Project Outputs
The project is grounded on the premise there will be a skills gap in the upcoming hydrogen sector and therefore a need for a suitably educated workforce.
In order to meet this need, the international consortium came together to create “HySkills”; an industrially relevant, modular, vocational education and training (VET) course aimed at educating learners for the hydrogen sector. The HySkills modules will focus on fundamentals of hydrogen, imparting technical & practical knowledge as well as the important critical safety considerations of hydrogen.
The project commenced in December 2020 and the consortium consists of 5 transnational partners with expertise in hydrogen, sustainability and education. The main outputs of the project are the learning outcomes and units, the modular course and a “train the trainer” programme and handbook.
Intellectual Outputs
1. Learning Outcomes & Units
The Leaning Outcomes and Units portion of the project will ascertain the needs requirements which are relevant to the workforces who will work directly within the hydrogen sector. Surveys and interviews will be carried out with company and industry representatives from all partner locations to assess the gaps. A needs analysis report will be produced and from this information, partners will create the learning outcomes and units for 8 modules which will form the HySkills modular course.
2. Training Course
The HySkills Training Course will provide foundation knowledge and aspects of hands-on skills to learners in the EQF level 5 range, allowing them to gain core understanding of the necessity of critical safety which is required while undertaking practical work in the hydrogen sector. The modular course will be based on the needs analysis to ensure industrial relevance. The training course will seek endorsement from industry. A guidance document will be produced to give recommendations on how the course can gain accreditation. The resources produced for the modules will be openly accessible as part of the Toolkit.
3. Train the Trainer Programme & Handbook
The Hyskills Train the Trainer element will serve as a programme to enable the VET trainers to be able to successfully deliver the knowledge and skills to students undertaking the HySkills modules – who will become the future workforce in the hydrogen sector. This programme will contain the appropriate modules and course content to sufficiently train the VET trainers to enable them to deliver the course.
Project Objectives
1
To undertake a comparative needs analysis across 5 EU countries to map the relevant safety and technical skills of future workforce in the H2 sector in order to aid the design and development of the HySkills curriculum and learning outcomes.
2
To enhance the labour market relevance of VET learners by designing a modular training course and practical learning to develop accredited safety skills with the intention of creating a workforce fully equipped to integrate into the H2 sector.
3
To initially strengthen the key competences of 90 learners through the pilot delivery of the HySkills modular training course within the partner institutions.
4
To develop and pilot a teacher training programme to 50 teachers and trainers to enable the effective delivery of specialised cross-disciplinary engineering VET.
5
To introduce modern training delivery methods (interactive case studies, project-based learning) and open access pedagogical resources (e.g. online toolkit) for staff and learners across Europe building capacity for the future H2 workforce
The European Commission’s support for the production of this publication does not constitute an endorsement of the contents, which reflect the views only of the authors, and the Commission cannot be held responsible for any use which may be made of the information contained therein.
