We wanted to create a non-formal educational environment to support inclusive education and digital skills development of adults form partners counties on their path towards digital transformation, by improving the competences in digital social inclusion of social educators and social volunteers. This was achieved through: • Increased quality of work for 15 adult education staff to support vulnerable social groups by providing learning activities and digital social practices • Enabling individual transformation by digital social inclusion of 60 adults improving their digital skills through participation in social inclusion initiatives • Building capacity of 12 adult education organisations to work transnationally and enable social inclusion through integrating digital practices in regular activities Our goal was to integrate new educational tools, practices and social inclusion initiatives for adult education into partners organizations, and even beyond within the network of adult education organizations, addressing the challenges: (1) lack of online training capacities of adult educators; (2) lack of digital capacities of adult learners. (as per Adult Learning and COVID-19: challenges and opportunities, ET2020).
An ambitious consortium of three small organizations applied for this project willing to strengthen their capacities for offering to adults more flexible opportunities to learn by enhancing the quality of adult education. Partners needed an enabling environment to connect with others and develop themselves professionally, and this EU funded opportunity was the perfect enabler to open doors, increase visibility, attract collaborators, and to form a network of European organizations active in digital social inclusion. Thus, the partners put efforts to address the needs of social educators and adult educators for having a non-formal educational environment in which they can improve own digital skills, foster synergies with peers to create and adapt attractive educational programs for adult learners and to transfer knowledge and expertise at individual and organizational level. By an integrated approach, partners contributed to empowering relevant community stakeholders, which needed support in implementing programs for reducing digital divide of adults. Finally, the adults with reduced digital skills needing support to become active technology users are more confident in using digital tools in daily life.