Soft skills are becoming a necessity in today’s workforce. With the growth of emerging digital companies and the increased competition in the global job market, employees need to be well-rounded and have strong soft skills.

This article will explore the ESSENCE project, funded by the Erasmus+ programme, which aims to increase the employability of university students and its graduates through the development of soft skills.

Nowadays, it is crucial to match both technical knowledge and soft and intangible skills. To meet the demands of employers and recruiters connected with the most desirable competencies, the demand-driven employers’ perspective guided the structure of the courses.

GOALS – The Importance of Intangible Qualities

According to the research published by the World Economic Forum in 2016, in the era of digital automation and AI, career success factors are facing significant changes in all industries as time passes (especially in those with high technological coefficients). 

Nowadays, strategic competitiveness depends more and more on intellectual capital assets: the fourth industrial revolution– where new technologies such as the Internet of Things (IoT), robotics, virtual reality (VR) and artificial intelligence (AI) dominate the world- hence the need to create new managerial talents that are also highly empowered on both technical knowledge and soft and intangible abilities. 

ESSENCE project’s aim is to create a complete set of new soft abilities on the students and fresh graduates to enhance their educational and labour market competency.

In order to achieve this result, during the project partners developed training, courses, educational modules, content and, last but not least, 4 operational tools.

THE 4 INTELLECTUAL OUTPUTS

1 – OER Platform

The OER platform, available in seven languages, is meant to reach different international populations: students, trainers, and teachers who specialize in labour, business experts with substantial knowledge in HR and PR, entrepreneurs, and managing directors. The material has been transcoded into an e-learning format for the target groups and other stakeholders to benefit.

2 – Mapping the Soft Skills

The 2nd Intellectual Output linked soft skills with employability by mapping the most desirable soft skills among employers within the EU countries based on questionnaires distributed among the private sector and business associations.

3 – Toolkit to Learn New Abilities

For each soft skill identified as fundamental in the mapping’s process, a Training content is available, more specifically:

• Coordinating with others
• creativity
• emotional intelligence
• judgment and Decision-Making
• Complex Problem-Solving
• Critical Thinking
• Cognitive flexibility
• Go to the Essence Decision Games

4 – Guidelines and the Soft Skill Manifesto

In order to maintain project materials and dissemination after Erasmus + co-financing ended, intellectual output 4 consists of two components: 

1. The guidelines will aim to mainstream them and foster their use across geographic areas. You can find them here: Guidelines
2. A soft skills manifesto, aimed at university administrations to encourage employability and empowerment of employees in the business community and organisation environment. You can download the pdf here: Manifesto

Partners of the project

• UNIVERSITY OF INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY AND MANAGEMENT
• IBAF
• IDDP
• UNIDU
• IHF
• SSE RIGA
• INTERNET WEB SOLUTIONS
• UNIVERSITY OF ECONOMICS – VARNA

L'articolo Project Result | Learn New Soft Skills With ESSENCE proviene da Youth Networks.

RuReality | Social Entrepreneurship

The topics of “RuReality” project were sustainable entrepreneurship and rural development.

The main idea that we wanted to convey was encouraging youngsters to repopulate
rural areas creating sustainable business, cooperating with the territory and other enterprises, and participating actively in the social and political life.

We created ideas and considerations on it with the youngsters involved to see how
this could be achievable, therefore stimulating them to develop entrepreneurial ideas following this approach.

Download the output.

Youth Exchange in Ligonchio

The Youth Exchange took place in Ligonchio (Italy), a depopulated area in the Apennines, and involved 37 young people from Bulgaria, Croatia, Italy, the Netherlands and Spain.
During the meeting we implemented workshops on social entrepreneurship, sustainability, visited local social enterprises and, finally, we guided the participants in developing 4 entrepreneurial ideas, to be implemented in the area of Ligonchio.
During the workshops we used several methodologies, mostly inspired to the “Youth@Work” methodology, developed during the Capacity Building project “SEEDS.2” of Associazione Joint.

This short presentation of the activities aims at inspiring all the youth workers and organisations who want to develop projects on similar topics. For more information on the specific methodologies, do not hesitate to contact us.

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Partners:
Associazione di promozione sociale Joint (Italy)
ASOCIACIÓN BRÚJULA INTERCULTURAL (Spain)
Green Association (Bulgaria)
Lag Sava (Croatia)
International Labour Association ILA (Netherlands)

L'articolo Project Result | “RuReality”, Social Entrepreneurship proviene da Youth Networks.

• more than 60% of educators face difficulties in continuing their studies through electronic platforms during the pandemic.

Starting from that, eADULTS collected the best practices of virtual, online and remote education activities for educators and teachers.

The Project

The Covid crisis has showed how the field of education is not 100% prepared to face a virtual, online and/or distance teaching model. This is especially notable in adult education, as this target shows to be less-skilled when it comes to digital competences.

