Knowledge 4Foot (K4F) project has contributed at fostering the excellence in training for footwear manufacturing by linking the three areas of education, research, and business-oriented innovation and has demonstrated good practices of cooperation and has bridged the worlds of education and work.To this purpose, the project has achieved the following objectives: 1) set-up a new Knowledge Platform for transferring research and innovation for footwear manufacturing where the HE students have received project-based training into a virtual environment by simulating all developing stages of the research projects, having as starting point the real identified needs in leather and footwear companies; 2) developed active collaboration among education, business community and research and had assessed the skills needs on innovation, research, development, and technological transfer; 3) designed a common curriculum and related e-learning content which incorporated creative thinking, problem-solving approach and project-based learning for virtual internship in the Knowledge Platform for transferring research and innovation.Based on the authentic and adequate needs of both actual business environment and learning and training programs for managers, engineers/technicians and designers in footwear sector, the K4F project has contributed at developing sustainable solutions to attuning curricula for placement/internship and has developed skills and competencies in area of project-based work focused on research, innovation and technological transfer. Thus, the K4F project had a significant impact on the development of education and training and has brought added value at EU level.K4F project has proposed, created, tested and evaluated contents and methodological solutions by developing synergies between different fields of higher education and training for educating and training the next generation of managers/ engineers/ technicians/ product and process developers/ high skilled workers that will be able to understand innovation, to perform applied research activities and to transfer the newest technological inputs from research to leather and footwear companies from partner countries and elsewhere in Europe.The online training courses, the virtual internship, as well as the Intensive Learning Activities, undertaken by the target group within the framework of the Knowledge Platform for transferring research and innovation in footwear manufacturing have stimulated innovative and creative mindsets of students, and have allowed the application of their knowledge and research insights.In terms of further sustainability, the universities running courses for managers, designers and engineers/technicians and the training centres running courses for the industry could adopt the virtual internship as a preparatory stage for learners’ placements into a real company. Moreover, the business community (SMEs and research centres) could be in contact with future employees in the early stages of the learning/training process.

The LEARN2WORK project main goal was to create a bridge between the industry working opportunities and non-formal educational paths that can support youngsters (16-25 years) to get in contact with footwear industry careers, in order to work towards the appealing and attractiveness of this sector and consider it as a career option. To achieve this goal, the consortium has adapted and transferred the production schools model from Denmark and has applied it in Portugal, Italy and Spain. The production schools educational methodology is based on learning by practice in order to develop each youngster in a social, personal and professional dimension, and thereby, supporting them to be able to make an informed decision about their own future. This methodology enables a clarification process for young people working through a workshop system where learners should be clearer on “what am I able to - what are my opportunities – what do I want – what do I need to do to get there?”LEARN2WORK project has adapted production school methodology to the Portuguese, Italian and Spanish VET reality and applied it to the footwear sector, where the goal was to strengthen the personal development of the participants/students and improve their chances in the ordinary labour market by entering in a innovative educational programme, which teaches them the required professional qualifications that footwear industry is looking for and at the same time ensuring that students will improve their soft skills and understand what are their future options if they decide to embrace a career in this industry.The target group of the project were youngsters in the age of 16 to 25 who have not succeeded in the regular educational system, that are not in training and don’t have a job, and are more willing to learn by doing. The target group is therefore what is common to refer as NEET.The adaptation of the production school model applied to the footwear brings added value to the European footwear industry, which is currently facing an important challenge related to the growing lack of skilled workforce. Students do not fulfil the demands of the industry because there is a gap between industry practical daily operational needs and schools educational paths which do not prepare students or young workers for industrial activities. Furthermore, the actual rate of education dropout and school early leaving still remains quite high in Europe and this project has also intended to contribute to retain young students with a more “on-the-job” curriculum, that combines practical training and educational knowledge adapted to the market needs, giving them a better perspective to get a job in the industry, by providing contactwith a future professional career.In conclusion, these were the project objectives:- Encourage youngsters to be the leader of their lives, with a positive role in their local economy and society;- Foster cooperation between organisations from different countries in the fields of youth work and non-formal learning for young people;- Adapt and transfer relevant elements of production schools creating successful alternative training paths focus on experiences for the young people, which should give them the courage to invite learning into their lives as a passage for a future career option;- Develop new approaches to youth work and encourage young people to get in contact with practical operations in footwear industry, fostering an holistic approach at professional, personal and social level;- Support the development of future professionals matching the footwear industry needs;- Get the recognition and validation of soft skills competences.To achieve those objectives the project was structured in 7 outputs, 8 events and 1 short-term training session abroad. First we have created a common ground of understanding about the production school model by getting in contact with this reality in Denmark and with that we were more prepared to adapt and transfer the best practices of production school to the LEARN2WORK project. After that we have established 5 profiles for the footwear industry and then developed the educational/training path according to those profiles. With these 3 first outputs we were ready to immerse young people in the pilot tests. After completing the pilot tests we were in contact with National Authorities and other stakeholders to present them the results of the pilot and to promote ECVET recognition of an innovative training path. We have also promoted the project sustainability by the establishment of an exploitation agreement to scale up the project results to other business activities and other regions. The events and the short-term training session had an important role in the global implementation of the project to spread the project results and the LEARN2WORK methodology across important stakeholders and career advisors.

