Abstract:

Social engagement plays a relevant role in the learning processes, being the development of the social and civic values identified as one of the key competences for lifelong learning in the European Union. Social responsibility goes even beyond social engagement, typically involving the operation in an environmentally and socially responsible manner. Cooperation between academia and other organizations can highly reinforce the shared social responsibility approach, e.g. through tailored service-learning experiences framed by effectively designed internships.

Internships are meaningful means for the professional and personal growth of higher education students, as they enable real experiential learning. These collaborations are increasingly part of the higher education programmes across Europe. The approach and variety can certainly be enhanced, as the available internships are not always fully aligned with the professional skills students will need in the current and future industrial markets and the needed consideration of social and environmental issues.

The Erasmus+ IN4SOC project (“Internships for Enhancing Social and Civic Key Competences for Lifelong Learning in Technical Universities”) suggests new ways to design internships across European technical universities, by enhancing the value of social responsibility in line with the sustainable development goals. The main objective of this project is to increase the involvement of technical universities in the social responsibility of the students’ host organizations, as a pedagogical approach that considers the acquisition of the key social and civic competence of students and strengthens the engagement of academia with the community.

The present paper aims at describing the monitoring and communication tools conceived throughout the project to maximise the impact of the actions taken and to optimize the evaluation and control of the procedures.

These tools are designed to:
(a) evaluate the advance on the social and civic competences of the students,
(b) ensure a seamless and autonomous follow-up,
(c) optimize and customize the social and civic dimension of the internship for each specific case,
(d) promote the reflection of the students concerning the social and civic competences and
(e) facilitate the communication between the involved stakeholders, especially in what concerns students and supervisors.

By incorporating a social and civic approach from early stages of the career, we believe that future professionals are better prepared for contributing to a sustainable world. A world where soft skills, along with knowledge and awareness in sustainability are increasingly valued. The mutual benefit between hosting organizations and students in the context of the internship is based on the exchanges facilitated by the professional environment and the individual interests and concerns from the interns. In order to maximize this exchange, it is crucial to design useful resources and tools for the monitoring and evaluation of the internships.

Keywords:

Higher education, social competences, civic competences, sustainable development goals, lifelong learning.