The marine industry is a key component of the European economy and includes activities such as traditional shipping, offshore oil and gas, renewables and offshore construction. These activities are undertaken on sight by ships and offshore facilities, supported from shore by a complementary cluster which includes ships’ construction, repair, management, chartering, survey, classification, insurance, consultancy, valuation and finance. The marine education and training organisations and the recruitment companies are key stakeholders and part of the industry value chain, as they educate and supply workforce for the marine industry. In this context, the project main objective was to improve the employability skills and work opportunities for marine workers and to reduce the existing gap between the education and labour market, by diversification of career paths and skills recognition. This project led by Constanta Maritime University, Romania envisaged supplying better quality personnel and targeting the full range of primary and support activities of the marine industry. Such approach needs to proactively consider the trends outlook of the rapidly changing industry, shaped by technological advancement and the supply and demand curves. In order to respond to these challenges, we collaborated with researchers from Nikola Yonkov Vaptsarov Naval Academy from Bulgaria, European Association of Career Guidance from Cyprus and STC-Group, from Netherlands. Specifically, we built a collaborative network to continuously identify the gaps between marine labour market needs and educational field in terms of both hard and soft skills. We used this network and 200+ marine professionals to identify those skills that are most required by marine labour market. The skills base equally refers to the technical skills adapted to new technologies and activities, and to the soft skills that assist employees to demonstrate and complement their hard skills. Employers benefit from both above categories of skill sets by enriching their intangible resources through improved organisational competences. EU recognises this context and recommends education development through increasing quality of and access to vocational education and training and their adaptation to labour market needs.The next stage was represented by creation of teaching curricula focused on areas of hard skills shortage, targeting new marine qualifications: -Ballast water management-Energy efficiency of ships -Dynamic positioning maintenance -Marine surveying -Cargo surveyor -High Voltage Safety and Maintenance -Electronic navigational chartsIn order to promote the continuous professional development of educational staff and marine workers in using ICT methodologies for training and assessment four learning sessions have been organized. Ten educational staff from partners’ institutions participated to two short term training sessions aiming to establish a common framework for skills development and assessment for: Effective communication, Leadership, Teamwork and Problem-solving.The developed materials and learning assessments were integrated in a E-platform for blended learning to facilitate target group’s access to training and certification. A system for recognition and validation of work-related skills and learning outcomes was integrated on the platform and it was tested during two pilot courses with 25 participants from Romania and Bulgaria. The project results impacted on the marine labor market, marine workers, training organizations and VET trainees that benefit from improved and transparent system for blended learning, new curricula for soft and technical skills development and assessment, better trainers and adequately trained and certified employees. Longer term benefits include:-E-platform for blended learning and assessment, continued online survey to identify the marine labour market requirements, curricula developed for seven marine specific subjects and for four soft skills. -Update of the database of the Classification of Occupation from Romania with marine specific occupations: Expert for operation of Dynamic positioning systems, Marine surveyor, Inland waterways surveyor and Technician for dynamic positioning system maintenance. -International recognition for continuing professional development by participation to courses for: Marine surveying, Cargo surveyor, High Voltage Safety and Maintenance, Electronic navigational charts.-Professional development of educational staff in using ICT and new pedagogical approaches for teaching and assessment, which represents a benefit for the new generation of learners.Through academic articles, workshops, multiplier events and panel session, the results were transferred to 500+ direct and indirect participants: future and actual marine workers, marine employers, trainers and training institutions that can provide training in accordance with the marine labour market expectations.

