Author: Éva Szalma

At the invitation of the Open University of Catalonia with the organisation of the BME Institute of Continuing Engineering Education, ten lecturers, department heads and colleagues involved in continuous engineering education from the Budapest University of Technology and Economics  participated in the D-Reskill@U Masterclass on Skills Intelligence Strategies for Career Guidance in Higher Education: Lifelong Learning and Agile Continuous Education for Employability.  The masterclass was held in Barcelona between September 13 and 15 was based on the results of the Digital Re-Skilling@Universities project, led by the Sorbonne University (namely the Institut Parisien de Chimie Moléculaire) with the collaboration of the Institute of Continuing Engineering Education. Among the main topics included in the masterclass were the introduction of the multilingual European classification of skills, competences, qualifications and occupations (ESCO); the significance of the training content to be transformed into block of skills (BOS); the strategic importance of the verification of BOS with micro-credentials; details of the European Year of Skills; and the presentation of the so called “Smart Catalogue” developed by the project that helps to create a customized path for reskilling and upskilling.

The project, which has been ongoing for two years and will end in October this year, was born out of the realization that employees need effective guidance in reskilling and upskilling, a career counselling tool in order to maintain or improve their employability, as job requirements are currently very flexible and can change quickly. This support must be effective and affordable so that as many people as possible can use it, in accordance with the guidelines of the European Skills Agenda.

The primary goal of the project was the development of software to create customized path for reskilling and upskilling. This Smart Catalog helps assess the user what kind of job they can fill with their current skills and what skills they need to acquire to fill a position that they are almost qualified for. It provides a list of training offers as well, where the user can acquire these skills.  The operation of the smart catalogue was modelled by processing analytical chemis and data scientist skills.

Over the course of the three days, the nearly 50 participants, who came from the Sorbonne, the University of Milan, BME and the hosting Open University of Catalonia listened to lectures on innovative solutions for skill coordination and career counselling in higher education.  Dénes Zarka, director of the Institute of Continuing Engineering Education, and project manager Éva Szalma introduced the participants to the importance and practical application of micro-credentials and the nature and use of digital badges. This segment was supported by the DIScoPLAYER platform, a displayer platform managing digital open badges developed under the leadership of the BME Institute of Continuing Engineering Education, which was successfully integrated almost a year ago into the BME GTK recognition system. It is worth noting that the platform, which there are few similar in the world (e.g. Badgr), is already capable of managing digital badges in a stackable manner (stackability), thus enabling the micro-credentials to be added up to a larger-scale verified learning result.

The master course also provided an opportunity for participants from the same institution, but from different roles, to formulate common strategic goals during guided exercises.

The continuation of this masterclass in Barcelona is a Leadership School and Final Conference organised in Budapest, 24-26 October 2023, organised by the Budapest University of Technology and Economics. Follow the news of the Institute of Continuing Engineering Education (on Facebook or on the website) for more details.

If you have any further questions about the information in the article, you can contact the colleagues involved in the project at info@edu-inno.bme.hu.

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