We are living in UNCERTAIN TIMES. Our world is becoming a more and more insecure place. In order TO COPE with this in a positive way, NEW FOOTPATHS OF LEARNING are needed. Our project responds to this and puts ARTISTS in the centre. The project activities nurture talents in community art and foster entrepreneurship in cultural and creative domains. It OFFERS ARTISTS GUIDANCE and QUALIFICATION so that they can set up artistic interventions (workshops, community theatre, etc.), especially to strengthen YOUNG ADULTS (ca. 200 are directly involved as end beneficiaries) who find themselves in PRECARIOUS CRISIS (UNEMPLOYMENT, LACK OF EDUCATION). The qualification of the artists comprises a theoretical and a practical part. It starts with COLLABORATIVE LEARNING GROUPS in which ARTISTS (ca. 50) and ADULT EDUCATORS (Ca. 30) meet to learn from each other at eye level about artistic strategies and knowledge of the context in adult education. A STRUCTURE and MATERIAL for the self-directed learning process will be provided. (The model can be transferred to other fields, e.g. artists with social workers, community workers, etc.)In addition TRAINING MODULES to gain comprehensive knowledge in the field of Art Strategies, Social Psychology and Adult Education are developed (by artists and teachers working in the higher education and continuing education) and provided. They also show how to connect these fields to develop designs of artistic intervention to raise resilience.In the PRACTICAL PART of the qualification the artistic interventions are tested and researched in its effects. The methodology used is a combination of ACTION RESEARCH and AESTHETIC RESEARCH. The experiences in the work and the connected processes are described by the participating artists in the form of an AESTHETIC DIARY. This accompanying research leads to recommendations that describe what is needed to be successful with artistic interventions which have various goals: To strengthen resilience, to raise the belief in one's own self-efficacy, to find creative solutions in times of crisis.So there are FOUR OUTPUTS: A. The model of collaborative learning B. Training modulesC. Recommendations for and articles about artistic interventions based on the aesthetic diariesD. An E-Learning Platform for interactive and collaborative learning.All the material is prepared on an E-LEARNING PLATFORM, which is publicly accessible via a common project website. The participating ARTISTS have the chance through the project to get NEW WORKING OPPORTUNITIES. The YOUNG ADULTS participating in artistic processes will IMPROVE their RESILIENCE and it will help them to remain active. The experience of artistic intervention will make them BELIEVE IN THEMSELVES and enable them to find creative solutions for their future. In the LONG TERM organisations will involve ARTISTS in their normal everyday business and so artists will get through their competences a more SECURE ECONOMIC BASE. Organisations in the field of adult learning, youth work, community work will have NEW WAYS to initiate PERSONAL DEVELOPMENT. And there are QUALIFICATIONS offered to PREPARE ARTISTS to do the work.

"""Rethinking Music Performance in European Higher Education Institutions” (REACT) is a reaction to a current problem arising from the long-established model for teaching music performance in Higher Education Institutions (HEIs): musicians are trained for acquiring read-only skills instead of educating them to become creative professionals. HEIs are not helping musicians to meet the challenges of working life (López-Íñiguez & Bennett, 2020). REACT will mobilise a knowledge-creating international cooperative network to develop a new pedagogical model for HEIs - the Artistic Research-Based Learning (AR-BL) model, inspired by the epistemological framework proposed by the project’s leading team (Correia & Dalagna, 2020).The novelty of this project resides in shifting the focus from technical skills to material thinking, i.e., a specific mode of thought resulting from how ideas and works shape each other, reconfiguring the established mythopoetic configurations. The AR-BL model aims at encouraging a shift towards developing students’ creativity, proactive critical thinking and reflexive musical practice. The main objective is to offer alternatives that will link artistic research, artistic training, personal development, and career management. This model will: (i) increase articulation between HEIs and current professional requirements in the field of performance; (ii) promote a teaching/learning environment based on critical self-reflection and wider societal reflexivity beyond the existing practice; (iii) promote awareness that artistic productions involve knowledge production (material thinking) and exploration of means to share this knowledge academically and via practice (artistic research); and (iv) stimulate and exemplify the integration between different fields of artistic expression in the teaching of musical performance.The implementation of the AR-BL model will not only impact current students and professionals but also aims at having a long-term impact on musical performance teaching practices. Consequently, degree structures and curricula in HEIs, both on a European and wider international scale, are expected to be influenced as well. Using this critical and reflexive approach, based on the aforementioned epistemological framework, the project will pioneer the use of artistic research in music performance teaching and learning practices. Aware of the shifting role of artists and musicians in rapidly changing societies, REACT offers new potential for development in the arts.The added value of REACT is mirrored in its goal of encouraging the training of academics in music performance and the exchange of both existing and new practices developed within the project.Uniting several renowned European HEIs, REACT will contribute to strengthening the European Higher Education Area in the field of music. The project will be developed through a transnational-cooperation setting coordinated by the University of Aveiro, with the participation of the University of Nicosia, the Luleå University of Technology, the University of the Arts Helsinki and the University of Agder. It will focus on improving music performance teaching on a practical level (addressing institutions, teachers/mentors and students), a strategic level (addressing music industries), and on an advocacy level (addressing policy makers). The members of the project