Inspiration

The San Blas Digital Skills School, an initiative by Ayuntamiento de Madrid and its partners, is part of the “Madrid, Digital Capital” strategy to position Madrid as a benchmark city in digital transformation. Located in the refurbished Santa Marta de Babio educational complex in the San Blas-Canillejas district, the school focuses on creating a training and employment space for young people and new technologies. The goal is to establish a new management model for training, education, and employment promotion activities.

Who are the Beneficiaries?

The primary beneficiaries of the San Blas Digital Skills School are citizens of Madrid, companies interested in digital innovation, and public and private entities committed to digital transformation. The school aims to stimulate and promote employment related to digital transformation, innovation, and the use of digital environments. The school targets young people, job seekers, and professionals seeking to enhance their digital skills and employability by offering various resources and activities. Additionally, companies presenting innovative proposals for digitalisation benefit from the school’s initiatives, making it a comprehensive hub for digital skills development in Madrid.

Current Impact

Since its launch in February 2023, the San Blas Digital Skills School has seen steady growth in participation. Throughout the year, 9,108 individuals engaged in the school’s activities, with the latter half recording monthly participation figures exceeding 1,000. Over 546 activities were conducted in 2023, with 66% focused on digital training and education. The school hosted significant events such as the 1st San Blas Job Fair. These efforts have contributed to transforming citizens’ vision regarding job opportunities in an increasingly digitalised environment, fostering the creation of digital talent geared towards innovative processes.

Why is it a Good Practice?

The San Blas Digital Skills School exemplifies best practices in digital education and employment promotion by addressing the critical need for digital literacy and employability. By providing a wide range of activities, including training sessions, workshops, exhibitions, and professional conferences, the school ensures that participants gain both theoretical knowledge and practical experience. The mentoring and advice from professionals, along with modern facilities equipped with state-of-the-art devices, create an optimal learning environment. The school’s comprehensive approach, including leisure activities to develop personal, social, and digital skills, ensures the holistic development of participants. The collaboration with citizens, companies, and public and private entities further strengthens its impact, making it a model for digital skills development and employability in the city of Madrid.

The goal of Funk-IT Lyftet is to increase digital skills in society – especially for people who in one way or another find it difficult to embrace modern technology. These may involve disabilities of various kinds or lack of knowledge, access or accustomed to using digital services for other reasons. A lot in society today requires us to be able to use a computer, tablet or mobile – such as e-mailing and making video calls, searching for information on government agencies, using payment services and booking medical visits or trips. Funk-IT Lyftet includes a number of courses that help users get started with modern technology in everyday life.

Background and objectives

Funk-IT Lyftet is a collaborative project between Uppsala Municipality and the Swedish Post and Telecom Agency (PTS). The target group was primarily people with disabilities who have support measures in various forms through the municipality. This was then broadened to most people who need to learn how to use modern technology in their everyday lives, such as the elderly and people with visual impairment.

In connection with the start-up, a needs inventory was made where it emerged that large parts of the target group had difficulties in contacting authorities, using mobile phone and computer and managing their everyday finances or paying bills.

Development of course material

The course material was developed in 5 stages during the period 2019-2021.

• Stage 1: Here the course leaders designed the material in smaller working groups with feedback from user representatives, after which test courses were conducted with subsequent feedback.
• Phase 2-3: In these phases, the course material was further developed and used practically, with feedback from online surveys.
• Stage 4: During this period, the pandemic affected the work on physical courses, and therefore the work was shifted to digital meetings where films were created for several of the courses.
• Stage 5: The focus in the final stage was on visual interpretation of the filmed material, as the target group and course content were also broadened to most people who need to learn modern technology, to example the elderly and people with visual impairment.

Important parts of the work have been: needs inventory, feedback from users and user associations in all phases, making available, clear impact targets and follow-up after completion of the project.

