"As identified in the initial project proposal, the Promoting Green Games project sought to develop an educational digital game & associated resources to innovate & support improvements in the area of sustainability education in schools, along with a toolkit for teachers to aid in the integration of this game in the classroom. The project achieved this primary goal by creating a game & associated resources to support the introduction, integration & support of sustainability (&/ or climate action) education & activity within schools for both students & for teachers. The developed project outputs have been subject to testing, feedback & re-development a number of times over the course of the project to align them as closely as possible to the needs of the target audience & education sector & the main outputs (primarily the game & associated training material) are currently freely available on all major mobile formats & in public repositories such as the iOS store & Google play store. Feedback from pilot participants indicated an extremely positive opinion towards the use of the game for teaching & learning.The project has exceeded expectation in a number of key areas. In particular, the project has developed a large number of resources, beyond the initial targeted expectations identified in the project proposal. In particular, the project has developed a number of online platforms (3 in total, beyond the single platform - O5 - defined in the proposal) in order to diversify and promote the individual elements of the project - the developed project game (http://penjiithegame.com/), the teacher back-end supporting the game (https://teachers.penjiithegame.com/) and the ""official"" online platform housing all developed resources (http://greenskillsgame.eu/). The project has developed a large and varied amount of training material as part of the game development process and has made this material across multiple formats and media, ranging from the in-game learning resources to classroom-based posters, to online animations. The project has developed an innovative digital game, which not only serves as an engaging tool for supplying and raising awareness about key sustainability/ climate action areas - including climate change, plastic pollution, biodiversity, the SDGs, climate justice, household water, food and energy waste - but has, as part of this development, created an innovative approach supporting sustainability and climate action education in which Game-Based-Learning can be used as part of a flipped classroom approach to support climate action education inside of and outside of the classroom and which can ultimately support teachers and students in creating genuine impact and action. This innovative approach arises from the presence of a “Teacher Back-End”, linked to the developed digital game, through which teachers can release specific levels to students so that students can learn about one or more of the 4 key climate action areas covered by the game - either in-class or outside the classroom. Teachers can then further build on students’ in-game learning by accessing a range of curated existing climate action education resources, alongside bespoke climate action education resources developed as part of the project, through the teacher back-end website and/ or project game website in order to deepen student learning through in-class activities and supports. Teachers can also, as a fourth step, utilise a database of climate action initiatives aimed at primary and secondary schools available on the the game website and teacher back-end to identify suitable initiatives which their students and/ or schools can become involved in, in order to create genuine impact. The project results have been validated with a large audience - primarily the key target audience of teachers and students in primary and secondary schools, but also with organisations/ institutions charged with supporting sustainability/ climate action education alongside policy makers, education representatives, public representatives, etc. Feedback on the project outputs has been uniformly positive and ongoing activities look to embed the resources in the area of sustainability/ climate action education for schools across Europe. The project was widely disseminated to a large range of participants across multiple channels locally, nationally, across Europe and internationally - through face-to-face meetings, conferences, festivals and events, through piloting activities and trainings and through a wide range of online means. The developed project outputs are freely available and have been developed and provided so that they remain freely available indefinitely on open online portals such as the Google Play store and Apple iOS store, (where the digital game has currently amassed in excess of 500 downloads), maximising access and visibility not only to the target audience, but to the general public as well."

Level Up has produced innovative resources that engage in the promotion of VET pathways to young people making decisions around education transitions. These aims are driven by the fact that the number of people entering VET has dropped across Europe in recent years, a fact which is contributing to growing skills mismatches within European labour markets. Therefore, policy makers and VET practitioners have begun to realise that there is a need to challenge misconceptions around the reality of contemporary VET in order to help position this educational pathway as a ‘first-choice’ once more for young people. Level Up has contributed to this work by building an interactive tool for use in guidance sessions with young people that draws clear parallels between the learning outcomes found within work-based VET and career development. In part, this approach begins to breakdown stereotypes around VET routes being a second choice to academic tertiary education, by highlighting that learning outcomes in VET are as varied and complex as those found in university courses etc. At the same time, the link which the tool draws between VET and the labour market demonstrates to young people the value which training within the VET sector has on long-term career progression. Given that young people nowadays are digital natives, an innovative use of ICT was needed to maximise the impact of project activities. As a result, the project took a game-based learning (GBL) approach to the development of its outputs. A VET-based game has been built which allows young people to simulate progression through the VET system, by drawing on scenarios based on the learning outcomes, levels etc. found within work-based VET. By designing the GBL platform around the principles of flow theory, the project demonstrates the diverse and challenging nature of VET through a medium which is proven to add an engaging, innovative dimension to traditional educational guidance for young people. Indeed, the interactive, ‘fun’ nature of the GBL platform guides and informs young people, increasing their motivations for considering VET pathways by disseminating its information and guidance through a medium more normally associated with leisure and free time. To capitalise on players’ increased motivation around VET, and to further challenge misconceptions and stereotypes, each game level links to complementary content found within the project’s online portal. Here, both young people and the guidance practitioners who work with them are able to find regional, national and European information on the career benefits of VET, Labour Market and Skills Information, and further guidance on training routes etc. This provides game players and professionals with the hard data and further information needed to inform decisions around VET pathways, by showing the concrete long-term impact of gaining such skills. To make sure that these outputs were of the highest quality, the project carried out extensive research into the current state of both GBL and the promotion of VET within European careers guidance. This research informed all project activities, as well as fed into practical resources for careers professionals, to help them further develop their own skills and confidence in embedding innovative ICT tools, such as GBL resources, into their work. At the same time, the project drew on several European level tools and resources in its development. This is because it was felt that an open, transnational approach to the promotion of VET was needed in order to offer effective resources that highlight the diverse training routes and career opportunities found across Europe. This includes the European Qualifications Framework, as well as practical labour market tools such as Europass. This approach has helped the project produce universal resources, which demonstrate the demand and opportunities for people with vocational skills to build careers on the local, national and European level. Level Up’s outputs will have a positive impact on the quality of guidance provided to young people considering education options, as these resources both engage learners and upskill the support staff who work alongside them. In terms of staff development, the LMSI resources and guides to digital tools produced by the project help to improve the quality and standard of guidance, as staff will feel more confident in both promoting VET and using digital tools in their work. Similarly, this increased staff engagement, coupled with the direct interaction with young people through the GBL platform, means young people will make better informed decisions about their education and training. Ultimately, this means that they will develop skills more directly suited to the needs of the labour market, and so begin to address the skills mismatches found across Europe.