Lean and Agile Practices linking Engineering Higher Education to Industry Erasmus Project

Project Title

Lean and Agile Practices linking Engineering Higher Education to Industry

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 2016

Project Topics

This project is related with these Project Topics: New innovative curricula/educational methods/development of training courses; ICT – new technologies – digital competences

Project Summary

Higher education prepares learners for their future role as professionals and active citizens in multiple ways: it builds field specific knowledge; it builds learning-to-learn capacity that empowers students to develop knowledge throughout their careers; it prepares students to effectively transition from the educational environment into the professional world, to become effectively integrated into the professionally community, and to adapt to market-driven processes. According to the Modernization Agenda for Higher Education, the sector faces multiple challenges in its quest to build critically thinking, creative, and adaptable adults (Vassiliou A.); these include the economic crisis, youth unemployment, integration of new technologies and modes of working, and more. On the other hand, the Communication on Opening-up Education highlights the need to stimulate innovative ways of teaching and learning through new technologies and digital content, to alleviate the “new digital divide” which has led to 50-80% of students never using digital content, and to exploit the opportunities of the digital revolution in educational contexts. In engineering principles in particular the need for building critical thinking capacity in addition to foundational knowledge is imperative due to the rapid evolution of technology and industry practices. Furthermore, it is necessary to build knowledge in a manner that allows students to transfer it to real world contexts upon graduation.
Project LEAP aims at building experience and knowledge among higher education engineering students on emerging lean and agile industry practices empowering them to effectively transition into the professional world. Agile design refers to production and development practices in which the design and implementation process are interleaved and not distinct. It is applied when user requirements are not clear from the start and aims at better addressing end user needs. Lean production refers to practices that eliminate non-essential production activities with the objective of facilitating easier maintenance and ultimately reducing production costs. LEAP aims to demonstrate how agile and lean design is applicable not only in the traditional software engineering and manufacturing sectors but in wider engineering production processes.
LEAP builds agile and lean skills among engineering higher education students through an active, experiential learning framework that is delivered in practice through serious games. Three gaming frameworks have been developed. The Technical Debt game demonstrates how investing in sound production practices early on can contribute to contain costs further down in the production process. The 5S game on lean production exposes students to the concept of maintaining clean and sustainable production practices by adoption the principles: sort, set in order, shine, standardize, and sustain. 3 scenarios have been implemented that show the usefulness of the 5S lean design in organizing diverse workspaces such as a pharmacy inventory, an on-line office space, and a scrapyard. The SCRUM agile design game demonstrates the SCRUM process in which user requirements are documented and prioritized before being implemented in “sprints” of work, while this process is iterated until the final product is complete. 2 scenarios have been implemented demonstrating SCRUM application in urban design and agriculture. The LEAP learning games are complemented by instructor support content in the form of learning sheets that describe wide learning activities built around the games in the context of blended learning as well as how-to videos that demonstrate the game functionality.
The LEAP methodologies, games, and supporting content were validated through the engagement of higher education students in Greece, Estonia, Portugal, the UK, and Spain. The results demonstrate the positive effect of serious games as means of facilitating active learning and building skills that are transferable to the real world.
In terms of impact, LEAP promotes quality teaching and learning in higher through the adoption of emerging pedagogical methodologies based on active and game based learning, and through the development of digital content for higher education that is openly accessible to all, in line with the Communication on Opening Up Education. It further builds instructor skills on integrating emerging practices into classrooms. Finally, it helps link higher education to industry needs, builds highly demanded skills, and promotes sustainable development by focusing on building human capital.
Project partners are the University of Thessaly (GR), Tallinn University (EE), Porto Polytechnic (PT), University of Vigo (ES), University of Central Lancashire (UK), and the Centre for Research and Technology Hellas (GR). The partners offer collectively expertise in pedagogical design, serious games design, graphical design, learning delivery, and pedagogical evaluation.

EU Grant (Eur)

Funding of the project from EU: 216932 Eur

Project Coordinator

PANEPISTIMIO THESSALIAS & Country: EL

Project Partners

• TALLINN UNIVERSITY
• INSTITUTO POLITECNICO DO PORTO
• UNIVERSIDAD DE VIGO
• ETHNIKO KENTRO EREVNAS KAI TECHNOLOGIKIS ANAPTYXIS
• UNIVERSITY OF CENTRAL LANCASHIRE