Europe represents now 4% of the worldwide footwear production (2017 data) but has the highest average price worldwide. Europe maintains a tradition of footwear production, and a capital of knowledge throughout its institutions, schools, universities, which allows it to produce the highest quality footwear in the world. Thus, when it comes to the Top 10 most important footwear exporters, 5 European countries are well represented, summing more than 10% of world share exportations. The future of European footwear production is undoubtedly centred in the highest segments of the market, in terms of quality, functionality, design and more and more differentiation.Footwear and leather goods include a variety of product categories: from commodities to specialised products (sports, technical, professional, safety) and finally to luxury products, exclusive and unique, being much more than high quality goods, respond to the most distinctive and capricious niches of market all over the world. In the same way that bespoke exclusive and high-end products such as Rolls Royce and Bentley’s cars, or some of the most traditional Swiss watches are completely handmade rather than assembled in line, high quality, luxury and exclusive footwear is also totally handmade. Consumers from around the world recognise Europe as the reference of luxury footwear manufacturing, which is represented by a limited number of SMEs and micro companies and successful designers with innate entrepreneurship skills (running their own atelier and commercialising their shoes on-line) that both develop and manufacture complete handmade footwear, where every single component is thoroughly studied and becomes special, exclusive, and which average price of 800 Euros/pair is later clearly justified. Such high-end companies have the “savoir faire”, but they cannot find really youngsters or newcomers to whom to transmit their knowledge and skills and who could continue their businesses. They face not only the problem of attracting the young generations to the footwear manufacturing, but also finding candidates with the right skills and competences to produce exclusive and innovative footwear. There is a hidden potential in an increasingly “generation” of new talented designers who have completed VET in the field of Footwear Design in many European countries with footwear industry tradition, very creative and skilled in terms of design but finds a lot of difficulties to materialize their ideas and creations, because they lack the manufacturing skills and means to turn their own ideas into luxury tradable products. Therefore, if Europe wants to maintain, and spread around the continent, its first ranking position in the production of high-end footwear, the industry needs to work on a complementary strategy focused in the differentiation, details, sophistication, exclusivity, and image, which includes a B2C attentive model of marketing and commercialization targeted to such group of consumers. The success of this strategy includes different factors like high quality materials and components, innovative design, but the most important relies on the development of a very target-oriented skills and competences capacity of the manufacturers. A consortium of 6 partners from the most representative countries in terms of Footwear tradition and positioning in the rankings, meeting all necessary competences in the field, assigned this challenge.The whole project was dedicated to maintain and strengthen the high-end footwear production across Europe taking into consideration the specificities of this product category, while promoting the entrepreneurship of new talent designers and the development of a new generation of high-skilled manufacturers, oriented to high-end products in footwear. The project was focused on the creation and development of innovative vocational training ICT and practical based, targeted to a wide range of groups – VET students, new talented designers, footwear workers/technicians, new entrepreneurs in the field of Footwear as a mean to cope with the lack of skills/competences in the field of high-end (luxury) footwear manufacturing in Europe. A wide range of outputs were delivered for the success of the upgrading skills/competences, starting by a deep study on the luxury aspects and the real evidence based training need in this field, evolving to a new profile on technician toward high-end/luxury segment, a programme and a compilation of training contents, a B-learning course which was tested and piloted, as well as diligences for the recognition and validation of the professional certification.All the outputs are available in English and in all languages of the consortium: Spanish, Portuguese, French, Italian and Czech.

