There is an escalating need for a digitally competent and scientifically based foot health practitioner workforce to meet societal needs. For example, 24 to 30% of the EU population will have to turn to a foot health practitioner/podiatrist during their life, driven by changes due to ageing, diabetes and/or obesity (McRitchie et al., 2018). This matches global trends and together form more than half the EU population. European Commission statements on “enabling the digital transformation of health and care in the Digital Single Market” (2018) asked that we rethink health care systems to ensure that they remain fit-for-purpose. This requires innovative solutions making health care more accessible and patient-centred. In terms of achieving this in foot health care practice, several barriers exist. One barrier is the low levels of digital literacy in the foot health workforce, creating a mismatch between client/patient needs and expectations and the services on offer from health professionals. A second barrier is the risk of unchecked clinical practices being adopted leading to wasted treatments and money, ineffective practices, and at worst a risk to people’s foot and general health. Teachers of foot health practitioners recognise that education already lags behind the use of digital technologies in clinical practice. A key example that this project will address is the digital design and manufacture of foot orthoses (therapeutic insoles). These can now be prescribed using end-to-end digital systems, including opportunities for cloud based knowledge systems to support clinical, manufacture and supply decisions. These are the types of real world digital innovations available to students when they graduate and enter employment. However, they are too often inadequately prepared for either use of these systems or their critical appraisal against the needs of their own practice/employment. To address these issues, the partnership intends to:- improve the digital skills in the foot health professional community, both for undergraduates and postgraduates.- transfer research and scientific knowledge into clinical foot health practice educationThe results foreseen are: 1. Develop a new knowledge framework: the current knowledge framework related to clinical foot biomechanics and foot therapeutic insole practice is outdated, disproven and there is a major risk to professional standing and standards of clinical care. The current knowledge framework is too often divorced from the opportunities that digital technologies offer, a situation reinforced by low levels of digital literacy in some professional disciplines and territories.2. Develop 2 new undergraduate and postgraduate curricula to integrate the knowledge framework into pedagogical material dedicated to the subject: “Digital skills for clinical practice: foot orthosis and communication with the patients” and “Digital skills for business practice: entrepreneurial skills for students”.3. Develop one teacher training “Digital skills of teachers/educators to support the future digitally literate foot health workforce” to integrate the new digitally based knowledge framework, and materials into the educational practices of teachers. 4. Develop a web-based platform to connect foot health students, researchers and teachers in a peer-to-peer transnational digital learning community.The project targets specifically students (undergraduates, postgraduates), teachers, researchers and the foot health community in general.

<< Objectives >>This project aims to develop a gamification based learning management system with micro-credentials embedded to provide teachers of various fields professional learning opportunities to develop their resillience and capacities to create and implement effective digital learning materials.<< Implementation >>The learning management system, Empower Teacher Platform as we called it, includes materials for improving teachers' knowledge of digital tool use as well as the pedagogically effective ways of integrating digital learning materials into teaching. As teachers learn about, create learning materials with digital tools and implement them, the Platform will allow teachers to collaborativelly critique each other's works and improve their practices of teaching with digital learning materials.<< Results >>At the end of the project, we expect to have an effective and user friendly Empower Teacher Platform where teachers can collaboratively and collectivelly improve their knowledge and practices of digital tool use for creating online learning materials for their respective fields. In the long term, Empower Teacher Platform has potential to create a strong learning community for teachers to effectively integrate digitalization into their teaching professions.

