Abstract:

To support citizens to become digitally competent, the European Commission has established a Digital Competence Framework for Citizens (‘DigComp’). To date, there has been no similar framework to support the third sector’s (TSOs) and the social enterprises´ (SEs) digital maturity journey. In this paper, it will be introduced the project and outputs of EU3Digital (EU3D), a transnational project to support the training and education about the digitalisation of TSOs and of SEs. Digital development leverages and fosters many opportunities for TSOs and for SEs, as digital technologies and skills offer increased efficiency, outreach and growth and are vital for their capacity to innovate and deliver their social mission. Project started by identifying a framework of specific competences and by gathering and developing learning resources and materials to improve those competences in individuals and in organisations. EU3D project second stage consisted in synthesising the background knowledge, the research work, the design principles and the set of common decisions to propose a competence framework as the basis for developing a proper curriculum and associated training resources. It was followed by the consequent design of a curriculum and of a set of competence assessment tools and techniques identified as adequate to be used in relation with the specific framework. Third phase consisted in the creation of training materials and resources for selected competences of the framework. In the fourth stage the training resources were tested during three pilot training sessions held in Portugal, Spain and Croatia. These training sessions evaluation helped tuning the training resources, the teaching methods and the training materials to allow a more effective use of the training resources and materials. These activities were accompanied by the development of a training kit to be used in emergency situations, like the one motivated by the recent pandemia, and by the dissemination actions among stakeholders like the training, the SEs and the TSOs sectors. Several difficulties and obstacles were identified along the project implementation concerning the training and education of the SEs and of the TSOs staff. First, it is very challenging to address every element of a competence framework in a single training output, so the breadth of the task may need to be concentrated on the most pressing needs. Second, competences are largely associated with individual rather than organisational development. Research during project implementation affirmed the value of a more distributed understanding of the organisational processes of digitalisation and of related training and assessment. Third, the SEs and TSOs sectors are diverse, with different forms and cultures across Europe. Training and developing competences for a diversified target group with limited resources are challenging, especially in different training and operational contexts. The design and use of the proposed training modules are presented and analysed, while suggesting several scenarios according to needs. In conclusion, recommendations are made to use the existing developed tools and resources with the inclusion of online and face to face modules and with related training effectiveness assessment.

Keywords:

Digital skills, third sector, social enterprises, framework, competences, training.