Skills2Capabilities (Horizon Europe Project)
The Research Centre for Education and the Labour Market (ROA) collaborates with eight European partner institutions in the Skills2Capabilities project, funded by Horizon Europe.
This project aims to bring together a diverse set of related skills mismatch issues in one comprehensive framework with the following overarching objectives:
- Improving the effectiveness skills and lifelong learning policies and enhancing the responsiveness, proactiveness and resilience of VET and AL systems
- Identifying emerging patterns of skill demand and associated skill mismatches
- Analysing institutional responses to emerging patterns of skill demand and mismatches
- Formulating lessons for policy and practice: Understanding pathways to develop and enhance VET systems of support
These objectives will be thoroughly examined across 9 distinct Work Packages. ROA's primary involvement is in Work Package 4 (on the demand for VET skills), Work Package 6 (focusing on skill supply and lifelong learning among VET graduates, that is coordinated by ROA), and participation in the Management Board of the consortium.
Work Package 4 relates to ROA’s work on the skills demand, e.g., Project Onderwijs-Arbeidsmarkt (POA), Tasks and skills at the workplace, Craftsmanship, and technology and work (ai:conomics, Technequality).
Work Package 6 includes tasks such as identifying VET skill supply, assessing the inclusion of 21st-century skills in study profiles (e.g., non-routine skills, skills in VET education), conducting interviews with key figures in vocational education, investigating education pathways, studying labour market effects of educational reforms, and exploring skill supply during VET graduates' working lives (e.g., Lifelong Learning and Development, adult skills).
Through participation in the Skills2Capabilities project, ROA strives to enhance comprehension of the challenges confronting European labour markets and to devise strategies for tackling skill mismatches. This research project aims to provide valuable insights and suggestions for decision-makers, empowering them to more effectively address the changing skill requirements in a rapidly evolving, interconnected global landscape.
The project is funded with approximately 2.4 million Euros for three years starting in 2023. Coordinated by 3S Unternehmensberatuting GMBH (Austria), it involves partners from Bulgaria (Institute of Philosophy and Sociology, Bulgarian Academy of Sciences), Estonia (Tallinn University), Finland (Finnish Institute for Educational Research, University of Jyväskylä), Germany (Federal Institute for Vocational Education and Training, BIBB), Norway (Fafo Research Foundation), the Netherlands (ROA, Maastricht University), Italy (University of Padova), and the United Kingdom (University of Warwick).