NEED:Digital literacy which is considered as life skill in the digital age by UNESCO’s Information for All Programme (IFAP). Young people in tertiary education are called Z generation and they grow with digital technologies from the moment they were born. It is a necessity for the new generation to be trained according to the new conditions and to develop skills appropriate for the age. However, students spend time with digital technologies generally for entertainment, playing games and socializing in the virtual world. Digital competence is among the 8 Key Competences of European Union. With that aim, the European Digital Competence Framework, also known as Dig Comp is prepared. It offers a tool to improve citizen's digital competence. Considering DigComp, digital literacy means process of finding, processing, editing, sharing, evaluating and analyzing information through network devices (smartphones, tablets, laptops and desktop computers). “A digitally literate person can use technology strategically to find and evaluate information, connect and collaborate with others, produce and share original content, and use the Internet and technology tools to achieve many professional and personal goals (National Lifelong Learning Strategy (2020). Also, one of the pillars of Europe 2020 Strategy is “Promoting digital literacy, skills and inclusion”. As to Turkey, Therefore, in 2018 -2019 academic year, the main goal of the Council of Higher Education is determined as “Digital Transformation”. Besides, the importance of digital literacy skills is underlined by the President of Turkey in Opening Ceremony of 2018-2019 Academic Year of universities.Consequently, this project is designed to meet the need of university students by improving their ability of surviving in the digital age. In order to improve the digital literacy skills of university students a new elective course on digital literacy will be developed. OBJECTIVES:- Improve the digital literacy skills of university students - Develop a learning environment for digital literacy skills.- Contribute to the capacity building of universities on digital literacy through training the teaching staff- Facilitate the access to sources related to digital literacy by sharing outputs in project website RESULTS:1-Digital literacy skills of university students are improved. 2-Capacity building of universities on providing digital literacy skills are improved3-Tools for providing digital literacy skills are developed 4-Cooperation among partners is strengthenedINTELLECTUAL OUTPUTSO1- Digital Literacy Course Curriculum O2- Educational Materials of Digital Literacy Course for Students O3- Online Guideline for teaching staffNUMBER AND PROFILE OF PARTICIPANTSParticipants of:-survey will be university students (800). -pilot trainings will be teaching staff (totally 40).-pilot implementation of elective digital literacy course will be students (100) at the first year of university life.-conferences will be students, academicians, lecturers etc. who haven’t participated to the pilot implementation and other related stakeholders in each partner country (max. 100 participants for each conference). DESCIPTION OF ACTIVITIESA-Management activities (transnational and online meetings)B-Output preparation activities1.Development of Digital Literacy Course2.Preparing questionnaires3.Preparing need analysis report by conducting online survey4.Preparation of digital literacy elective course curriculum5.Preparing the training plan of teaching staff6.Developing online Guidebook 7.Piloting the training of teaching staff 8.Piloting digital literacy course9.Revising and finalizing the digital literacy course in accordance with the piloting results.C-Dissemination activities (Multiplier events, website, social media, visits, e-newsletters etc.)METHODOLOGYQualitative/quantitative methods and communication/management techniques will be used for planned activities in this project. After the content and development phases of intellectual outputs, piloting phase will done by using experimental method, e-learning techniques in order to find out the deficiencies and level of efficiency of the intellectual outputs. IMPACT AND LONGER TERM BENEFITSProject owners will develop worthwhile reports, curriculums and learning/teaching materials in the lifecycle of the project. The project will strengthen the profile of teaching staff, enable them to respond to the needs of university students in terms of digital literacy. The learning materials and digital literacy elective course curriculum developed in the course of the project is directly related to university students in every part of Europe. In longer term, not European universities will have an access to developed materials but also anyone related to the topic all around the world will have a chance to benefit from project innovative teaching/learning materials and other outputs

"Context:Current training in the aquaculture sector is based on providing training for workers with traditional methodologies and materials, which do not adjust to current technological development or a European perspective. In addition, there is a lack of homogenization in aquaculture techniques and a lack of common regulation that increases the differences between the member countries. The need for a unified training and, above all, accessible to all and take advantage of ICT is clear.Goals:There are two main objectives in the project:1. To develop a Standardized Training Program at a European level for the aquaculture sector, which, in addition to including the training modules necessary for the qualification of professionals in the sector, also includes the training content required for their training in the competencies of health, welfare and physical-chemical controls of fish.2. To develop the program through an online platform that allows quick and free access to anyone who wishes to carry it out. Integrate this program into an App where the user can review the contents, make an evaluation of it and obtain a certificate of knowledge.The partners members of the consortium are the following:- BENEFICIARY: The Spanish Aquaculture Farmer's Association (APROMAR)- SGS TECNOS (Spain) Enterprise specialized in quality and labor training- The Italian Pisciculture Association API (Italy)- The DOKUZ EYLUL University (Turkey) marine science and technology department- The Croatian Chamber of Commerce CCE (Croatia)Activities carried out:The project has been focused on 3 main activities:1. Make a preliminary report: ROADMAP FOR THE DEVELOPMENT OF TRAINING TOOLS AT THE EUROPEAN LEVEL: ""HEALTHY_FISH"" This report was necessary to know the state of the art of training in Europe, prior to the development of a new training program2. THE EUROPEAN HEALTHY_FISH STANDARDIZED TRAINING PROGRAM. The partners developed a program divided into 11 modules and available in 5 languages3. The Online Platform and App HEALTHY_FISH. The program has been integrated into the Moodle platform, allowing access to online content and through the MoodleMobile App. In addition, it includes evaluation questionnaires for modules that issue a certificate of achievement, signed by the project entities for those who approve the evaluation. This is all available at http://apromar.es/healthyfishapp/Results and impact achieved:The main result of the project is the provision of an innovative training tool to the professionals of aquaculture farms on fish health and welfare.The additional impacts that the project is generating are:- Creation of innovative training materials- Impulse to the implementation of e_learning in the sector- Promotion of vocational training activities for professionals- Promotion of linguistic diversity in the sector (the program is in English, Spanish, Italian, Croatian and Turkish)- Improving the competitiveness of the sector with the introduction of ICT- Implementation of more efficient and sustainable pisciculture techniques- Professionalization of workers in the sectorLong-term benefits:The project will favor the normalization of training in terms of the professional qualification of the personnel of the aquaculture sector at European level. It will be a support tool for standardizationHealthy Fish has the approval of FEAP (European Federation of Aquaculture Producers) who have known in first hand their development and are disseminating it in their networks, as well as from the EATIP (European Aquaculture Technology Innovation platform) In this way, communication between the professionals of the sector and the debate on what the quality and sustainability standards in fish farming should be is being promoted."

