Strengthening cooperation in research, innovation and higher education for promoting sustainable economic growth, social inclusion and creating new opportunities for youth in the Western Mediterranean Region
The Dialogue 5+5 Member Countries agreed on strengthening the potential of youth, which is fundamental to the development and prosperity of the Mediterranean Region. They ensure full opportunities to access higher education and recall that training and professional integration of young people and job creation must remain a priority for projects within the framework of the European Neighbourhood Policy and the Union for the Mediterranean, and in the context of the EU-Africa partnership.
Creation of a Network of Higher Education Institutios within the 5+5 Dialogue
Lead country: Portugal, Tunisia
This action intends to strengthen the network of Higher Education Institution within the 5+5 Dialogue Member Countries, by stimulating the discussion of qualitative and innovative aspects on effective management and institutional capabilities. This action is supported by the UfM Secretariat.
Blended Learning for Increasing Youth Opportunities
Lead country: Spain, Morocco
Blended learning refers to a wise combination of face to face and on-line education models trying to capture the best of the two worlds. The development and used of blended learning models for technological areas where technology evolution is very fast, has expanded in the last decade. This process is driven by the wide availability of faster and cheaper fixed and mobile networks, the use of smartphones by higher percentages of students’ population, and the diffusion of specific digital applications and platforms for education services. The combination of these factors is playing a prominent role in education innovation. Blended learning also addresses some barriers found today to offer face-to-face specialized technical courses for students located in remote areas where the access to labs is a hard requirement. The concentration of face-to-face activities in some locations and periods of time where teachers were available, and higher flexibility to accommodate individual constraints combined with costs reduction in curricula implementation made attractive this approach.
The Action will be implemented through a set of workshops to understand current efforts, drivers and barriers, and opportunities for youth, the development of short pilot courses by sharing on-line modules and teachers in specific domains, and a final workshop to agree on recommendations for the future.
Quality Assurance, Governance and Accreditation
Lead: France, Mauritania
The aim of this action is to draw the state of the art of Quality assurance in Higher education and research as well as the way of organizing the Governance of HE&R institutions and Accreditation processes followed in each 5+5 countries. The objective of the action is the setup of network of QA agencies allowing a benchmark on the issues of QA Governance and Accreditation processes followed by each 5+5 countries.
Building Capacities and Developing Skills on Blue Economy
Lead country: Italy
Italy supports the initiative on enhancing capacities and developing skills in sustainable blue growth. The action aims at promoting socio-economic development and creation of blue jobs in Member Countries of the 5+5 Dialogue and the entire Mediterranean Region. The initiative is focused on:
- Advanced Master Programme on Sustainable Blue growth (2nd Level) (English language) – Yearly edition;
- Summer School on Sustainable Blue Economy in the Euro-Mediterranean Region;
- Research Mobility: multi-lateral scholarships for researchers and talents, mainly for PhD and Post-Doc researchers;
- Professional Traineeship: multi-lateral scholarships available for students and/or researchers hosted by partner countries (Training and Research in Partner’s Labs);
- Specific Workshops (Organization of minimum one thematic workshop on one main issue identified), Conferences (Organization of minimum one event per year related to blue topics; general outreach);
- Further contributions in particular for awareness and divulgation besides publications;
- Online Portal Management: content creation on the official portal www.bluegrowth.inogs.it
These actions are fully supported by the Italian Ministry of Education, University and Research (MIUR) and implemented by the Italian National Institute of Oceanography and Applied Geophysics (OGS). This action is also endorsed by the UfM through the label awarded on March 2019 to the project “BlueSkills: Blue Jobs and Responsible Growth in the Mediterranean throughout Enhancing Skills and Developing Capacities”.