Centres of Vocational Excellence (CoVEs) are formed by networks of partners that develop local "skills ecosystems" to provide high quality vocational skills to young people and adults, and contribute to regional development, innovation, industrial clusters, smart specialization strategies and social inclusion. By bringing together a wide range of partners, such as providers of vocational education and training (VET), research centers, business stakeholders, development agencies and associations we form an international collaborative network. Aim of this network (CoVE) is to establish a bottom-up approach to vocational excellence involving a wide range of local stakeholders enabling VET institutions to rapidly adapt skills provision to evolving economic and social needs.
Algebra University College is a proud lead partner of the project named AI-powered Next Generation of VET (AI4VET4AI). Science is clear: Artificial Intelligence is defining development of the 21st century. There are many developed AI-powered solutions available across industries, but they lack wide acceptance. The reason for this is twofold - the lack of experts who understand the value of AI solutions and lack of trust in AI applications. AI4VET4AI project addresses the need for trained workers in the field of AI, by supporting the growth of an AI-skilled workforce in Europe, with a special emphasis on VET teachers and learners.
The main objective of AI4VET4AI is to contribute to the digital transformation of the EU labour market by adding new innovative teaching content and methods to VET curricula across 11 European countries and 18 EU NUTS2 regions. The project will be implemented during 4 years (June 2023 – June 2027), with the support of EU total grant of 3.946.880,00 €.
The project was successfully kicked off on 28th June 2023 in the online environment with nearly 50 attendees from 26 organizations in the role of project partners:
- Algebra University College (Croatia)
- Technical School Čakovec (Croatia)
- Croatian Artificial Intelligence Association (Croatia)
- Poslovna inteligencija (Croatia)
- Faculty of Information Studies in Novo Mesto (Slovenia)
- School Centre Celje (Slovenia)
- Rudolfovo (Slovenia)
- Arctur (Slovenia)
- Belgrade Metropolitan University (Serbia)
- Association for Women's Potential Affirmation and Networking (Serbia)
- Management Center Innsbruck International Hochschule GmbH (Austria)
- Network Development Hub GmbH (Austria)
- Technische Informationsbibliothek (Germany)
- Strategische Partnerschaft Sensorik (Germany)
- AKMI Anonimi Ekpaideftiki Etairia (Greece)
- Rezos Brands (Greece)
- Universita Degli Studi di Napoli Federico II (Italy)
- Keylon (Italy)
- Inercia Digital (Spain)
- Camera Commercio Italiana per la Spagna (Spain)
- Universiteit van Amsterdam (Netherlands)
- AlterContacts (Netherlands)
- S.K.T.A.I.H.L (Turkey)
- Southeast Anatolian Exporters’ Association (Turkey)
- Griffith College (Ireland)
- Anser (Ireland)
Project partners’ main activities will be organized around creating and implementing innovative teaching content and methods for VET as well as establishing 11 innovative AI VET campuses and 7 VET innovation AI incubators for VET learners. Big portion of consortia’s effort will be aimed towards awareness-raising activities for promoting AI potential in our regions among representatives of public and private sector, as well as civil society.
We are looking forward to establishing our European centre of excellence, sharing experiences with our project partners and brining AI closer to VET and future European workforce! Big thanks to the European Commision for recognizing the potential of our project proposal and European Education and Culture Executive Agency (EACEA) for supporting us on this endeavor.