consortium have diversified backgrounds (philosophy, music performance, business, sound studies, psychology, sociology, education and transdisciplinary projects) ensuring a syncretic perspective on pedagogical practices regarding music performance in HEIs.The project will produce open access and free outputs throughout its development including not only articles in specialised journals (which are specified in Project Description) but also: (i) a Stakeholders’ requirements report, (ii) a Virtual Academy of Music Performance, (iii) a Toolkit for teachers and students and (iv) a White Book on this topic, entitled Rethinking the teaching of music performance in higher level institutions. The project will also develop two training courses to disseminate the pedagogical model centred on teaching music performance through artistic research and offered to teachers/mentors (interested in reacting and rethinking their pedagogical practices) and students (interested in reacting and developing an artistic career as performers or in performance teaching). The project will organise two multiplier events. The first - REACT Symposium - taking place in Sweden, will ascertain the widest possible, broad dissemination of results and interaction of the strategic partnership consortium with students and teachers/mentors. The second multiplier event – REACT Music Performance Expo, in Finland, addresses the target group of local stakeholders (especially those related to music industries) and aims to stimulate debate concerning career development for performers from higher education music institutions."

Higher education institutions (HEIs) play a key role in educating people to understand the underlying values in societies and cultures, which create crucial abilities to foster social integration. To succeed in this, the managers, teachers and students of HEIs need novel ways to increase intercultural understanding and social inclusion. Hence, the project created a comprehensive educational model “Roadmap for Societal Engagement for Higher Education Institutions” which is grounded in experiential and challenge based learning to increase the higher education institutions’ societal engagement (HEISE). The objectives were: first, to develop a toolkit for HEI teachers to integrate challenge based learning methods into their teaching supporting greater societal engagement and impact of HEIs; second, to create model for HEIs with insights on how to understand, manage and evaluate the societal impact of HEIs. HEISE project consisted of two Intellectual Outputs (IO) which are both covered in the final publication of the project. First, IO1 is a participatory learning model for societal engagement for HEIs through a challenge solving course module with an e-publication called “Insights for Teachers”. It introduces the context and insights of challenge based learning; presents its philosophy, practical tips, tools and methods. The material is illustrated with video-clips, examples of methods, guidelines, and original case studies which are the outcome of local challenge solving processes during the project.Second, IO2 is a model for HEIs to evaluate their societal impact and the engagement in societal projects. This outcome of the project can help HEIs to better integrate the societal impact into their strategies. The outcomes of IO2 research activities were integrated into the final project publication, presenting practical insights for managers and current situation in HEIs and in society at large. From a methodological point of view, HEISE project carried out a systematic process including an investigation of the existing participatory learning methods. Based on the results, a challenge based learning model was developed and tested in the international HEISE Winter Academy as well as within locally organised challenge based learning courses. The modules were analysed, contributing to the further development of the challenge based learning model. To create a model for evaluating the HEIs’ societal impact the engagement with society, a similar approach was adopted by evaluating and analysing the project’s societal impact (Semantic Analysis, Google Analytics). This was accompanied with 3 stages of research on societal impact (desk research, quantitative and quantitative study).The knowledge gained from these international surveys are integrated into the final project publication available online as web-resource as well as downloadable e-publication. The final publication enables the stakeholders and interested audience to navigate within a diamond-shaped model get a brief overview of the matter first, and also deeper knowledge from various references, added reports, insights, examples etc. HEISE was a 36-months project with six (6) partners: Estonian Academy of Music and Theatre (Estonia; main coordinator), Sibelius Academy of the University of the Arts Helsinki (Finland), Laurea University of Applied Sciences (Finland), Aalto University (Finland), Estonian Business School (Estonia), Universidad del País Vasco/ Euskal Herriko Unibertsitatea (Spain). The partners represented widely the field of HEIs from art to business and social sciences to economics complemented each other's expertise of social and societal challenges, higher education pedagogy, innovative learning methodologies such as arts based methods as well as evaluation of impacts.One of the main results of the project is a comprehensive publication guiding HEI teachers and managers to integrate art and challenge based learning methods into teaching. This will further result in greater societal engagement and impact of HEIs. HEISE project affected the students and stakeholders of HEI by the challenge based learning methods which resulted in a more active dialogue between them while solving the real-life societal challenges collaboratively. The project had an impact on the management of HEIs and the way they strategically integrate the societal engagement and impact into their operations. The project added new knowledge on societal impact of HEIs and its evaluation to the participating audience of two Multiplier events. The long-term benefits lie in the further development of course content in which the challenge based learning methods are utilized. In addition, the longer-term impact of systematically evaluating the impact of HEIs will increase the importance of the topic leading to broader societal engagement of HEIs, which will further affect the way citizens understand intercultural and social inclusion.

