Smart City ASEAN Learning Network

INFO		Title: Smart City ASEAN Learning Network
		Acronym: SCALe
		Programme: ERASMUS-EDU-2022-CBHE-STRAND-2- International Capacity Building
		Start – End Date: 15/05/2023 – 15/05/2026
		Funding Agency:  Funded by the European Union.
		Project Homepage: https://projectscale.eu/
		Project Coordinator:  UNIVERSITY OF MALAYA, Prof. Dr. Ramesh T. SUBRAMANIAM
		Status: running

DESCRIPTION The SCALe project aims to support the upskilling of current and prospective smart city professional and provide adequate educational opportunities to young students and existing workforce, which are evidently deemed important for a fair, efficient and sustainable transition towards smart cities. The SCALe project develops an innovative ecosystem in Asia consisting of:

• Micro-courses/micro-credentials to train Theoretical, Natural, Engineering, Computer Science and Information Technologies graduates to address the new challenges posed by the ever-increasing needs for environmental awareness, energy efficiency and concerns posed by urbanisation and technological developments. The micro-courses will introduce innovative elements to the existing curricula.
• Professionals’ courses / MOOCs, introducing dual learning systems bridging tertiary studies with upper secondary VET to boost graduates’ employability.
• Practical training schemes, internships, and study of real-life cases in business and industry.
• Capacity building workshops for academic, technical, and administrative staff to support HEIs to develop and implement the institutional reforms.
• Knowledge triangle integration, establishing new collaborations and enhancing the nature, content and types of partnerships with businesses, regional authorities, research organisations, governmental bodies, NGOs and other societal partners.
• Exchange of good practices through enhanced networking and mutual learning.

Objectives

Ο1: Develop a labor market-driven competence framework for SSCs in the ASEAN region exploiting the DevOps group of competences, which will reflect the local and regional skills demand for SCCs’ workforce. It will address the need for concrete steps towards establishing an SSC –aware Education ecosystem. This objective includes a self-assessment tool for PCs’ HEIs through which the training offer will be opposed to the skills demand in order to highlight required curricula udates to meet the SSCs’ training demands. Ο2: Develop an innovative ecosystem of micro courses for SSCs thus helping build the capacity of the PCs HEIs to address the skills and training gaps for SSC professionals. Thus, the micro-courses will boost existing curricula improving the level of competences and skills offered in the field of SSCs and addressing the existing absence of comprehensive programmes in the field of SSCs. This objective is also based on the SSCs competence framework defined through O1. Development of the SSC micro course ecosystem will be guided by a pedagogical framework, which will endorse student-centered teaching and learning methods (i.e., project-based and collaborative learning) and learning outcome based learning and assessment content development. The consortium will also research and formalise the design of multi-stage, mixed model MOOCs for SSC lifelong learning, including non-formal and informal learning. These MOOC modes will serve the project’s target groups via a combination of study and work. Tailored specialisation pathways will be used for young people entering the job market, practitioners in SSC, and professional networks in sectors of innovation and learners in the context of regional development. The competences and skills offered by each PC HEI will be a product of the self assessment tool for this HEI. Ο3: Pilot and evaluate the SSC micro courses by encapsulating them in curricula offered by partner HEIs. This objective includes the development of a SSC micro courses integration roadmap to steer the curricula adaptation process though the definition of a methodology for reforming existing curricula to include SSC-related micro courses. Educational curricula will be designed to focus on acquisition of diverse skills with specific work-based learning topics directly linked to each micro course to guarantee effective building of targeted skills. Demand in target countries is already shifting towards emerging skills and the ability of the new employee to arrive with a specific practical skillset and be full “job-ready”. Ο4: Establish viable synergies and links with the regional and national providers of services for smart cities, to address their needs for SS –ready personnel, training in new, disruptive technologies and enhance the employability of graduates. The partnership will achieve these objectives by addressing the current SSC training gap in the region, thus providing the industry with a steady stream of highly qualified staff (either new HEI graduates or retrained existing professionals). Viable synergies and links with the regional industry will be established, through actions such as targeted dissemination activities including the SSC Final Conference. The synergies will also be reinforced by the formation of a Community of Practice for SSC Education (CP-SSC), a cooperation hub, supported by a virtual environment, which will foster cooperation and exchange of good practices among community members. Ο5: Reinforce the capacity of the PC HEIs by training their academic staff in the implementation of the new IVM and the micro courses and appropriate delivery methods. The target countries’ educational system is expected to produce workers that can fit the needs of the industry. Thus, it is expected that SCC – ready graduates should be the goal of the educational system. In turn, this requires the appropriate preparation of the educational system both in terms of human capital (educators) and means of delivery (educational processes, structures, equipment, methodologies). Greater human connectivity through the exchange of students and staff, which is enabled through global and regional networks, including ASCN will be also stimulated. Cooperation, exchange of know-how and good practices in the subject area between EU and PC HEIs will be promoted. Alumni virtual centres and organizing Carrier info days for SSC will be created. PARTNERS UNIVERSITI MALAYA (UM) – Project Coordinator UNIVERSITI TEKNOLOGI MARA (UiTM) NATIONAL UNIVERSITY OF MANAGEMENT (NUM) INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY OF CAMBODIA (ITC) NATIONAL UNIVERSITY OF BATTAMBANG (NUBB) ASIAN INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY (AIT) CHIANG MAI UNIVERSITY (CMU) PANEPISTIMIO THESSALIAS (UTH) HELLENIC OPEN UNIVERSITY (HOU) UNIVERSITA DEGLI STUDI DI ROMA LA SAPIENZA (SAPIENZA) PLANET T AND S COMPANY LIMITED (PTS) UNIVERSITI TEKNOLOGI MALAYSIA (UTM) PHNOM PENH INTERNATIONAL UNIVERSITY CO LTD (PPIU) SKYBRIDGE PARTNERS