On 12 July, SHINE –  Italian partner Confindustria SIAV Veneto organised the final multiplier event of the project together with policy experts on HVET in the Veneto Region.

The opening message was dedicated to young people by Mr. Gianluca Vigne “We need to support them on their path from school to labour market, to the moment the finding the right job placement”. To do this end, we need to improve the connection in between schools and business. 82% of Italian young people who follows HVET would find a job right after. Though still the rates of enrolment on HVET in Italy are a way lower than in Germany.

Mr. Filippo Viola stressed few of the challenges ahead of the HVET (ITS) such as how to fight the drop outs, how to connect theoretical and technical knowledge and in connection to this to improve the world of work with the educational systems.

Mr. Luca Boetti introduced the last project development and frames the context of SHINE -SHare, Improve, develop: today’s excelleNce for tomorrow’s HVET, stressing different lessons that we learnt along the project. Among them we need to find the good balance of work based learning and the school based training, and indeed to find the right path to train the trainers not leaving them alone in the process of improving their own skills.  With regards to skills, it’s clear that all the stakeholders involved on this, need to work to anticipate the right skills. We are in a moment where there is a clear skills mismatches, that’s why educational systems need to be one step ahead in order to match with labour market needs before even they know which skills they would need.

Today, soft-skills are key as they will make the different of future employees but as well the current employees need to rework these skills. As a matter of fact, the Local Action Plan from Gothenburg (Sweden) presented by Ms. Ana Cato Moe stressed that most of the companies requires training programmes focused on soft-skills. But, what kind of soft-skills? In particular, communication, organisation or leadership. These skills would increase HVET students’ employability.

Obviously, we can’t leave behind the necessity of Industry 4.0. Ms. Silvia Oliva from Fondazione NordEst explained how Italian companies have started to give relevance to Industry 4.0 sectors such as AI, robotics or the internet of Things… In fact, the technical skills would help youth unemployed people to obtain jobs but they need the right qualification.

The panel discussion was moderated by the Journalist Economist, Maurizio Crema. The panel gave a picture of how Italian HVET (ITS) system works, and how they go one step ahead working together with companies. Even more, three students explained why they decided to follow HVET. One of the main reasons was the practical training and the possibility to be in contact with the world of work. Though, they recommended to improve the apprenticeships periods from two weeks up to two months.

Stefano Mioto, General Director of Confindustria Veneto SIAV, concluded the conference.