OBEC is an Erasmus+ project that aims to explore the potentials of Blockchain technology to promote competency development and recognition of skills and qualifications by creating an innovative system to issue and validate learning credentials on a trial basis. Through this effort, the project’s goal is to encourage the professional and academic integration of migrants, exchange students, and individuals with alternative learning backgrounds. Focusing on the key issue of lack of uniformity and transparency in systems for validating credentials, it is expected that this effort will also result in positive effects in promoting employability, empowerment, and accessibility to the labour market.
The project gathers partners from four European countries: SwIdeas (Sweden), Regional Development Agency of Sisak-Moslavina County (Croatia), Lai-Momo (Italy), Universita’ degli Studi di Urbino Carlo Bo (Italy), and EURADA (Belgium).
The first stage of the project has now been concluded. This involved researching into the problems which OBEC aims to offer solutions to: the barriers which people face when trying to be recognised for their skills and knowledge from previous studies or experience, especially after moving to another country. In order to understand this well, all of OBEC partners have surveyed and carried out in-depth interviews with working and work-seeking migrants, international students, and those who have an alternative education background, as well as the institutions which support them all and innovators who work with the target technology.
Now, focus of the OBEC project is on the more practical second stage. The ultimate result of this will be to develop and test courses that will be certified on database for verifying educational credentials. These courses, varying in content from partner to partner, will begin close to the end of 2021. In the meantime, the partners are developing the contents to be taught on the courses and will soon be developing the system for certifying them.
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