This was the starting point of this “Exchange of good practices for promoting virtual education among adult people through electronic platforms” (eAdults), which arose from the need to seek, identify and evaluate which were the most effective educational platforms and methods in a context of virtual teaching for adults.

The objective was achieved through an exchange of best practices between Bulgaria, Italy,
Poland, Portugal, Spain and Sweden. Due to this, the entities that are part of this project were able to increase their knowledge in the field of virtual education and electronic platforms in the field of education (specially among adult people).

The following activities were carried out:

• Context Analysis | A questionnaire was designed to identify which platforms
  were the ones that students and educators had used the most during the
  confinements, as well as how their experience had been using these platforms
  and if they considered face-to-face or virtual education to be better.
• Mapping Best Practices | A template was designed to identify good practices in
  virtual adult education that have happened during lockdowns and the
  pandemic.
• Transnational Workshop | Based on the context analysis and the mapping of
  good practices, a virtual workshop was designed where the different functionalities of the platforms in non-formal education activities were put into practice. At the end of the workshop, the participating students and educators evaluated each of the platforms and gave their final verdict.

Project Results

eAdults have generated evidence for other educational entities (or dedicated to the field of education), so they can develop new, alternative and effective virtual teaching activities tailored to the needs of educators and adult students. At the same time, this project serves as an initial step for the partner organisations to continue researching on online, virtual and distance education.

See the results below:
Good practices in virtual adult education
Results of the survey
How the project started

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Project partners:
Associazione di promozione sociale Joint
BB&R
Universidad de Salamanca
Rosto Solidario
MoreMosaic
SAFE Project
Regionlne Centrum Wolontariatu

Co-financed by the Erasmus Plus programme of the European Union.

L'articolo Project Result: eADULTS | Exchange of good practices proviene da Youth Networks.

The Project: Living Solidarity Alliance

The general aim is to increase the ability to work more effectively, with a focus on solidarity, with young people, and to find new inspiration on how solidarity can be more present in our society.

Referring to the recent developments on the youth policy level in Europe and the challenging situation of young people in Europe (Covid19, unemployment, rising of populism, climate crisis), the partners of the project want to contribute as NGOs to the development of a strategic and systematic support structure to empower young people to participate in activities with a solidarity focus.

The Guidebook

The Guidebook “Living Solidarity Alliance In Practice” sets out methods for inclusion, participation and community building.

“How can solidarity become more present in our activities? What can we do to develop a sense of solidarity in our communities through youth work? This manual practically implements the methods and approaches that we have developed or adapted while searching for a deeper understanding of these questions. We have collected expert knowledge of already existing methodologies and created new ways (often in cooperation with other local organisations) to share the methods bringing more solidarity into our everyday activities. Some of the essential values in life are human bonds and continuously learning about ourselves and the world around us. Through various methods, including shorter and longer interactive experiences, we encourage reflection on universal values and the role of different aspects of solidarity in our life.”

The 3 dimensions of solidarity – inclusion, participation and community building – may serve as orientation points for you and your organisation to find the methods that best respond to your needs at the moment.

The methods are presented similarly with some key points: the connection with solidarity; the aim and target group; step by step how it works and how the methodological work needs to be applied; materials and tools required; experience of participants or possible options.

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Living Solidarity Alliance Website
Facebook page
Contact: living.solidarity.alliance@gmail.com

Partners of the project:
Associazione di promozione sociale Joint
PANGEYA Ultima
Arte Ego
CABUWAZI
Tandem

Read also

Project Results: How non-formal learning supports education policy – Time 4 Tea

Project Results: BEYOND VISIBLE

L'articolo Guidebook: Living Solidarity Alliance In Practice proviene da Youth Networks.

Time For Tea is an initiative of Momentum World CIC. The project is being further developed through an Erasmus+ strategic partnership between Poland, Italy, Spain and the UK, together with the following partners: Associazione di promozione sociale Joint, Regionalne Centrum Wolontariatu w Kielcach, Biderbost, Boscan & Rochin. 

Any teacher, teaching assistant or youth worker can lead a Time for Tea project, with a group of any age, either in school or somewhere else. No special knowledge is required.

The Project

Time for Tea is an educational activity which uses tea to give young people a voice. It encourages global learning, creative thinking and social action. It is a 3-stage process which gets children and young people thinking about important issues and then communicating their ideas to people who make decisions.

1 – Prepare

• Plan your activities. Choose which class or group of children or young people you will work with. Remember – it needs to be their own project: the teacher’s role is to advise and support. 
• Encourage the group to explore the issues that matter to young people about the world, near or far.
• Facilitate a discussion and reach a decision on which topic is most important to them: what do they want to say about it, and who do they want to hear them?