Course content

All courses are available as Powerpoint, PDF, video on Youtube and audio-interpreted version. The content reflects the needs of the target groups and covers a variety of everyday needs:

• Use e-mail
• Good in everyday life (e.g. shopping online)
• Travel (such as booking a travel service and buying bus tickets)
• E-leg, internet banking and Swish
• Find information on public authorities’ websites
• Communication support (including video calls with different apps)
• Download an app
• Search for news and culture
• Seeking information and risk awareness (including social media and source criticism)

Therefore, this is a good example

As society becomes increasingly digitised, large groups risk being excluded – both in everyday life and professionally. This can increase the risk of lack of care, limit participation in society, cause difficulties in managing the economy, and hinder the ability to reach and provide feedback in contact with the public (such as care and support).

Funk-IT Lyftet is an example of how projects can be implemented for target groups with challenges in using digital tools, and how it can be done with anchoring among users and user associations.

“I didn’t know how to get an email address. Now I’ve created an email account, and can write to my friends!

Course participants quoted in the final report *

In total, approximately 10000 uses of Funk-IT Lyftet’s course material have been registered (participants in courses/info and page views on internal and external web), and 85 % of course participants in the target groups and 92 % of staff who participated were very satisfied/satisfied with the content of the courses.*

The courses have not only developed the skills of target groups when it comes to using modern technology. It has also helped the instructors to get better at their job.

“There are so many people who need Funk-IT that are not in the digital world. We’ve had to focus, make it clear. The need is huge, not only for our target groups, but for many across Sweden.”

Instructor quoted in the final report *

* From Final Project Implementation Report: Funk-IT Lyftet – increased participation through courses that provide everyday digital competence.

Download the final report for the project (in English).

Each year, the Latvian National Centre for Education, together with LIKTA and with the support of companies in the Latvian ICT sector, organizes Latvian Olympiad in Informatics. Preparations for Olympiad, along with Latvian students’ participation in international coding Olympics, are coordinated and partly funded by the National Centre for Education (VISC), the Institute of Mathematics and Informatics at the University of Latvia, municipalities, and contributions from companies in the Latvian ICT sector.

Get to know the initiative

This event, known as the Latvian Olympiad in Informatics, is a multi-stage programming competition designed with the following objectives:

• Broaden and deepen students’ programming knowledge, fostering additional enthusiasm for coding and encouraging extracurricular engagement.

• Identify candidates for the Latvian National Unit to participate in international programming competitions.

• Cultivate students’ interest in developing effective algorithms and programming skills.

The Olympiad is divided into two age groups: junior (8th to 10th grade students) and senior (11th to 12th grade students). The junior category is also open to students below the eighth grade. It consists of three stages:

• Educational institution Olympiad

• Municipality Olympiad: Participants who demonstrate outstanding performance in their educational institution’s Olympiad are invited to compete at the municipality level. Additionally, other students who have achieved commendable results in programming and possess sufficient programming skills may apply for this stage.

• National Olympiad: Following the Municipality Olympiad, the organizing committee invites a maximum of 40 participants per age group based on their results.

At the conclusion of all stages of the Latvian Olympiad in Informatics, representatives are chosen to compete in the Baltic IT Olympiad, followed by the Global IT Olympiad.

Why is this a good practice?

The continued support of Latvian and international Olympiad by companies in the ICT sector is crucial. Such support encourages youth participation, promotes sectoral focus, and stimulates interest in coding and informatics.

Over the years, hundreds of students from schools across all Latvian regions have participated in the IT Olympiad, with many of the participants later pursuing professional careers in ICT.

• The 36th International Informatics Olympiad IOI 2024 was held from September 1 to 8 in the Egyptian city of Alexandria, on the campus of the Academy of Arab Sciences, Technology and Maritime Transport.
• Full results of both this and previous IOIs: https://stats.ioinformatics.org/
• In the coming years, the Olympics will be held in Bolivia (2025), Uzbekistan (2026) and Germany (2027).

