WISE (Work Integration Social Enterprises) for Digital Upskilling Erasmus Project

Project Title

WISE (Work Integration Social Enterprises) for Digital Upskilling

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 2020

Project Topics

This project is related with these Project Topics: Access for disadvantaged; ICT – new technologies – digital competences; Inclusion – equity

Project Summary

One in four European adults aged 25 to 64 (about 64 million adults) helds low qualifications. Only 64% of adults with low qualifications actively participated in the labour market, compared to 80% with a medium educational level and 89% of those with tertiary education. Workers with low basic skills are 1.8 times more likely to be unemployed and run a high risk of inactivity: only 55% of the low skilled surveyed in a recent study were in employment, showing their fragile link to the labor market. Today’s labor market and industry 4.0 presuppose some basic competences for all potentially employable people; we are talking about literacy, numeracy and digital literacy. Low skilled adults have poor such skills, in particular digital skills, the vast majority of low skilled adults having low digital ability, and are therefore further away from the ordinary labor market. Re-entering the labor market often requires acquiring a formal qualification, but low qualified persons remain more than 4 times less likely to take up lifelong learning opportunities than high qualified persons. These persons need individualized service given their often cumulated difficulties. Existing public employment services do not provide such individualised activation services. WISE are essential actors for such a complex process as employers dedicated to the most vulnerable workers, in many cases also providing social services – such as for instance homeless shelters, or vocational training for young adults coming out of the child protection systems, therapy and integration counselling for disabled persons, social food and food waste programs etc. WISEs fulfill their mission of general interest of enabling the access and the integration of disadvantaged people on the labor market, as their primary goal. To do so, they position themselves in the economic system as providers of goods and services in order to generate jobs for the disadvantaged people. Considering the difficulties usually cumulated that are faced these persons, these enterprises adopt a strong pedagogical dimension aiming to increase the competencies and empower the workers within the enterprise through a tailored and individualized social accompaniment. Upskilling the low-skilled long-term unemployed in work integration social enterprises WISEs is a complex long-term (from 6 months – 2 years) process that builds on the assessment of each individual’s skills and skills needs. In this initial phase the literacy, numeracy and digital needs of the new worker are identified, and the learning of these basic competences is addressed if needed. The process generally includes on-the-job training, supported by counseling and guidance throughout the path to stable employment. In order to favor the development of this type of enterprises, and their training some Member States such as Spain, France, Belgium participating in the project have implemented active labor market measures designed to support social economy initiatives and in particular WISE as providing an adapted answer to the need to provide up-skilling measures and access to labor market to most disadvantaged workers. The pathway followed by a disadvantaged person in a social enterprise is: Recruitment; profiling, work based Training; Search for a job; Integration and stabilization in the new job. WISEs in Europe coach disadvantaged people into work according to individual need.
The project has the following objectives
1. Developing, testing and implementation of innovative digital learning materials to be used for up-skilling of disadvantaged workers participating in work-based training in work integration social enterprises – literacy/numeracy and basic digital skills
2. Developing, testing, implementation and dissemination of a set of tools and innovative digital learning materials to better prepare job coaches in work integration social entreprises as professionals equipped to promote and achieve equity, diversity and inclusion challenges in the work-based learning environment – tools for skills assessment, designing integration pathways for disadvantaged workers and life and job coaching
3. Strengthening the cooperation, networking and practice sharing between organisations engaged in work based training for low skilled adults in participating countries;
Also through the project a common set of basic digital knowledge training materials for low skilled adults will be developed to include also new technologies that are emerging into the labor market.

EU Grant (Eur)

Funding of the project from EU: 176492 Eur

Project Coordinator

ATELIERE FARA FRONTIERE & Country: RO

Project Partners

• BRIGADES NATURE
• RISE ROMANIA – RETEAUA ROMANA A INTREPRINDERILOR SOCIALE DE INSERTIE PRIN ACTIVITATEA ECONOMICA
• FORMACIÓ I TREBALL, FUNDACIÓ PRIVADA
• European Network of Social Integration Enterprises