PATHWAYS FOR EMPLOY Erasmus Project

Project Title

PATHWAYS FOR EMPLOY

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 adult education

Project Call Year

This project’s Call Year is 2016

Project Topics

This project is related with these Project Topics: ICT – new technologies – digital competences; Recognition (non-formal and informal learning/credits); Labour market issues incl. career guidance / youth unemployment

Project Summary

In 2006 there was a European recommendation on key competences for citizenship. All EU member states have agreed on a framework of eight key competences for lifelong learning. Digital competence is a key transversal competence that allows acquiring other key competences; it is a relevant and necessary skill to prepare people for the labor market and, in general, they are digitally competent.

On the other hand, Europe faces a skills deficit and in a time of economic crisis highly qualified people are more likely to find a job. In the near future it is estimated that 90% of jobs require digital skills. Therefore, it is essential that education and training systems provide people with the required skills (EU2020).

In this context, the Pathways for Employ project is included, taking as a reference the DigComp framework to assess the digital competence of citizens and whose main objective is that skills and qualifications can be more easily recognized.

The objectives of the project are:
-To promote the evaluation of digital competences, specifically for two competences profiles: Entrepreneur and Teleworker
– Practically apply the international reference framework DigComp
-To facilitate the recognition of digital skills and their qualification
Seven organizations participated in the project: Tecnalia (project leader and consortium), DMG, Guadalinfo, Telecenter-Europe (now All Digital), FIT, IED and Basque Government (through its KZgunea network).

The consortium has different profiles that complement each other to achieve the objectives set. Tecnalia is a research and innovation center with a specific line for digital competences; In addition, Tecnalia has been offering a service for the evaluation and certification of IT competencies in the Basque Country for over 15 years, in collaboration with the Basque Government and its network of KZGunea centers.

On the other hand, there are organizations with telecentre networks whose main mission is to improve citizens’ digital skills and help the digital transformation of society. This is the case of: Telecenter-Europe (now All Digital) at European level, Guadalinfo in southern Spain and KZGunea in northern Spain. In this way, the project guarantees a remarkable impact and diffusion thanks to its power of capillarization.

Finally, the project has entities that have a high knowledge of the needs of society’s IT skills as well as relationships with private and public educational entities in their countries, such as DMG, FIT and IED.

The main activities of the project have been:
-Analyse the needs of entrepreneurs and virtual office workers through surveys (83 respondents for the entrepreneurial profile of 11 different countries and 63 respondents from 9 different countries)
-Define the competence profiles of these two profiles taking as a reference the DigComp framework, the result of the surveys and the knowledge of the consortium
-Analyze and define an Open Badges ecosystem as well as integrate a tool that allows its issuance with the Pathways for Employ platform
-Develop a free Web platform that allows the evaluation of digital skills and the recognition of these skills through Badges
-Design evaluation modules for the two competences profiles (327 questions of knowledge, skill and attitude)
-Pilot the tool in 5 different languages: English, Spanish, Euskera, Latvian and Greek
-Diseminar the results at the international and regional level

The results of the project have been:
– Free Web platform (http://pathwaysforemploy.eu) to evaluate the digital competences of two competences profiles (Entrepreneur and Teltrabajador) in 5 different languages: English, Spanish, Basque, Latvian and Greek
-Design of an Open Badges ecosystem, integration of an Open Badges issuance tool with the Pathways for Employ platform and identification of the path of improvement to achieve recognition of competencies
-Design and implementation of two evaluation modules corresponding to the profiles of Entrepreneur and Virtual Office Worker

The Pathways for Employ platform has been used by 1,019 users from different countries (Belgium, Latvia, Greece, Ireland, Spain, etc.). These users have been both experts in digital skills and users who have wanted to know their level of digital skills. 88% of these users would most likely recommend this platform, which is an important indicator of the outcome of the project.

EU Grant (Eur)

Funding of the project from EU: 170528 Eur

Project Coordinator

FUNDACION TECNALIA RESEARCH & INNOVATION & Country: ES

Project Partners

• CONSEJERIA DE DESARROLLO ECONOMICO Y COMPETITIVIDAD-EUSKO JAURLARITZA-GOBIERNO VASCO
• Fast Track into Information Technology Ltd.
• SIA DMG
• TELECENTRE-EUROPE
• CONSORCIO PARA EL DESARROLLO DE POLITICAS EN MATERIA DE SOCIEDAD DE LAINFORMACION Y EL CONOCIMIENTO EN ANDALUCIA FERNANDO DE LOS RIOS
• INSTITUTE OF ENTREPRENEURSHIP DEVELOPMENT