Background

Training young people with the skills and competencies required by market players is key if we are to foster market growth in IT and other sectors, especially where the desired growth is linked to digital efficiency gains.

As regards the training/education of young people, academic training is often criticised for being unable to keep pace with rapidly changing technological developments, especially in the field of IT. The average age of teachers in Hungarian IT training is very high, a large percentage of the teachers working there are not in the market but only teaching. The IT sector, on the other hand, needs up-to-date market knowledge. The aim of the education fund initiative is to ensure that the knowledge gained by students during university classes is truly up-to-date, practical and from industry, so that after graduation they have the skills and knowledge that market participants need.

The aim of the large-scale national project “Programm your future!” is to increase the number of IT graduates in the coming years, thus contributing to reducing the current shortage of qualified IT staff, which is becoming increasingly important from a national economic point of view.

The main objective of the project is to improve the labour supply, support the development and training of IT competences in higher education so that the training system provides marketable knowledge that meets the needs of economic operators. The project works to introduce students to the technologies used by ICT companies. The project is supported by the Operational Programme using ESF funds. In the project, IVSZ is responsible, among others, for the concept of the so-called training fund and the implementation of the service.

The aim of the programme component is to expand existing and new cooperation between higher education institutions and ICT companies working in their environment, and to involve market specialists of companies in the practical training of universities. A priority objective is to integrate the practical knowledge and experience of companies into higher education IT curricula in order to provide students with practical technological, market and business knowledge and competences in addition to theoretical knowledge during their studies. This element of the project supports the development of cooperation between the two countries and provides practical support for concrete educational cooperation.

The biggest advantage of company tutoring is that it can bring real market knowledge to universities that will later be required by employees in practice. It can also greatly facilitate recruitment as these courses provide a platform to meet students, identify talented students who can later be employed by their company as interns or as full-time employees.

Reserve is also important for universities as there is a general feedback that universities do not have competent teaching staff due to lack of practical knowledge or capacity.

Key areas: Flexibility, DevOps, AI, cloud native, data science, test security, low-code platforms, embedded system technologies, 5G.

How does it really work?

A brokerage company was selected to perform the service of unifying teaching. Universities can identify their tutoring needs at the beginning of the academic year. For example, they have an AI course but no instructor. The university can send a request for a tutor to the intermediary company performing the service (the company was selected as a result of a procurement process). The university may have a specific ideal tutor it would like to invite (but cannot pay), or it may approach this intermediary company without a specific person (in which case only the fact of the demand for the tutor is fixed). If the university has a target person, the mediator hires and invites the person, enters into a contract with the person, facilitates the process to completion, and pays a fee to the instructor. If the university does not have a person in mind, the mediator searches among former teachers who have already been used within the service (pool of teachers), or if there is no person meeting the specified search criteria, he searches an IT company’s database for a suitable person. Invited guest speakers become members of the pool immediately after the first teaching session. The resulting database (pool) is owned by the project. For GDPR reasons, the list of trainers (nor the list of companies employing external trainers) is not public, but only information on the types of training conducted and the priority areas of training is published.

So far this reserve has been realized 4 times (4 procurements in 1-1 academic year)

A checkpoint has also been introduced to ensure the quality of the rigorous trainer placement processes. The need to include a guest lecturer from the market crystallises in universities well in advance of the start of the academic term, at which point they need to present their tutoring needs. Once the lecturer has been selected, the tutors and the university should jointly submit the description of the planned course to a “body” (3 members) which will check that the course covers eligible areas (areas where knowledge is currently lacking in the labour market). A topic description may be rejected if it does not provide market knowledge (e.g. introduction to basic calculus) or if the topic is not requested/requested by market participants. Of the Board members, 2 are IT specialists and 1 is a labour market expert. Each expert presents his/her own position, reasons and makes a decision by consensus. The “Board” considers the description of each topic.