Projectcontext:Boatsmen/ master in the Inland Navigation industry is increasingly becoming a highly international profession, with workers from many different (cultural) backgrounds. Besides the fact that this makes it an interesting area of work, it also carries along some challenges, amongst others with respect to these different cultures and backgrounds. Too many accidents, a large amount of them due to errors in communication, still happen on the European Inland Waterway's: in between vessels, but also amongst the crew of a single vessel and personal accidents. These facts call for other, adapted competences for our students. The partners in this project are all part of a big community, better known as EDINNA (www.edinna.eu). Directors/management of 31 inland waterway transport educational institutes from 18 different countries are member of EDINNA, however the teachers of those institutes don’t actually know each other. Communication and safety is one of the main reasons EDINNA developed EDINNA Riverspeak and is therefore suitable to be used within the CLIS-Project. Riverspeak is an ensemble of jargon and nautical terms that are being used in the inland navigation. Riverspeak is designed to have one communication language in inland navigation (English). Objectives:- To develop a course in general Safety in Inland Navigation on (pre) vocational level, consisting of the following topics: Cultural awareness, Standardised communication phrases in English to be used on and in between vessels, competences with respect to personal safety, risks assessment, accident prevention, prevention of collission, first aid, men over board procedures, etc.- For students and teachers to experience and learn from cooperation and communication in (online) intercultural teams, - To create, develop and expand intercultural and international professional and personal networks for both students as teachers- To expand an international network and international contacts as part of the strategy of STC-groupParticipant number/profile:All partners in this project are ((pre) vocational) educational institutes dealing with the education of students willing to work as boatmen/masters on European rivers. All partners, from the Netherlands, Germany, Austria and Belgium, educate their students as part of the (pre- )vocational system and have similar aims: to prepare their students as best as possible to be able to navigate and work safely on European waterways, and to become well-qualified crew members. Our participants are students in Inland Shipping (15-19 years old), teachers in English, Inland Navigation and safety related topics (3 teachers per partner, approx 20 students per partner, one or two projectmanagers per partner). Activities:The materials have been developed in working groups of teachers, communicating through e-twinning and other online facilities. Besides projectmeetings pupil exchanges have been organised, where the course was introducted and tested, and students met each other in joint assignments. The materials will be implemented in the day to day school context, where students (amongst others) will work together in a joint assignments, in order to eventually reach the competences that our project aims for. Methodology:The project has been managed according the Prince2 project management principles. Prince2 is an acronym for 'Projects in Controlled Environments'. All procedures in the Prince 2 methodology aim to control the project and to make it managable and in line with the agreements made, the overall and specific objects, all being executed in the set timeframe. Results, impact and long term benefits: The project has the following results:- Intensive cooperation and knowledge exchange between students and teachers of different ages, backgrounds and cultures- Increased self confidence, motivation and managing skills of students (because of the cooperation and teamwork/peer review)- Increased language competences (English) for teachers as a result of the intercultural cooperation and communication- Increased competences with respect to the personal safety on board for our students - Increased competences with respect to the use of standardized English communication for our students - Increased understanding and respect of/for different cultures, fading of European boundaries for students, teachers, others involved and our organisations as a whole- A more internationally orientated focus of all partnerorganisations and an extended and more divers international network- As a result of the intellectual output in the long term: less accidents on and between vessels in the European Inland waterways - Increased employability of all students involved (broadening of network, job perspective and job rotation/job exchange in Europe), due to both the cultural agility/flexibility, as wel as the standardised competences in both use of standard English communication and safety handling on board/be

"Technological advances are profoundly changing the multiple work processes that take place in the ""port world"". It is a singular intersection of private and public disciplines where the interests of a plurality of subjects are gathered: public bodies in the port and maritime sectors in their various forms, loading and unloading companies, carriers and shippers, industrial companies and other users, port workers, and of course, the entire national community, becouse the economic and social importance of the ports themselves. In this context, work in ports requires even greater professionalism, specialization, safety and stability.Ports are an asset of vital importance for the European economy. In fact, over 70% of goods crossing European borders travel by sea and ports really represent the commercial gateway to Europe. European ports employ 1.5 million people and manage goods for a total value of 1,700 billion euros each year.A port is not only consist in breakwaters, dams, docks, dockyards, wharves and piers but it also consist in technological networks able to communicate with ships, trains and goods lorries.The port labour demand has fundamentally changed its characteristics due to technological innovation and the high degree of automation processes. This demand is reduced in terms of number of units of workers, but at the same time this raises the level of skills and training required for the port operations being carrying out. This level can only be guaranteed by high quality on going and refreshing training systems that are able to identify the needs of companies and motivate, listen and involve port workers in port work changes.The objective of the project is to define the basis for a European training plan in ports that, while respecting the individual national regulations, identify common applicable elements throughout the European Union. The project will focus on the exchange of best practices on continuous training for the development of innovative professional skills on the following topics:1)New port skills: training systems to update the skills of the workers in the perspective of the increasing automation of the port terminals. Optimization and sharing of plans for continuous training. Retraining themes:- Digitization- Automation2)Port government bodies, entrepreneurs and managers in project