Nowadays in Europe folk heritage and traditional rural culture are disappearing, which is a pressing issue due to urbanization and globalization all over the world. Recent generations have already lost their roots and they have no contact with the traditional folk culture anymore. We truly believe cultural heritage is not only about preserving identity and history. Cultural heritage is a universal value shaping our personality and defining our daily lives. It is an important expression of cultural diversity – thus preserving it and passing it on to future generations is really important. The key of fostering change and reversing this tendency is in youth’s education. School education in Hungary has serious prestige problems, which is a general issue in other European countries as well. Music education could be a platform for sharing folk music and heritage with current generations but the classes are underestimated by students, parents and even by the teachers. Undervaluation comes from the lack of modernization during the last decades. Students need to get information by a channel they already use and understand – the tools of digital technology. Our project Folk_ME – Folk Music Education for Future Generations gives a niche solution to save folk heritage in Europe with a new methodology for teaching folk music in schools. The strong pillar of our methodology is a digital toolkit inspired by Polyphony – Collection of Disappearing European Cultural Heritage project’s research and archive. We want to develop our project together with experienced education and music professionals in order to have a real and actual answer for the threatening disappearance of folk heritage. International cooperation is an exceptional tool to merge knowledge, share best practices and develop the new form of folk music education. The main objective of this project is to design, test and implement a new, adaptable model which could be further used and developed in other national contexts as well. Our desired intent is to reintegrate the knowledge of our partners and their cultural heritage to the society through education not only in Hungary but in other European countries as well. That is why we chose the most relevant partners to achieve our goals. Our strong professional partnership comes from both academic, public and private sectors and from the field of education. The well-known Sibelius Academy – University of Arts Helsinki gives us a considerable amount of experience in education and academic know-how as well as the Hungarian Institute of Musicology. Piranha Arts Consulting gives its significant network and Ivan Honchar Museum its folk heritage knowledge and real experience in using digital archive in non-formal education besides many more values added to our project. The final output – a digital tool and pilot curricula and methodologies – will merge the three main pillars researched during the project period:-Integrating new technology in music education and adopting it to the digital shift-Integrating traditions and wider international context in the high school folk music education-Adopting new educational methodologies in the folk music curricula based on already existing academic researches

Reflective Entrepreneurial Music Education Worldclass - RENEW’ is a two years project (2016-2018) developed by five higher music education institutions (The Royal Academy of Music Aarhus, The Royal Conservatoire The Hague, The Norwegian Academy of Music, The Guildhall School of Music and Drama and the Sibelius Academy) and a European network organization (The Association Européenne des Conservatoires, Académies de Musique et Musikhochschulen - AEC). The project has directly contributed to the improvement of the employability of future music graduates through the artistic, pedagogical and entrepreneurial development of higher music education studies while initiating a cultural shift within institutions by changing teachers’ mind-set and approaches to guiding students through their programmes-Developing an entrepreneurial mind-set, including instinctively self-critical and reflective processes. During the two years of the project implementation, the six RENEW partners have worked together on the development of tools and models to generate change inside institutions. Each project partner has planned, hosted and successfully delivered five student bootcamps (one per HME partner institution) involving both teachers and students from very different disciplines and providing them with conceptual tools placing entrepreneurship in the wider context. In addition, the RENEW consortium has organised a joint entrepreneurial staff training for teaching staff that has brought together international experts to design staff development sessions aimed at teaching staff members involved in promoting an entrepreneurial mind-set within institutions as well as regular teaching staff members.Based on the experience and know-how gathered during the project teaching/learning/training activities, the RENEW project consortium has provided HME institutions with a description of how to implement a Joint European Module for Entrepreneurship teaching. The concrete results give guidelines about the establishment of several Joint European Modules mixing elements both at local and international level. The joint module description includes information on the curriculum in terms of content, workload and teaching methodologies- Arrangements for admission and assessment- Quality assurance arrangements- Models for financial sustainability in terms of costs and tuition fees. In addition, the RENEW project has succeeded in expanding the entrepreneurial mind-set among HME institutions in Europe and helping them better understand the importance of this topic and the need of addressing it in order to be able to help future students engage and face the profession. The partner institutions participating in the project have develop tools and expertise that will allow them to implement entrepreneurship in their curricula and train their teaching staff for them to be able to answer the challenges involved in preparing students for the profession. In the long term, not only the institutions that have directly participated in the development of the project will see be benefit from the outcomes of the project but also all HME institutions inside the AEC network (around 90% of all the HME institutions in Europe) will count with models and tools to better embed entrepreneurship in their curricula.