An(other) EU project is born
On July 5th and 6th there has been the official kick-off of the project ENCORE. ENCORE stands for ENriching Circular use of OeR for Education. The partnership composed by 13 partners, belonging to 7 different countries (France, Germany, Greece, Italy, The Netherlands, Sweden and Spain) will pursue the following objective: contribute to the teaching and recognition of the skills most relevant to the new macro-trends of digitalization, climate change and post-COVID economic recovery challenges.
In particular, ENCORE aims at facing the following challenges:
- (1) help students and workers acquire some of the relevant skills needed to face economical, ecological, and technological challenges;
- (2) address the skills mismatch between the demand of companies and the supply of educational institutions;
- (3) support educators to be aligned with the ever-evolving landscape of relevant skills;
- (4) support educators to face the evolution of the educational context with emerging pedagogical approaches;
- (5) mitigate the reluctance to change of the education sector;
- (6) facilitate students in the certification of the skills they acquire through non-standard pedagogical approaches.
Partnership.
MY COMMENT
…Apart of the grandiloquent expressions of any EU project that makes it to be funded, I could see in this project a relevant (if not the most relevant) element. There is an interdisciplinary team, and there is willingness to listen to the otherness to build fairer and more empowering AI-based educational tools-.
Let me say that I don’t necessarily agree with the 5th challenge, for I don’t believe the “resistance” to change from the education sector is purely based on narrow-mindedness. Instead, we should take a look at what is delivered as change and innovation in education, and we might understand that many educators are desperately searching to protect their agency, their right to choose what they believe are their pedagogical values.
So I’m preparing to live this interdisciplinary adventure, with plenty of curiosity and of willingness to learn.
Work Plan
The work that will be carried on can be described in phases. The universities involved will have a great responsibility in Phase I of the project– data-driven / technology, with UNIPI in charge of defining the GDE (Green, Digital and Entrepreneurial) skills (WP2) and USAL responsible of the collaboration with the technological providers (mainly BMU, FBK) (WP4). In Phase II (expert-driven / pedagogy) UNIPA will take care of defining the ENCORE approach (WP5). All the educational providers, led by CHA, will be equally involved in the internal and external testing (WP6). The picture below better summarise it:
The ENCORE team is composed by 5 universities: UNIPI- University of Pisa, USAL- University of Salamanca, CHA- Chalmers University, UNIPD- University of Padova, HOU- Hellenic Open University; 3 VET providers: KFRU- Knowledge Foundation at Reutlingen University, LSU- Institut Polytechnique UniLaSalle and ATF- Adecco Training France; 3 Labour market actors: VAL- ValueDo, BMU- Beam Me Up, and REC- Reconnaitre- Open Recognition Alliance; 1 research institute: FBK- Fondazione Bruno Kessler and 1 NGO: EADTU- European Association of Distance Teaching Universities.
Here is the happy team…
Complicated, isn’t it? Stay in touch with the project coordinator, Filippo Chiariello from the University of Pisa. He will have wiser things to say about the project than me… 😁
En el jardín net 