Instructor needs may include an instructor to develop both hard and soft skills. For example, an IT life course was supported to develop soft skills by presenting project management methodologies and practices. IT companies complain a lot that recent graduates do not have appropriate soft skills, for example project-based thinking.

След като приеме описанието на темата, обучителят се подготвя за курса и изнася лекцията. Това може да бъде един урок или цял курс. След обучението, посредническата компания завършва административния процес и плаща на инструктора. Проектът също така извършва съответното плащане към посредника на редовни интервали от време. (от бюджета на проекта — такса за обучител + завършване на целия процес)

Pix is an initiative aiming at fighting the digital divide and enhancing the digital skills of the largest possible audience, through an online platform accessible to all, for free. Pix platform was created as an online service that aims at assessing, developing and certifying digital skills in France, Belgium, and Europe. After 6 years of existence, it helps +4,5m students per year improve their digital skills through fun and challenging tests, but also teachers monitor digital literacy of students.

Assessment and certification framework

At the beginning of each academic year, all students take a first evaluation on Pix to map out their level. Then, all teachers can rely on the results of this test to provide adequate training in relation to their subjects, and pupils continue developing their skills on Pix with dedicated subject-based (French, history-geography, maths, MIL, etc.) and thematic-based (cybersecurity, etc.) digital tests proposed by teachers. All of those tests are adapted to the level of the students and their classes and allow them to prepare for the certification exam in year 10 and 13.

The Pix assessment and certification framework is based on the European digital skills framework DigComp 2.2. It assesses the participant’s level with knowledge-based and challenged-based questions, according to the levels 1 to 7 of the DigComp (beginner to expert levels).

Pix uses an innovative adaptive algorithm, developed in open source, to assess its participants’ real level in a benevolent way through a positive experience. It also promotes skill development through a “learning by doing” experience and the recommendation of training content. Lastly, it allows the valorisation of the skills through an official certificate that can be obtained after a certification exam.

Why is this a good practice?

Today, 100% of secondary schools (around 11.000 schools) and 97 universities (150.000 students), in France are using Pix to assess, develop and certify their students’ (+4,5 millions) digital skills. In secondary schools, students start using Pix around 12 years old (year 8) and take a first mandatory certification at the end of middle school (year 10) and a second one at the end of highschool (year 13).

On a larger scale, 10 million accounts were created on Pix and 3 million certifications were delivered since 2016, making Pix Certification the first certification in terms of number in France. Overall, Pix attained its original objectives of 2 million users and even outperformed them. 1 billion questions were answered and are used for research purposes or to improve the algorithm.

Pix development

Noting the success of Pix and the 6.7 million users per year (of which +4.5 are students), ministries decided to make Pix a long-term player in digital education since September 2019: Pix is now the official French certification of digital literacy. Its development focuses on:

• Reinforcement of the formative dimension
• Thematic and sectorial approaches of digital issues in health, parenthood, cybersecurity…
• Extension of uses for teachers and other professionals, and beyond French borders.

Given this success, a specific “Pix+Edu” was initiated for teachers. Today, more than 12.000 teachers and teaching interns have already participated in the pilot project, and in 4 years it means to attain 500.000 teachers or teaching interns tested.

Beyond education

Pix is now used for a large diversity of audiences: employees, job seekers, adults in continuous training, digital inclusion beneficiaries, etc. Pix is available internationally in French and English languages. Students already use Pix in 16 countries around the world, including in Belgium, Spain, Denmark and Switzerland.

In 2021, the GIP Pix signed an agreement with the Wallonie-Bruxelles Federation (Belgium) to use Pix in education, administrations and for all citizens, and deployment in education started in 2022. This partnership is in a logic of co-construction and permanent co-management of a service of general interest conceived as a global “educational commons”, and aims at being enlarged to other countries.

Discussions are also ongoing with other ministries of education in and outside the EU to implement Pix. Finally, Pix platform was replicated for skills in written expression in French (Ecri+ project) and a similar project is studied for green skills.