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For the ninth year Telecentre Europe will organise its annual conference under the theme of Digital Skills for Future Work on 06-08th of October, 2016. This year the event will be hosted by Belgian member Digipolis Ghent at the NH Gent Belfort Hotel in Ghent.

Day 1 (Thursday 7th October) will be focused on policy and practice around digital skills for future technologies and modes of employment. Delegates will then consider the future needs of citizens and plan for interventions that will support them. Day 2 (Friday, 8th October) will provide further in-depth discussion on future skills for learning and recruitment, how industry and government can help organisations to adapt, with some practical ‘how to’ sessions. It will also provide a forum to discover the learning from specific transferable projects of the member organisations.

The culmination of the conference on Friday evening will be the Telecentre Awards 2016 ceremony to recognise the best individuals and organisations in digital inclusion across Europe.

Delegates will also be able to preview the Ghent Digital Interactive Fair on Saturday 8th October.

To learn more about the upcoming event, please check the TEAC16 Programme

The European Commission has set out steps to improve digital skills in Europe, which are the cornerstone of a truly functioning digital society and Digital Single Market. These steps were outlined in the New Skills Agenda for Europe: working together for human capital, employability and competitiveness, adopted recently by the European Commission.

Its purpose is to improve the quality of skills development, make skills and qualifications more visible and comparable and improve skills intelligence for better career choices.

In the future all jobs will require digital skills, and despite continued high levels of unemployment there could be 756 000 unfilled jobs for ICT professional by 2020.

Andrus Ansip, Vice-President for the Digital Single Market, said: "There is a clear and urgent need to boost digital skills. Our Digital Skills and Jobs Coalition is not only about filling existing jobs. It is also about the many new jobs that a truly functioning Digital Single Market will create."

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On June 15th, 2016 the European Commission published a report on the impact of information and communication technologies (ICT) on job quality. Looking at the evidence from 12 specific types of non-office jobs, the report found that the use of digital technologies is beginning to have a profound effect on the tasks carried out and the skills required for many jobs outside the traditional office.

The report is the first part of a wide-ranging study which will provide comprehensive evidence regarding digital skills in the workplace. The results will feed into the Commission's work on digital skills and its new initiative the Digital Skills and Jobs Coalition.

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A network of major European cities has called on the EU to place its members at the heart of efforts to boost digital skills, tackle unemployment and prepare citizens for the high value jobs of the future.

The number of EU citizens not in education, employment or training (NEETs) is growing, and many lack the basic skills they need to be a part of the modern economy. This lack of skills has a negative impact on long-term unemployment and inequality.

More than 40% of EU citizens lack basic digital skills, according to the European Commission. The executive also predicts that the skills gap will lead to 756,000 unfilled jobs in the EU’s high tech industries by 2020.

To address this issue, the Commission has launched its New Skills Agenda for Europe. This scheme is designed to equip Europeans with more, and more relevant skills by connecting education and businesses and recognising skills learned outside of school.

Read the full article on Euractiv

Tertiary education institutes (hochschule and university college) and ICT training specialists from across Europe are creating a course to train students to help small and medium-sized enterprises select and use open source cloud services. The course will be tested on Spanish and British exchange students working for SMEs in the two countries.

Having completed the course successfully, students must know how to determine the ICT needs of SMEs, select the best open source tools or cloud services that meet those needs, and be able to implement and configure the solutions. Examples of services include creating and hosting company websites, reducing the costs of management, and improving customer relations.

The trainings are developed by tertiary education institutes in Remmen (Norway), Skovde (Sweden) and Berlin (Germany), working with ICT training organisations and public administrations in Madrid (Spain) and Sheffield (UK). The two-year project received a EUR 200,000 grant from the European Union’s Erasmus+ programme. Cisoss started in September, and the project will end in August 2017.

Read the full article on Joinup