partner countries: exchange of best practices from application of the European law on the guidance and management of ports to the organization of port in relation to new European legislation on privacy.3)Port system organization:- Environmental sustainability of the ports - Ports integration in the urban area- Energy from renewable sources in port areas- Safety and security: best practices for involving companies and organizations working together on transversal issues in the port system.Exchanges of best practices will include meetings in partner countries for 3 to 5 days maximum.A maximum of 72 pupils (participants + accompaining person), divided between partner countries, may be involved during the project time. They will be selected in each partner country among port workers in port terminal, port authoryties, port companies, marittime authoryties depending the topics of the meetings.One of the results of the project is a network creation with the partner of the project and other institution not partners in this project building a cooperation to set up a technical board aimed at develop the many initiatives including:a) build and consolidate a cooperation network;b) build and share criteria and methodologies to realize new projects for validating and certifying professional skills in the port, logistics and maritime sector;c) build criteria and operational modalities to encourage the mobility of human resources in the port and logistics sector;d) cooperate in matter of learning and skill certification, development programs as per premise;f) involve respective territorial networks disseminating the objectives of the project in the areas of interest in order to extend the multiplier effect and promote networking.The impact of the project at the local, regional, national, European levels is the develop of the skills and competences of port workers (manager, enterpreneurs, chiefs of personell, trainers, tutors, etc...) concerning:-- new professionals profiles discussed in meetings- transferrable analysis of units of learning outcomes in the port sector using procedures related to evaluation, transfer, validation and adding of learning outcomes in formal, informal and not formal contexts- information and diffusion to stakeholders and wide public- increased employability and social inclusion in the port sector"

Projectcontext:The Competency Based Inland Waterway Transport Education & Training (IWTCOMP) supports the implementation of the European directive 2017/2397, on the recognition of professional qualifications in inland navigation. According to this EU Directive all Inland Shipping Training and Education institutes must be prepared to comply with the CESNI Standards of competence, built around tables of competencies for personnel working on board inland vessels on Operational Level (OL) and Management Level (ML) and lay down the minimum key competences for staff working on board of an inland vessel in the entire EU. Due to this new Directive, the IWT education and training institutes need to get prepared for competency based education, assessing and examination.Objectives:The purpose of IWTCOMP project is to lay the foundation for competency-based education and training for the IWT sector, to ensure that every student in the EU possesses the same competencies on OL and ML after graduating from their study or training. To reach these goals, teachers need to be able to educate students in the competency-based system. Within the IWTCOMP project specific products were developed to prepare the institutes in training and assessing with the competency based approach, namely:•Table with CESNI Standards of competence on OL and ML combined with EQF levels•A collection of best practices in competency based education•A train-the-trainer course on competency based education, including didactical manual and supporting (e-)learning materialsProject partners number/profileThe 6 IWTCOMP partners are members of EDINNA (Education in Inland Navigation), the network of all existing inland navigation education and training institutes in the EU. All these institutes educate their students for their future jobs and have therefore similar aims: to prepare their students to navigate and work safely on European waterways, and to become well-qualified crew members. All teachers working within these institutes must be prepared in training and assessing with the competency based approach. From all partners a project manager and 2 or more teachers were involved in the development of the intellectual outputs. Besides additional teachers from every partner were involved in the trainer the trainer course and workshops conducted during the project.Activities:The application of the EQF system in the different partner member states was analysed and compared to the existing qualifications for IWT. After review by national EQF experts, findings were discussed during a meeting with all EDINNA members. Conclusions were drawn about the use of the EQF system for IWT and a proposal for minimum job requirements for IWT job qualifications.The collection of best practices in Competence Based training started with a study on the definitions used, such as “competence based learning” and “best practices”. With these definitions as a framework the examples from EDINNA members as well as education institutes from related sectors, such as maritime, shipbuilding, fishery, etc were gathered.The development of the train the trainer course was done by first defining the target group (teachers), objectives and main subjects. It was decided to create a didactical manual as well as additional (e-)learning material, which can be used as an integrated set of learning materials. The topics were divided and developed by different partners. All materials were reviewed by EDINNA members. During the course evaluation was done by a dedicated evaluator, the trainer and the 12 participants. To reach a higher amount of teachers follow-up workshops were conducted within each partner institute. These 6 different workshops in 4 different countries were led by the participants of the train the trainer course and a total of 90 teachers from different sectors attended these workshops.Results, impact and long term benefitsBy means of this project and the members of EDINNA, IWTCOMP did lay the foundations on a European level for competency based education and training for IWT throughout the EU, furthermore it will ensure that every student will benefit from this approach and be able to work in inland navigation in every EU Member State, and at last the systematic approach of IWTCOMP can be transferred to other sectors as well. Students will receive a high quality training provided by the well trained trainers and they can acquire required competencies needed to work in the IWT sector. This results in bigger changes of finding a job. The trainers trained during the lifetime of IWTCOMP will become multipliers and will train other teachers with the material developed in the project, and thereby facilitating the uptake of competency based education and training by all IWT E&T institutes throughout the EU. This way, the outcomes of IWTCOMP will strengthen key competences in Inland Waterway Transport curricula and will lay foundations for future use by other sectors.