In the last three decades, the emphasis on STEM (science, technology, engineering, mathematics) continued to increase as a potential solution to overturn declining numbers of students choosing careers in STEM disciplines. The emphasis on STEM continues with increasing number of STEM centers in the UK or MINT (mathematics, information technology, natural sciences, technology) centers in Germany. STEM literature emphasizes on supporting design, for instance Turkish Ministry of National Education made several updates in the elementary and middle school curriculum to add design based thinking into the curriculum. 2023 Vision aims to add design studios in all schools,and the Council of Higher Education (YÖK) also added design based thinking into teacher education. On the other hand, European reports underline the lack a coherent agreement to support design based pedagogy. Departing from this need, teacher education programs will share thinking about how to leverage design to improve coherence and relevance of instruction In this project.The biggest difference of this project is to change the emphasis on completing the design products to creating a learning environment around design products. Previous studies focused primarily on completing design products. This project aims to change the emphasis on the teaching environment created around the design products. By looking at its nature, the project is the first of its kind about design based pedagogy. The project will offer guidelines for teacher education programs and teachers by presenting activities supporting interdisciplinary thinking and offer assessment strategies to measure design based pedagogy. The project will start with creating the Booklet of Design Based Pedagogy. Then the project will shift to Practical Applications of Design Based Pedagogy and Online Learning through eTwinning projects.When creating the Booklet of Design Based Pedagogy, the main goal will be to offer a common framework and set of activities to implement design based pedagogy. The partners collaboratively create the booklet that will include three steps: (1) Reviewing Design Challenges and Design Products across European teacher education programs, (2) Supporting Scientific and Engineering Practices with Critical Thinking, (3) Assessing Design Based Pedagogy. Reviewing design challenges and design products across European teacher education programs will help to picture the existing practices across European teacher education programs. In the next step, activities that support critical thinking when engaging with scientific and engineering practices will be created. Finally, partners will work on creating tools for assessing the design based pedagogy. After reviewing the existing practices, the booklet will offer guidelines to implement design based pedagogy with critical thinking and ways to assess design pedagogy.After creating the booklet, partners will focus on practical applications of the design based pedagogy. To reach out a bigger audience, partners will focus on practical applications in two different ways: (1) Applying design based pedagogy in teacher education programs, (2) Applying design based pedagogy in eTwinning projects. When applying the pedagogy of design, four different teacher education programs will test the activities and these results will serve an important role to finalize project activities. Then all partners will start reaching out to teachers through induction programs to create eTwinning projects.Induction programs are part of teacher training in Europe. To reach a bigger audience, teachers from all European countries will be able to access the project activities. All partners will connect with local teachers, and teachers from all European countries will be able to access project activities.Besides offering a common framework of design based pedagogy, the project will also offer online learning for teachers in a rapidly changing world. As schools and universities started doing classes online in 2020, the project will aim to prioritize online learning and implementation. Finally, the project team will present how design based pedagogy can be supported in teacher education programs and schools. This final step will show how design based pedagogy can be implemented coherently in teacher education programs and schools. By the end of the project, European teacher educators will design a coherent framework and set of activities for design based pedagogy, test the framework and activities in teacher education programs and schools. In addition to picturing how design based pedagogy can be learned in teacher education programs, the project will also present the pathway to implement a coherent design based pedagogy in schools through induction programs.