Abstract:

This proposal aims to present the Mu.SA - Museum Sector Alliance Project, funded by the European Commission, more specifically by the Erasmus + Program and the Key Action 2 (Cooperation for Innovation and Good Practice Exchange), which supports the Sector Competencies Alliances (575907-EPP-1-2016- 1-EL-EPPKA2-SSA).

Building on the results of the previous project (eCult Skills_2013-15), funded by the Lifelong Learning Program, weaknesses in the museum sector were identified at the level of digital and transversal skills. The Mu.SA project intents to contribute to the mitigation of these fragilities, in order to empower museum professionals, as well as those who aspire to be, to better face the challenges of Information and Communication Technologies and to enhance their museums and Society by promoting their development and sustainability, building on larger and stronger synergies between different sectors of education, training and youth, for the better articulated interaction between research, policies and practices and for the best use of references for recognition and validation of skills and qualifications.

Thus, based on the identification and characterization of a set of emerging professional profiles and respective competencies, the Mu.SA_Museum Sector Alliance aims at, and has been, developing an Open Educational Resources repository to support individual equipping in more than forty digital and transversal skills. These duly structured resources are offered in different formats of education and training courses: an Open and Massive Online Course (MOOC), certified of a generic and introductory nature; and a Specialization Course, structured considering e-learning, face-to-face and work base learning contexts.

The legitimate and reasoned expectation of building communities of practice will also contribute to ensure the sustainability of the results, beyond the duration of the project. Among the other positive expected results, at the level of those more or less directly involved in its activities, there may be an increase in the spirit of initiative and entrepreneurship, a more active participation in society, a greater capacity for understanding, respect and response with respect to social and cultural diversity, greater motivation and personal and work-related satisfaction, as well as an increase in professional development opportunities, due to the greater and better quality of education and training.

The consortium, coordinated by the Hellenic Open University (HOU) (GR), has Culture Action Europe (CAE) as the European Sector Umbrella in Belgium, as well as other Greek organizations - Anonymous Educational Organization (AKMI) and the International Council of Museums’ national committee (ICOM-GR) -, Italians - Fondazione per le Qualità Italiane_Symbola, Istituto per I Beni Artistici Culturali e Naturali della Regione Emilia Romagna (IBACN), Link Campus University (LCU) and Melting Pro Learning (MeP) - and Portuguese - ICOM-PT, Mapa das Ideias (MdI) and the University of Porto (U.PORTO).

Keywords:

Museum professionals, digital & transversal competences, education needs, Mu, SA – Museum Sector Alliance Project.