We wanted to use the experience of Croatian teachers to train 10 technology teachers from Slovakia and 10 from Slovenia. This would help them involve children from marginalized groups, refugees, children with disabilities, and girls in working with small machining tools during lessons or after-school clubs. The goal was to improve their skills and open up more opportunities in the labor market. Through this project, we wanted to show that informal education in technology can be fun and accessible to a wide group of children. However, for this to succeed, teachers need to be inspired – which is why we trained them. Since competitions are a great motivational tool in informal education, we chose to use them as well. We planned to organize national rounds of the Masters of Technology competition in Slovakia, Slovenia, and Croatia, so teachers and their teams could compare results. With this project, all three organizations aimed to improve our skills in international teamwork, gain experience with an EU project, and raise awareness among foreign organizations with similar goals.
There is a lot of talk about the shortage of skilled, creative young people in the labor market who are willing to become masters – craftsmen – and replace those retiring. We at SEA participated as guests in the "Modelarska Liga" competition in Croatia, where we saw children aged 8 to 14 from elementary schools enthusiastically competing in creating wooden products on small machining tools. The competition focused on developing technical skills and promoting inclusivity, as teams of children with special needs were also given the opportunity to compete on equal terms. We wanted to bring such a competition to Slovakia. Our first step was to inspire technology teachers with this idea. Therefore, we asked our Croatian colleagues to share their experiences with us. We also approached colleagues from Slovenia, where the situation is similar, to form an international team. This is how the project was born, which we wanted to continue with an international competition. All three organizations have experience in informal education and organizing workshops for teachers in our countries, but we lacked experience with an international project. We wanted to try it out, gain visibility abroad, and open the door to international cooperation.