Digital Innovations for Growth Academy meets the strategic need defined in the Bruges Communique to improve the capacity of Vocational Education and Training to respond to the changing requirements of the labour market and to adapt VET to keep pace with shifts to new technologies, work organisation and internationalisation. Building upon the experiences of previous successful Leonardo da Vinci Transfer of Innovation projects the Strategic Partnership recognised that within the Business Skills VET sector Enterprise Trainers and Educators require an in-depth knowledge in the deployment of digital tools, ICT and the internet to enable them to effectively help SME learners to become digitally competent and to be able utilise the knowledge within business processes. However, current VET programmes, for teachers and learners in this sector focus upon traditional business development and do not address the new digital innovation context. This project aims to enable the enhanced deployment of digital and ICT tools by VET enterprise trainers and educators and improve their digital competencies in order to address the key needs to: 1. Develop the ICT and digital skills, knowledge and capacity of VET trainers to enable them to support learners within SMEs more effectively and encourage greater adoption of digital and ICT tools. 2. Develop VET programmes to support the changing needs of the EU workforce/economy in particular through the integration of ICT and digital literacy 3. Ensure that VET programmes are equally open and accessible to women and men learners. The Digital Innovations for Growth Academy will develop • a comprehensive research analysis defining the training needs, in a business development and learner context, of enterprise trainers and educators • a new VET curriculum and ICT and digital literacy competency framework for enterprise trainers and educators. • a training and development programme with comprehensive materials and on-line resources to support blended learning • a detailed Trainer Guidance manual which incorporates pedagogy and technical support Digital Innovations for Growth Academy operates through a Strategic Partnership from seven member states. The partners are from the social, private and public sectors. Through the testing and piloting of the Programme materials the project will include 120 enterprise trainers and educators from five partner countries. The programme materials and key communications will be translated into four languages from English, and will be openly available on-line through the project website. This project will therefore focus on developing an effective VET model for enterprise trainers and educators which will directly assist them in acquiring new knowledge and skills; and will enable the future delivery of digitally literate VET programmes and enable their learners and SMEs to deploy digital technologies effectively and with the greatest impact.
Digital Innovations for Growth Academy (DIGA) project meets the strategic need defined in the Bruges Communique to improve the capacity of Vocational Education and Training to respond to the changing requirements of the labour market and to adapt VET to keep pace with shifts to new technologies, work organisation and internationalisation. Learning from the experiences of previous successful Leonardo ToI projects it was recognised that within the Business Skills VET sector Enterprise Trainers and Educators require an in-depth knowledge in the deployment of digital tools, ICT and the internet to enable them to effectively help SME learners to become digitally competent and to be able utilise the knowledge within business processes and address the new digital innovation context. The project: 1. Developed the ICT and digital skills, knowledge and capacity of VET trainers to enable them to support entrepreneurial learners, entrepreneurs and SMEs more effectively encouraging greater adoption of digital and ICT tools. 2. Developed a VET learning programme to support the changing needs of the EU workforce/economy in particular through the integration of ICT and digital literacy – the DIGA Learning Programme 3. Ensured that the DIGA Learning programmes is equally open and accessible to women and men learners. The DIGA Project partnership consists of 7 organisations from Bulgaria, Ireland, Lithuania, Norway, Slovenia, Spain and UK. Drawn from higher education, social and enterprise sectors partners sought to harness the strengths of each to contribute to developing a high quality learning programme. Together the partners have high levels of expertise in research, vocational education and training curriculum and programme development, quality and impact assessment, dissemination and experience of developing programmes that meet the needs of women, as well as men, and of ensuring gender equality is built into the development process. The partner organisations are: Bulgaria - Bulgarian Centre for Women and Technology (BCWT) Ireland - University of Limerick (UofL) Lithuania - Social Innovation Fund (SIF) Norway - European Centre for Women and Technology (ECWT) Slovenia - Economic Institute of Maribor (Human Resource Development Centre EIM, HRDC) Spain - Inercia Digital (ID) UK - The Women's Organisation (TheWO) (Lead partner) http://digaproject.eu/partners/ The key activities and outputs of the DIGA project involved: • Undertaking comprehensive research and analysis into the digital training needs of enterprise trainers and educators and exploration of good practices and policies. • The production of DIGA project research reports in 5 European languages http://digaproject.eu/research-resources/ • The creation of a VET curriculum for enterprise trainers and educators – the DIGA Learning Programme. • The development of comprehensive materials and resources to support the delivery of the DIGA Learning Programme, produced in 5 EU languages. • The design and development of the online open-access DIGA Learning Programme, available in 5 EU languages http://digaproject.eu/learning-programme/ • The production of a DIGA Learning Programme Guidance on how to approach the delivery of the programme, an introduction and overview to the DIGA Project, comprehensive information and materials, available in 5 EU languages. Overall, the DIGA project successfully achieved all its original objectives. Findings from research and evaluation activities demonstrate the positive impact of the project on partner organisations and Enterprise Trainers and Educators (ETEs) / VET practitioners For example, partner organisations have developed tacit knowledge and instilled shared digital learning within and across partner institutions and are better placed to make informed decisions drawing from the project’s research and delivery experiences. For ETEs, the impact in terms of their personal and professional development was found to include: • Demystification of the language and jargon of digital in an applied entrepreneurial context and as a result better equipped to incorporate digital as part of the business narrative – moving digital from the peripheral to a core business function. • Acquisition of new learning on the overarching digital EU policy which provided context and an insight into its impact on digital practices in the entrepreneurial context – ETE now see the reason why digital is so important and that it will be a critical entrepreneurial function. • Greater confidence and ease in proactively discussing digital tools across business functions – making digital part of the discussions between ETE and their clients. • An expanded range of contacts and business networks for new business or ‘go to people’ for ongoing digital learning. DIGA Project Evaluation report, http://digaproject.eu/wp-content/uploads/2017/10/DIGA-Project-Evaluation-FINAL.pdf