Proiect iYouth

 Proiect ERASMUS+, KA2-2016-1-RO01-KA201-024399 

iYouth - Empowering Europe Young Innovators - the desire to innovate

Grant Agreement Number KA2-2016-1-RO01-KA201-024399

http://iyouths.eu/

Key European and global players, including the European Commission, the OECD and leading research communities are increasingly and jointly calling for profound changes in our educational systems.

Among promoted key competences such as technology and language fluency, there is an increasing focus on skills and competences directly linked to ENTREPRENEURIAL AND INNOVATION CAPACITY and being a citizen of the 21st century Europe.

The iYouth title stands for Innovative Youth, and the project will form part of the first generation of such practical experimentation promoted by the Commission within the Europe2020 framework through the recently launched by Empowering European’s Young Innovators Agenda,

iYouth is missioned to carry out practical experimentation with open schooling approaches fostering innovation mind-sets and capacity in secondary schools, addressing young students aged 12 – 15 which is unanimously confirmed as precisely the years when most young students lose interest in science learning and careering thus disengaging from what could be turned into strong innovation capacity.

The rationale of the iYouth project is to carry out practical experimentation with the creation of innovation interest, skills and capacity in early schooling, including developing appropriate methodologies and assessment approaches.

The project is focused on innovation interest, skills and capacity, but will at the same time will contribute considerably to the creation of early entrepreneurial mentality among the participating students and teachers.

The project will therefore carry out series of concrete and practical experimentations in the participating schools to test the principles of innovation-fostering interest and capacity in practical settings, and will deliver a set of outcomes describing and documenting the project results.

The practical experimentation will be co-designed by the involved teams of young students (as this is an important part of fostering engagement) and carried out in open collaboration with local cross-sector resources feeding real-life and real-time challenges into the learning processes.

The project will develop a special and very important sustainability strategy consisting in two integrated elements:

• the integration of the learning strategies to foster early innovation interest and capacity in the eco-systems of the schools
• a methodology to ensure that innovation interest and capacity is passed on between generations.

The project will apply a step-by-step methodology across the practical experimentation to offer a first but qualified orientation as to the crucial question:

HOW CAN INNOVATION INTEREST, SKILLS AND CAPACITY BE CREATED AMONG YOUNG STUDENTS AND THEIR TEACHERS?

*This project has been funded with support from the European Commission. This publication reflects the views only of the author, and the Commission cannot be held responsible for any use which may be made of the information contained therein.