"<< Background >>The ShoeGame project arises in the context of a need for renovation and change in the footwear sector. Within the challenges it faces, two main ones should be highlighted: first, the fact that the industry suffers from an aging workforce, which is not being replaced due to the lack of attractiveness of the sector to the new generations and second, the gap between the training and education offered and the industry demands. ShoeGame intends to address these needs by developing a VET solution, based on digital tools, aimed at students who are either deciding if they should enroll in a VET course or already enrolled. The relevance of the project lies, firstly, in the central role, the footwear industry occupies in the contemporary world. According to the ""European Footwear sector report: structure, social dialogue and future"" elaborated by the industry’s social partners, the footwear sector in Europe remain strong thanks to its long tradition and cultural heritage. European footwear is distinguished for its excellent design and quality of the product, where a skilled workforce provides a substantial added value. Statistics show the good path of the European footwear industry despite the financial and economic crisis: between 2009 and 2015, footwear exports to non-EU countries have increased by 83% in value and 39% in quantity.However, as mentioned, in order to guarantee its renovation and evolution, the sector needs to be able to attract younger generations. Dr. Lívia Palicska, President of the Association of Hungarian Light Industry (AHLI), claims that “one of the biggest challenges the footwear industry is currently facing is the attraction of young people”. As she mentions, “there is no vocational education focused on footwear in schools and although there are some training offered by companies the percentage of those who continue working at the factories after the courses finish is very low”. In her words, “the manufacturing industry in general and the footwear industry, in particular, have to present themselves as a real alternative for young students (...) and focus on digitalization, automatization, education, innovation, research, sustainability” (World Footwear, 2017).The focus on these new topics will not only make the sector more attractive to younger generations but also bring it closer to the contemporary demands and challenges. It is important, for example, that the footwear industry aligns itself with the various green initiatives that have been pursued all around the world, for example with the new Circular Economy Action Plan (CEAP), adopted by the European Commission in March 2020, which aims to promote circularity and sustainability and, in general, contribute to the effort of reaching a global circular economy and making sustainable products the norm in the EU. The training and education opportunities in the footwear sector also have to include innovative technology and digital tools in order to prepare future professionals to engage with them. This is even more urgent considering the current pandemic situation, not only because the education and training centers need to have the necessary skills to adapt to long-distance formats, but also because of the short and long-term impact Covid-19 is expected to have on the footwear sector. The report “World Footwear: Business Conditions Survey”, elaborated by the Portuguese Footwear, Components and Leather Goods Manufacturers’ in 2020 shows some negative predictions, “particularly gloomy in Europe”, and reinforces that “the footwear industry must therefore prepare for an extremely demanding scenario”, as the current situation will have an unprecedented impact in the sector. Therefore, adapting the training and education opportunities and tools to these challenges is crucial, in order to ensure the competitiveness of the footwear industry, and to promote its attractiveness and the career opportunities it offers, especially to younger generations.<< Objectives >>The ShoeGame addresses two of the main challenges faced by the footwear industry right now: on one hand, its aging workforce, mainly due to the lack of the attractiveness of the sector, and, on the other, the inadequacy of the training offered to the current challenges. It is expected that, by bringing the sector closer to the real world (by including relevant topics such as circularity and green economy, sustainability) and providing digital and technological skills, also very important in order to keep up with the modernisation of the sector, it will immediately become more attractive to younger generations. In parallel, the results produced by the project will directly target this need, by informing students about most of the typical professions and occupations in the industry and presenting them with all the possibilities it offers. The project has two main target groups: i) students who are at the age to take the decision to enter VET studies, who the project intends to inform and motivate to proceed with their studies in the field, and ii) students who have already taken this decision and are currently in the first year vocational training. The main objective regarding this group is to maintain their interest and increase their motivation to work in the sector, but also, more intensively, to capacitate them with the relevant skills and competencies to do so. Considering this, the project’s main objectives are:- To attract younger generations to the sector, informing them about the profession, the job market, and the challenges it faces;- To equip future footwear employees with relevant knowledge and skills related to footwear manufacturing from design till finishing, but also with competencies related to circularity, green economy, and sustainability in eco-design;- To promote students’ soft and transversal skills, increasingly important in the modern workplace, such as online teamwork, communication, positive attitude, analysis capacity and problem-solving, etc.;- To develop an innovative training approach and learning tools to be applied in VET contexts, related to the footwear industry or not;- To bridge the existing gap between the training offer and the industry needs;- To promote synergies and cooperation among businesses, universities, research centers and other relevant stakeholders operating in the footwear sector, contributing to the attractiveness and competitiveness of the sector;- To prevent school drop-out and maintain students’ interest and motivation;- To contribute, on a larger scale, to the renovation and modernisation of the footwear sector, maintaining its value and competitiveness.