Abstract:

The shortage of digital skills in Europe reported in 2016 in “European Digital Progress Report EDPR” of European Commission: 45% of Europeans have insufficient or no digital skills. Based on the Digital Economy and Society Index (DESI) index of 2017 there are big differences between the countries that are partners in this project. Denmark has one of the most advanced digital economies in the EU, while Lithuania and Austria are in the middle, but Romania and Italy have the lowest scores on the DESI. Studies performed by authors in the cultural and creative industries, in last 3 years in different countries showed a large majority scoring lower or basic level for the 21 digital competences. The usage of web, mobile, social and analytical tools is permeating the length and breadth of the culture, creative industries, areas which until recently have been reluctant to embrace the use of the new technologies. Eurostat 2017 identifies young adults from the creative industries as the most at risk for unemployment from the 22-36 years old, and lack of entrepreneurial and digital skills.

We aim to create a sustainable and efficient open education program - DigiCulture - dedicated to adult learners with low digital skills and low-qualified adults involved in the creative industries sector. The paper analyses the need for such an educational program and presents the instructional modelling for an open, online and blended learning, training program based on a Massive Open Online Course model and the UniCampus virtual environment. The modelling takes into consideration the existing UniCampus, which is further developed in order to integrate the requirements of low digital skills adults, Open Education, e-assessment and a mobile environment. The DigiCulture educational program will be fully integrated in the UniCampus as an online component, a blended learning model and easy-to-access features in the mobile app.

Keywords:

Digital skills, MOOC, blended learning, virtual learning, creative industries, adult training.