There is an evidence of skills shortage in STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics) fields across EU, that raises concerns and serious implications in the future concerning the recruitment difficulties that already are being felt over the recent years. The general perception in young students is that STEM related occupations are boring, hardworking and therefore unattractive for young people, with a persisting under-representation of women. The aim of the project “Boats4Schools: An Educational Challenge“ was to develop a ludic and educational methodology that can get young students attention to the importance of STEAM educational opportunities as a possible pathway for a future career. The methodology developed in the project was oriented as a youth challenge for young students (12-17 years old), that can be replicabled anywhere in the world. The methodology is based on a challenge where student´s (working in teams) will have to build a small Boat (miniature) under a set of rules like powered by a sustainable energy source or building the boat from a specific material, and, by doing that they will have to get in contact with several technologies like 3D design, Additive Manufacturing, Cloud Manufacturing, Computer-Aided Engineering (CAE) tools, Computer-Aided Design (CAD) tools, High-performance computing (HPC), Math, Physics, Innovative thinking, creativity and so many other skills. At the same time that students are building their Boat and preparing the Boat for the Challenge they are learning relevant contents related to STEM+A (Art/Creativity), with the help of a tutor (teacher) that will guide them towards the creation of the best Boat that will compete in the Challenges (Regional School Challenges, National and International Challenges). Further to the STEM+A (meaning STEAM) related contents, each team of students will be asked to work other competencies like marketing their boats and get sponsors, working leadership and presentation in front of a jury, self-employment and entrepreneur techniques among other transversal skills. This empowerment as a team will be an important asset to promote social inclusion among youngsters. The methodology that the project created is based on an extracurricular activity following a contemporary educational approach - learn by doing - with the power to stimulate pupils attention and given them the opportunity to promote the self-learning , active participation and independent (self) development in educational fields that are not often easy to engage the students. During project lifetime, partners created the methodology, and supporting materials for Boats4Schools, working in tasks like: - Benchmarking with other similar initiatives, around the world and collect the best practices; - Defining the educational approach and resources in parallel with the objectives and rules for future Boats4Schools Challenges; - Promoted several trial contests (pilot approach) in Portugal, Spain and Italy; - The project results were disseminated at national and European level trying to spread the project methodology to be adopted in other schools and countries. With the Boat4Schools project, the partners intend to share a friendly way to engage young students to be more positive about STEAM career paths and encourage them to choose STEAM studies.