In times when intelligent learning has been accelerated by the COVID-19 pandemic and there is a massive shift towards the online environment in global learning, the position of any sector depends on how much they embrace digitalisation. Consequently, how education and training will cope with the requirements of the present and how they will prepare in order to be futureproof are issues that can be addressed only if relevant institutions react and unite in partnerships able to put together their knowledge, their experience and resources.Therefore, aiming at improved capacity and efficiency of E&T institutions to provide digital training, 6 partners in as many EU countries (Romania, Bulgaria, Croatia, Netherlands, Latvia and Estonia) saw rather the opportunity than the setbacks of this challenging period and decided to work together for improved digital training and assessment of waterborne transport personnel through an increased level of digital competences of VET teachers/ trainers, realising that current needs and challenges in terms of capacity of educators to deliver digital education are quite common and the joint solution is developing the right tools and adapting the proper digital solutions with the support of technology providers as Associated Partners and stakeholders. Through a more efficient uptake of digital technologies for teaching and learning in a consolidated manner and not just in certain corners of the EU, high quality results of the educational process can be maintained even if the traditional “in classroom” environment cannot be used 100% of the time. As the theoretical part of the training is almost completely available in digital format, the focus of DERIN project will be for the practical training, or at least a certain percentage of it, to be shifted in the digital environment using the right tools, considering the vast diversity available and the fast pace the technology advances in the industry. The partnership consists of a VET school, three maritime and inland waterway training centres on their own or as part of maritime academies/ technical universities, a worldwide operating educational and research institution and a higher education institution. Coordinated by CERONAV, the partners will select the relevant learning modules adaptable to innovative multimedia tools, applications and resources, will test and familiarize themselves with the mentioned tools followed by the development of corresponding multimedia learning materials (curriculum, teaching methods, procedures, role-play scenarios, videos etc.) as a toolkit for practical training including also guidelines for trainers. For a highly relevant outcome, three learning teaching training activities will take place. A special training activity for students will allow trainers to include feedback from the end-users and trainees to gain knowledge and competence for the new working environment. As use of simulators in maritime and inland navigation education and training is an essential component for developing trainees’ competencies necessary for the job, a special attention will be given to developing innovative and easily accessible course modules via open educational resources on the internet. Specially designed to boost capacity of VET teachers and trainers, focussing on their digital competencies and capacity to upskill for innovative online resources and tools, their usage and design, the project will develop a toolkit for teachers/ trainers including newly developed materials. To take a step further and have a larger scope, policy recommendation and guidelines will be developed to focus on the impact and legacy of the project targeted towards sector’s stakeholders at the local, regional, national and European level concerned with maritime and inland waterway transport and the successful design and implementation of e-learning programme.The large sector of waterborne transport has to be taken into consideration, with all its implications in EU economy as training is always fundamental in an industry so well regulated and standardized at international level. Dissemination activities will be rolled out in order to raise awareness, increase knowledge, influence attitude and finally change behaviour of interested and relevant parties including at least one Multiplier Event in each of the six partner countries. Quality monitoring and control activities will ensure high standard outcomes and sustainable results to be transferred in different education areas and, with the support of Associated Partners to reach larger territories.