<< Implementation >>In order to answer the mentioned needs, and meet the proposed objectives, the ShoeGame project intends to provide future and current VET students in the footwear industry with the necessary skills and competencies, and motivate them to work in the sector. In order to do so, the following activities will be implemented: - In the first place, a status quo analysis will be implemented by all partners in their countries, in order to assess the knowledge gaps and training needs in the future generation of workers in the footwear industry. These analyses will be compiled into a common report. A second analysis will be conducted, this time on the relevant training resources to the national/regional curricula of the partners (educational goals) and their estimated benefits in terms of learning expectations and outcomes for the definition of the awareness content structure and the core training curriculum. This will lead to the establishment of the project’s methodology (Project Result 1)- The needs analyses will serve as a basis for establishing the contents and the tools to be used in the development of the scenarios to be incorporated in the serious game (Project’s Result 2). The scenarios will be tested and validated, firstly, by the partners’ staff (alpha testing stage) and, in a later stage, with target users (Beta testing stage) until the final version of the game is concluded. An external piloting phase will also be implemented. - The activities which are part of the project’s result 2, the main deliverable of the project, include the designing of the curriculum, strategy and the methodology, and the design and development of the game. All the training materials and guidelines will need to be validated and adjusted according to the comments and suggestions received.- The project’s consortium will also develop a series of support tools for teachers and tutors (R3).Partners will also work on three parallel horizontal workstreams: Project Management (A1); Quality Assurance (A2); and Dissemination and Exploitation (A3).<< Results >>The central objective of this project is to improve the attractiveness of vocational studies in footwear to the young generation while providing them with the technical and sector-specific competencies, as well digital, circularity and sustainability skills that are becoming increasingly relevant for the sector. The main result to be developed by the project’s team is the ShoeGAME serious game, with different content, aimed, on one hand, at attracting newcomers to the footwear sector, and, on the other, at providing information and knowledge to those already enrolled in VET training. In this sense, this result will both work as a training tool to be used in the classroom to develop digital skills and as a motivation reinforcer either for new students or students that are already in the VET system. The game will depict most of the typical occupations in the industry and will include special characters representing well-known symbols in the footwear sector in two-level scenarios. Players will learn about footwear manufacturing from design till finishing, including sustainable practices in eco-design, and options in recycling. The game will also develop transversal competencies from a lifelong learning perspective (online teamwork, communication, positive attitude, analysis capacity and problem-solving, etc.). The game can then be applied by teachers in different training contexts. In order to support the implementation of the ShoeGAME in the classroom, the consortium will also work on a package of training schemes, methodologies and pedagogical guidelines addressed to tutors/teachers for including the serious game and gamification as supportive tools to VET curriculum in the Footwear industry. With the objective of maximising the impact of the ShoeGame, and further developing the students’ capacities, the ShoeGame platform will include communication/collaboration features, that will allow the organisation of virtual sessions and favor the cooperation and exchange of information between students, allowing them to know other European realities. Moreover, the multiplier events of the project will be organised as a set of competitions, through the ShoeGame, aimed at pre-and VET students, motivating them and fostering their competencies and knowledge. This will also foster a sense of transnationality and of community between all the participants. Considering the target groups of the project, about 500 students and 100 teachers/trainers are expected to be directly involved in the different stages: needs analysis, design, development, pilot and testing. Through dissemination and exploitation actions (including the multiplier events, the website and social channels, printed documentation, etc.), the project will further reach about 5000 stakeholders, including trainers, students, schools/VET organizations, companies, managers, public entities and the general public."

<< Objectives >>The project main goal is to prepare EU footwear sector to embrace the challenge of transition to sustainable, human-centric and resilient industry, transcending efficiency and productivity objectives, in line with the sectorial pact for skills (EU Pact for Skills), allying benefits for industry, workers and society. With the outcomes of the project, it is expected to ensure that workers will acquire the needed skills to support green and digital transition in footwear factories across Europe.<< Implementation >>The work programme roles out in 5 WP (including Management), including short training pilot actions outreach Events for a 36m implementation. During each WP implementation it is expected to create relevant results in a combined and comprehensive manner, which will be used within project duration but also after the project lifetime to support the upskill and reskill of workers and managers towards a smoother implementation of I5.0. All partners will be involved in all the WP implementation.<< Results >>The project proposes to develop a multilevel tailor-made upskilling and reskilling scheme and correspondent innovative contents and tools, to implement the presuppositions of Industry 5.0 towards a green and digital transition, making footwear factories a place where creative and talented people can come and work and live a human, multicultural and personalized experience. With this project we will contribute to reshape and bring new competencies to European managers and workers.