As part of the validation and capacity building activities, the WEXHE project consortium has organised and delivered a series of workshops in the partner countries. 7 National Workshops focused on training the trainers and teachers from companies and HEIs in Cyprus, Germany, Netherlands, Poland, Slovenia, Spain, and the UK. The first International Workshop titled How to Create a Learning Environment for Entrepeneurship? has taken place in Munster, Germany, followed by the second International Workhop delivered by the Warwick University partners titled Work Placements and Traineeships.
International Workshops
The WEXHE Project invited 23 academics and managers from different backgrounds to the FH Münster for a four-day workshop, between 13th – 16th May, 2019. Organised and delivered by the Science to Business Marketing Research Centre team, the workshop allowed participants to be introduced to multiple strategies and techniques that can help setting-up their academic activities in a more entrepreneurial way.
WEXHE Project invited academic staff from different backgrounds across Europe to join a four-day workshop in the University of Warwick, UK, between 21-24 May. During the workshop, the participants were introduced to the WBL context in HE together with different strategies and examples of good practice that would help them set-up and reflect on ways to promote these courses within their own country context.
National Workshops
The National Workshop and the Feedback Session in Groningen took place on the 19th of June, 2019, with focus on the Work Placement, Traineeship & Entrepreneurship Packages. Facilitated by the University of Groningen (UG) project team, the two feedback sessions were attended by 11+ stakeholders, ranging from the UG university staff to business representatives, academics, and interns.
Two National Workshops were organised on June 17, at the University of Ljubljana, Faculty of Social Sciences, with one on placements and traineeship in the morning and the other on entrepreneurship in the afternoon. In the first workshop there were 12 and in the second 7 external participants. All relevant environments were represented: universities, enterprises, governments and their agencies and NGOs. Some experts came from the ‘case study’ organisations.
The Warwick National Workshop was conducted on July 1st 2019. There was a combined session in which participants were provided with the opportunity to discuss the WEXHE work packages for Entrepreneurship, Work Placement and Traineeship. Outside of the event itself further participants provided feedback on the packages via interviews and a feedback form.
The feedback received for the packages has been generally positive drawing attention for example to the useful signposting of issues, effective typologies and the competences and skills tables. However, further elaboration on the sections on finance and quality assurance were recommended together with reference to concrete examples where possible.
More specific feedback on Entrepreneurship included a concern to acknowledge the importance of Intellectual Property (IP) in setting up businesses. Also there were critical reflections on the ways in which “entrepreneurship” is understood and how this can be taught. In relation to this, flexibility and non-linearity needs to be emphasised in the relevant packages. With reference to the Work Placement, feedback included the comment that there could be further reference to how learning from placements can be shared with other students. In the packages this could be supplemented for example with reference to student testimonies. A further suggestion was that further clarification on the time-investment and support required in supervising work placements would be beneficial. Also the relationship between WBL and continuing education could have been further distinguished.
Here are a few moments from the WEXHE National Workshop in Cyprus called “Work Placements, Traineeships and Entrepreneurship: Lessons from Europe”.
During the workshop, the participants had the opportunity to learn about the WEXHE project and its aims, and also to discuss and provide feedback on its latest results. The most highlighted topics were the Work Placement Packages, showing the great significance of setting the right tools in order to reduce the gap between the HEIs and businesses, and therefore the problem of youth unemployment.
The Spanish Chamber of Commerce has held two national workshops in order to contrast the content of the models or guides on practical programs for university students (both students and recent graduates) and entrepreneurial internship programs. The workshops took place at the headquarters of the Chamber of Commerce of Spain (Madrid) in the months of June and July 2019.
The workshop attendees included representatives of universities, companies that have implemented traineeship programs, placement programs, foundations or institutions that coordinate and manage internship programs, as well as participants in these programs.
