remote technology. The maritime VET ecosystem must become more resilient to crisis and improve adaptation capacity to forced shifts imposed by force majeure. Being tightly linked to other ecosystems with a major role in economy and society as a whole (port ecosystem, national or international education ecosystem), maritime education must absorb social shocks generated by crisis situations and ensure the continuity of learning processes.Over the last decade, sensors enabled telemetry to connect devices, products, customers with Industry 4.0. While promising a wide implementation of automation, in most enterprises, operations are a set of tiring linear steps; slow, sometimes inaccurate or inefficient. Hence, frontline workers have been standing on the side line for the last 20 years; watching and waiting.The paradigm shift with Industry 5.0 is where the frontline worker is now in the centre of things - machines, methods and workflows, and the technical management level can connect to him in a seamless manner. The project will mirror the new paradigm “expert - frontline worker” proposed by Industry 5.0 concept to a next-level “teacher - student” paradigm for VET. Teachers will wear the AR device for examining remotely the students by evaluating quality of the instruction's students gave. Students will enhance their technological skills and hands-on experience by using the same AR device and executing tasks being remotely guided by the teacher. Both teachers and students will have the roles of expert or frontline worker depending on the objective: examination or learning.Led by University of the Aegean from Greece, the consortium will identify and adopt a common architecture and framework for future interoperability, scalability and sustainability of remote learning. The core concepts of the architecture will be inspired by the existing Proof of Concept developed by STC Group for maritime education (EQF 4-5). During the first stage, the partners will encourage experimentation and exchange of ideas and good practices.These will serve as requirements and criteria for establishing the most performant framework. Based on the selected framework, REmote Learning and examination system using AR (RELAR) will be developed. The established remote assistance communication protocol will ensure an efficient interaction between the teacher and student. The IMO's Standard Marine Communication Phrases will serve as model. This communication protocol will eliminate the risk of misunderstandings or omissions that can lead to failures and jeopardize the correctness of the learning or examination process. Teachers will attend Train the Expert sessions coordinated by maritime training centre CERONAV from Romania, to be trained on technical aspects like how to use and manage the system. Students will attend workshops during multiplier events, ME, to get more insights in the design and functionality of RELAR system.Being led by MCAST from Malta, scenarios are built to be used on RELAR system for learning and examination purposes for various use cases (ship engine officer, shipyard technician, transport fleet service & repair technician). The scenarios will benefit also from the associated partners’ input and will be demonstrated, evaluated and validated during a series of ME organised at the project partners location. Learning materials like videos and tutorials will be created to enhance the digital skills of students and teachers related to AR and to smooth the adoption process of RELAR in practical education. Teachers will attend Train the Trainer sessions organised by CERONAV, where they will get familiar with using RELAR scenarios for learning and examination using RELAR scenarios. Students will attend workshops during the ME to understand how to benefit most from the learning and examination with RELAR.Quality assurance will be coordinated by the Slovenian VET center Šolski center Nova Gorica.The partners will organise five Transnational Meetings, during which the teachers, students and experts from maritime industry and other sectors will get familiar with RELAR. The consortium partners will commit to further roll-out and implementation of RELAR in their organizations and at national level in VET and HEI and will establish a strategy for the continuation of cooperation.