2 – Create

• Get some tea, and help the young people to work together to design an imaginative packet for the tea together with their message. Encourage them to be as creative as possible.

3 – Communicate

• The young people should then deliver their tea and message to the person or people they have chosen. (They will need help from the teacher and perhaps other adults, to arrange the necessary contacts). The only request to the recipient is to drink the tea and think about the message; but with luck, they will send an answer or offer to meet the group.
• Tell the story of your project, through video, photographs or other media (again, let the young people themselves decide how to do it). This will then be shared with the world on the Time for Tea website, leading to possible links between schools in different countries, and further international projects.

Project Results

One of the problems faced by teachers is that their freedom of activity is (or seems to be) restricted by the policy framework within which they work. This makes it difficult to incorporate non-formal education into a school context, other than as wholly extra-curricular activities which are often impossible because of a lack of staff time, access to premises, and other resources. If school directors / principals and other senior policy-makers do not understand the point of non-formal learning, they may not support this kind of activity. In order to get their support, it is necessary to “speak their language” and show that their priorities will be actively enhanced by the proposed activities.

This handbook has been produced to help teachers, youth workers and other educators to understand how non-formal learning activities can be integrated into the framework of a formal school curriculum. More specifically, the aim of this document is to enable teachers to overcome obstacles and to get approval for introducing such activities (in particular, Time for Tea, as described below) into their work.

Further information is available in the Time4Tea website.

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Facebook page of the project.
Twitter page of the project.
Email: timefortea@momentumworld.org

Read also

Project Results: BEYOND VISIBLE

Project Results: Wellbeing Toolkit

L'articolo Project Results: How non-formal learning supports education policy – Time 4 Tea proviene da Youth Networks.

The Project

“Beyond Visible” was an international training course organised by “No Borders Association“, financed by the European Union in the framework of Erasmus+. For one week, in the beautiful area of Casalino di Ligonchio, youth workers from 10 different countries were exploring the Sensory Labyrinth Theatre as a tool of connection, emotional awareness and community building. 

The Sensory Labyrinth Theatre

Sensory Labyrinth Theatre is a kind of immersive theatre used to develop trust, awareness, empathy and connection. It was created by Iwan Brioc as an applied theatre methodology with therapeutic potential, inspired by Vargas ‘Poetics of the senses’. 

“SLT ramps up the inherent but suppressed sensitivity of human sensory perception and the suppressed capacity of luminosity inherent in everyday experience. Individual audience members journey alone through a darkened three-dimensional labyrinth and along the way encounter moments and meetings that provoke subconscious sensory memories (sensory portals) into which they are gently invited to fall. In accepting this invitation constructs such as time and space, me and you, the inner and the outer start to collapse. Framed for the audience as ‘theatre,’ this space also takes on the added dimensions of the aesthetic space – memory, and imagination: so that consciousness and this conditioned process of construction we call ‘reality’ can become an observable phenomenon – observed by the ‘character’ of the traveller in the performance.” 

Project’s Purpose

One of the aims of SLT is to awaken the senses beyond the dominant five senses we use in everyday life, in particular our overwhelming reliance on sight. Research suggests that we in fact have many more senses, and SLT attempts to draw out this awareness. It also aims to develop deep trust and connection, as the traveller in the performance is guided blindfolded by the group of performers, who seek to look after that person and be totally present and caring as they guide them. 

There can be many participants in sensory labyrinth theatre. The complexity of creating the labyrinth and delicacy of the performance may be better suited to adults, but could also be done with young people. Adults who experienced childhood trauma may also find therapeutic and healing potential in experiencing the Labyrinth and rebuilding this trust and experience of nurture and care. The more participants involved, the more sensory portals the Labyrinth can have. 

How To Use The Sensory Theatre

Participants ‘performing’ the labyrinth should spend some time in the creation process, considering what narrative, message, journey or sensory experiences they would like to give to their audience. The audience member will be guided blindfolded through the multi-dimensional labyrinth one at a time, guided through different sensory portals. These portals could take the traveller through different senses of touch, smell, sound, taste, or explore the traveller’s other senses of distance, time, balance, intuition, and dive deep into emotions or memories. 

The Labyrinth can be created with any found materials and tools. Everything that surrounds us is multi-sensory, we just need to awaken our awareness to see the multi sensory potential in all things. It is good to have a couple of people stationed on each sensory portal, because timing the Labyrinth can require some improvisation if a traveller moves faster or slower through the labyrinth than expected. 

Elements of different disciplines can be brought together in sensory labyrinth theatre, such as contact improvisation, dance, music, singing, sound baths etc. Also elements of sensory labyrinth theatre can be taken and used for shorter activities, such as a sensory labyrinth walk through nature that invites people to awaken their senses. 

The labyrinths are site-specific events that can be co-created with the community in order to build trust and connection but also to revisit local places and discover what is beyond visible.

