Strengthening students’ employability through enhanced skills formation Erasmus Project

Project Title

Strengthening students’ employability through enhanced skills formation

Project Key Action

This project related with these key action: Cooperation for innovation and the exchange of good practices

Project Action Type

This project related with this action type : Strategic Partnerships for higher education

Project Call Year

This project’s Call Year is 2018

Project Topics

This project is related with these Project Topics: Overcoming skills mismatches (basic/transversal); New innovative curricula/educational methods/development of training courses

Project Summary

Context/background
The youth unemployment rate in the EU was close to 18 % in December 2017. In general it has been on a rise since 2008.
Europe’s HE systems face challenges such as a mismatch between the skills needed and the skills it has because, e.g. students graduate without the range of transversal skills they need for resilience in a changing world.
Research shows that it is possible for higher education to improve student employability on a variety of measures, e.g. by strengthening the students’ transversal skills.

Objectives
To foster employability, the project has supported students in acquiring and developing transversal skills through these overall project objectives:
– together with companies develop and implement curricula that emphasise transversal skills and meet job market’s needs
– develop and implement new models (toolbox) to assess transversal skills
– implement teacher training activities to help them develop curriculum design skills
– develop and implement teacher support systems

Number and type/profile of participants
The project consortium was composed of four partner institutions from higher education as well as associated partners having different profiles, chosen based on their knowledge, competences and area of expertise relevant to achieve the project’s objectives as well as several criteria set to ensure a wide and international spread of outcomes produced:
European higher education institutions:
– UCL.dk (formerly EAL, university of applied sciences) – coordinating organisation,
– INSEEC.com (private business school, aka Centre D’etudes Europeen du Sud Ouest – CEESO),
– LAB.fi (university of applied sciences, formerly Lahti UAS),
– Fontys.nl (university of applied sciences);

Associated partners:
DHL Supply Chain Benelux, Bordeaux Technowest (FR), Lahti Events Ltd (FI), Damixa (DK), Belco Alliance – a sustainable educational partnership between European and non-European HE institutions

Results and impact attained
The most important activities and results in the EmploySkills project has been to develop six intellectual outputs, consisting of: .

IO1: A state of the art report concerning skills mismatch with specific focus on transversal skills and 6 module themes, that was defined.
IO2: 6 teaching modules were designed and a curricula (30 ECTS) supporting students in acquiring and developing transversal skills in order to reduce skills mismatch and foster employability.
IO3: Assessment toolbox was developed consisting of new tools to assess transversal skills. The Assessment Toolbox can easily be transferred to other sectors and institutions since the tools are not linked to a specific study field.
IO4: Teacher-training module to improve the capacity of the academic staff of the participating institutions to design and implement a curriculum focused on developing students’ transversal skills.
IO5: Teacher support systems were developed consisting of tools supporting teachers implementing curricula focusing on developing students’ transversal skills. Output was a Teachers Handbook and a supporting LinkedIn network.
IO6: Pilot project with around 2400+ students from the participating institutions in order to implement, test and evaluate the 6 modules, the assessment toolbox and the support systems.

Supportive activities has been conducted such as teacher training activity (teacher-training week) (C1) and an international online conference (E5).

The impact
Teachers and students are primary target groups, that will experience an impact as listed below.
– Teachers training in curriculum design improves curricula focusing on transversal skills that have been developed and implemented. Experiments can be transferred from traditional courses and not only short intensive courses. Raising awareness of the teachers teaching soft skills.
The project has had an unexpected positive impact 1) A sort of vocational training for the teachers involved – the possibility of meeting other teachers and being more open to other ways of teaching. 2) New interface btw companies and schools as some of the teachers also work in companies
– Students will be able to train, develop and acquire transversal skills adjusted to the needs of the labour market and thereby strengthen their employability through reduced skills mismatch.

– Institutions and companies:
A renewed and improved focus on integrating soft skills modules when developing new curricula.
Short flexible modules + short term mobility has been tested and is now ready to be implemented in a post covid future.
Improved transfer ability because of the unexpected flexibility in what has been produced in different contexts and the fact that both traditional and high intensive courses are very effective on the development of transversal skills.
Valuable input from companies decreases the mismatch and add value to the recruitment of students for traineeships/internships, impacting the HR strategies of involved companies.

Project Website

https://www.ucl.dk/employ-skills/

EU Grant (Eur)

Funding of the project from EU: 181116 Eur

Project Coordinator

UCL ERHVERVSAKADEMI & PROFESSIONSHOJSKOLE SI & Country: DK

Project Partners

• CENTRE D’ETUDES EUROPEEN DU SUD OUEST – CEESO
• LAB AMMATTIKORKEAKOULU OY
• STICHTING FONTYS