On 19 and 20 February, a consortium of 21 European organisations under the lead of DIGITAL SME launched “SMARCO – SMARt COmmunities Skills Development in Europe” in Brussels, a 4-year Erasmus+ project focused on supporting the skills development for resilient smart communities. This BluePrint Project will directly support the EU Skills Agenda and align with the Digital Ecosystem Large Scale Partnership’s mission to contribute to the Digital Decade Targets, highlighting the crucial role of digital SMEs in the upskilling and reskilling of the European Workforce.

SMARCO strives to become a unique one-stop-shop for smart community skills, focusing on three main objectives:

• Addressing the skills gaps of smart city engineers and procurers
• Granting flexible learning, trans-national dimension and learning mobility, as well as a wide recognition of trainings
• Creating a sustainable community of stakeholders related to smart communities’ skills via participation in the Pact for Skills (and its Digital Large-scale Partnership)

Throughout its implementation, the project will provide smart communities’ engineers and public administrations’ staff with HE and VET training programmes which offer the most comprehensive and effective results. At least 400 learners will be engaged in the testing and evaluation phase, aimed at measuring the programme’s success and collecting feedback to improve learning outcomes. In the last phase, the focus will shift to the creation of a certification framework leveraging micro-credentials as an acknowledgement of the specific acquired skills.

By the end of the SMARCO Project, more than 200 decision-makers will be included in roundtable workshops, 10 VET courses will be developed, and a minimum of 100 learning resources will be collected and developed for HE curricula. The involvement of external stakeholders, through the External Advisory Board, the Large-Scale Partnership for the Digital Ecosystem and the Roundtables with decision-makers, will be crucial for the project’s success.

“Skills for Smart Communities – Empowering the Workforce for a Digital and Sustainable Future” panel discussion

The transition to smart communities requires a workforce with essential digital and transversal competencies. Thus, existing skill gaps shall be bridged on both sides: targeting public authorities to lead the adoption of smart technologies, as well as industry, which shall develop innovative and sustainable solutions for smart communities, through the crucial support of VET and HE institutions for upskilling and reskilling.

The panel discussion “Skills for Smart Communities – Empowering the Workforce for a Digital and Sustainable Future” co-organised with SMACITE project within SMARCO Kick-off meeting addressed the critical skills needed for the development of smart, cyber-secure, and sustainable communities, laying the foundation for collaboration within SMARCO.

The discussion featured experts from OECD, CoR and relevant European organisations representing local authorities, such as ICLEI – managing the Covenant of Mayors – ENoLL and OASC – promoters of the Living-in EU initiative. Speakers highlighted the importance of cross-sector collaboration within public authorities, industry – in particular SMEs – VET and Academia to bridge the gap between digital innovation and public sector needs, showcasing best practices of successful workforce development programs and tools.

For further information on SMARCO, please contact Caterina Bortolaso at c.bortolaso@digitalsme.eu.