Read also

Project Results: “Inner Bridge: From Self Awareness To Self Expression”

Project Results: Wellbeing Toolkit

L'articolo Project Results: BEYOND VISIBLE proviene da Youth Networks.

About

Based on the Nonviolent Communication approach and ways of understanding self-care, the toolkit wishes to address a broad topic of wellbeing. Understanding the relationship between needs that are met and unmet that are the reasons for our emotional states, the aim is to propose a few strategies for achieving a state of well-being in everyday life.

The toolkit shares a few ideas of how you can contribute to be able to draw conclusions for yourself from the proposed practices and your day to day life, complete your routine with reflection practices. It will help you discover what supports your self-care and well-being most, and your local community.

Why do we consider it important? Well, “no man is an island”, we are all interconnected. We all need each other for different reasons. We are all social beings, we need others as much as they need us. Having good relations with others is essential for well-being.

The Project

The project CORE was designed as a process of exploration of self that led to understanding a broader context of our roles in society. During the training course, the participants have researched themselves in the context of a group and widened the understanding of their emotions, values & needs. This helped develop a sense of civic responsibility.

The participants took the perspective of the community, felt the power of unity and unlocked the creative potential for building engagement, empathy and responsibility in each individual.

The outcome of this project is this toolkit.

The partners of the project are:

• LUBLA
• ADRIBS
• KABUWAZI
• Tandem NGO
• Csoma’s Room Foundation
• Associazione Joint
• ARTE EGO Foundation
• Friends of Children in Romania
• Celulas Durmientes

Read also

Communication Guidelines For Project Beneficiaries

L'articolo Project Results: Wellbeing Toolkit proviene da Youth Networks.

• Italy (Stranaidea)
• Netherlands (Yes! Youth Exchange Service)
• Hungary (Galileo)
• Latvia (Jaunpils)

It started back in July 2019, with the very first event as a Transnational Training Course in Turin, Italy. During such event, teachers and youth workers from partner organisations experienced the Fairy Tales Life Storytelling Cards Method themselves. They learned and discovered how to implement the method in the 1st round of national workshops with school students, that took place later on in December.

Purpose of the project

The intent of this Strategic Partnership is to build an inclusive approach to formal and non-formal education on the basis of storytelling, through a specific practice, the “Fairy Tale Life cards”.

Methodology

The method includes the use of a deck of cards to create stories, under the inspiration of Vladimir Jakovlevič Propp’s cards and studies, about the identification of structures and elements recurring in the stories and tales, where diversity and different types of disadvantages are a factor belonging to the characters.

The Fairy Tales Life Storytelling Cards is a method that young people can use, with their own imagination, life experiences and empathic skills in order to work on Social Inclusion. The basis is an empty deck of cards and some supporting activities, but anyone is free to use only a part of it, the whole method or just to adapt it according to the needs of their target group.

Each time a group plays, they create a new and customized deck of cards. The group itself creates all the cards and actually draws them. Each deck of cards is a new adventure, with different settings, themes and characters. The creation of the deck of cards is the real challenge and the core of the method.

Project’s Results

The outputs of the project are meant to be disseminated to teachers and young people, who want to experiment social inclusion through this new, innovative way.

The results and outputs are downloadable.

Read also

Toolbox on Values, Sustainability and Social Impact of Social-Solidarity Economy

Civil Society Cooperation Call 2022 Erasmus KA3 Info Day

L'articolo Fairy Tales Life: Erasmus+ KA2 Strategic Partnership Project proviene da Youth Networks.

Erasmus Plus KA3

Key Action 3 provides grants for a wide variety of actions aimed at stimulating innovative policy development, policy dialogue and implementation, and the exchange of knowledge in the fields of education, training and youth. The Calls for Proposals (managed by EACEA) cover one of the following fields:

• Civili society cooperation
• Initiatives for policy innovation
• European policy experimentations

Funds go to a range of calls for tender and restricted calls, such as studies and surveys, European policy tools, cooperation with international organisations, and stakeholders dialogue, policy and programme promotion.

Selection Results

If you applied to this Call, you can find the results HERE.

If you did not apply… learn more about this and other European opportunities in Youthnetworks and don’t miss the next call for proposals!

L'articolo Selection Results: European Policy Experimentations (Erasmus+ KA3) proviene da Youth Networks.

The project was implemented in cooperation of three creative associations from Latvia, France and Italy.

The main theme uniting all the activities and outputs of this project is body and movement based learning – its important concepts, principles, benefits, approaches and various methods, viewing the physical body as a domain of learning and transformation.

Partners have developed an online course about body and movement based learning and an embodied learning toolkit 

Find out more about this project and get access to the toolkit, online course and a podcast HERE.

L'articolo BODY and MOVEMENT as tools to develop an entrepreneurial mindset – Embodied Change proviene da Youth Networks.