Periodic Reporting for period 1 - BUSLeague (Dedicated to stimulate demand for sustainable energy skills in the construction sector)
Reporting period: 2020-09-01 to 2021-11-30
With many sectors turning towards sustainable energy use, the construction industry demands a skilled workforce and experienced capacity building. The EU-funded BUSLeague project will address and control the challenges created by the rise in demand for energy-skilled and experienced workers for the building planning, operation and support value chain. The project will develop and apply European recognition of energy skills in conjunction with improving training methods and techniques already demonstrated by EU and national initiatives such as BUILD UP Skills and Construction Skills. BUSLeague will focus on a combination of mutual recognition of energy skills, awareness raising, capacity building and legislative changes. SMEs will be involved by engaging local and regional workforces.
The overall aim of BUSLeague is to address and overcome the challenges of the stimulation of demand for energy skilled workforce (demand side), along with hands-on capacity building to increase the number of skilled workforce across the building design, operation and maintenance value chain (supply side). BUSLeague will achieve this objective by developing and implementing a cross European recognition of energy skills, together with upscaling successful training methods and techniques which have already been developed in previous EU and National initiatives such as BUILD UP Skills, Construction Skills. BUSLeague focusses on a blend of four elements: mutual recognition of energy skills, awareness raising, capacity building and legislative changes.
Implementation will be done at country specific and regional levels; based on a blend of measures to stimulate demand complimented with hands-on and practical upskilling of involved local and regional workforce. In this way engagement of SMEs will be ensured. BUSLeague is formed by a coalition of former BUILD UP Skills and Construction Skills projects. The partners believe that by working together the national implementation plans and developed means will improve and become more attractive and effective. BUSLeague is strengthened by experienced anthropology researchers and educational technology researchers in order to prove impact and to optimize the blends for stimulating demand and optimizing learning transfer of applied learning means and materials.
The overall aim of BUSLeague is to address and overcome the challenges of the stimulation of demand for energy skilled workforce (demand side), along with hands-on capacity building to increase the number of skilled workforce across the building design, operation and maintenance value chain (supply side). BUSLeague will achieve this objective by developing and implementing a cross European recognition of energy skills, together with upscaling successful training methods and techniques which have already been developed in previous EU and National initiatives such as BUILD UP Skills, Construction Skills. BUSLeague focusses on a blend of four elements: mutual recognition of energy skills, awareness raising, capacity building and legislative changes.
Implementation will be done at country specific and regional levels; based on a blend of measures to stimulate demand complimented with hands-on and practical upskilling of involved local and regional workforce. In this way engagement of SMEs will be ensured. BUSLeague is formed by a coalition of former BUILD UP Skills and Construction Skills projects. The partners believe that by working together the national implementation plans and developed means will improve and become more attractive and effective. BUSLeague is strengthened by experienced anthropology researchers and educational technology researchers in order to prove impact and to optimize the blends for stimulating demand and optimizing learning transfer of applied learning means and materials.
As a starter initial training and further education systems in the partner countries were identified and summarised. Results and experiences regarding recognition of skills (including proving practical skills) and the associated effects on stimulating market demand were collected and analysed.
Short-term ethnographic research across the building design, operation, and maintenance value chain was performed in order to provide new in-depth qualitative insights related to the aims and goals of BUSLeague project. An interdisciplinary team of engineers, architects and anthropologists conducted this research in six countries – Austria, Bulgaria, France, Ireland, Spain, and the Netherlands. They used predominantly semi-structured interviews (47 in total) and anthropological theories to structure both the research and analysis. Based on this, BUSLeague researchers continue to contextualize their further work and develop locally and regionally specific solutions.
BUSLeague compiled a qualification for recognition of energy skills. The BUSLeague team has performed a quest on finding out the right approach, scope and the qualification contents. The quest started with a desk research into the actual state of play and a study of (lighthouse) examples found both at national and EU-level. In addition, the team retrieved lessons learned, perceptions and expectations on the recognition of Energy Skills from the ethnographic research done. A stakeholder consultation process on the developed qualification was carried out in the 6 participating countries.
The project partners researched barriers (technical and legal) to the use of "energy efficiency/nZEB" training clause in their countries. Simultaneously, project partners started working on how a "training clause" could be piloted in their countries.
To increase the demand for quality energy efficiency and hence further incentivise building professionals and construction workers to upskill, awareness campaigns will be carried out at DIY/Hardware stores as a place where to interact with the public willing to carry out an EE renovation. A first campaign was organised by Bauhaus in Spain.
Based on the national implementation plans in the partner countries the BUSLeague team identified, assessed and collated relevant upskilling content and resources (curricula, presentations, handbooks, demos, e-tools, schematics etc.) from previous national and European projects. An ‘Overview of applied e-Learning interactions’ has been drafted. This report contains an overview of the applied e-learning interactions and experiences with their use in practice.
For National Implementations BUSLeague provided the 6 BUSLeague national teams (NL, FR, BG, SP, IE, AT) with a common methodology to define their National Implementation Plans (NIPs) and facilitate the evaluation and monitoring of their progress over time. Effectiveness of the national implementations is evaluated both from the ethnographical and educational perspective. This in order to build up and disseminate a collection of evidence-based stimulation of demand and upskilling measures. To foster learning from each other and dissemination of lessons learned in the EU network an internal learning community is formed.
With regards to communication and dissemination the BUSLeague website was launched including scaffolding Social media channels and a video summarising the project. Other dissemination materials produced have been: a project brochure and a poster.
Short-term ethnographic research across the building design, operation, and maintenance value chain was performed in order to provide new in-depth qualitative insights related to the aims and goals of BUSLeague project. An interdisciplinary team of engineers, architects and anthropologists conducted this research in six countries – Austria, Bulgaria, France, Ireland, Spain, and the Netherlands. They used predominantly semi-structured interviews (47 in total) and anthropological theories to structure both the research and analysis. Based on this, BUSLeague researchers continue to contextualize their further work and develop locally and regionally specific solutions.
BUSLeague compiled a qualification for recognition of energy skills. The BUSLeague team has performed a quest on finding out the right approach, scope and the qualification contents. The quest started with a desk research into the actual state of play and a study of (lighthouse) examples found both at national and EU-level. In addition, the team retrieved lessons learned, perceptions and expectations on the recognition of Energy Skills from the ethnographic research done. A stakeholder consultation process on the developed qualification was carried out in the 6 participating countries.
The project partners researched barriers (technical and legal) to the use of "energy efficiency/nZEB" training clause in their countries. Simultaneously, project partners started working on how a "training clause" could be piloted in their countries.
To increase the demand for quality energy efficiency and hence further incentivise building professionals and construction workers to upskill, awareness campaigns will be carried out at DIY/Hardware stores as a place where to interact with the public willing to carry out an EE renovation. A first campaign was organised by Bauhaus in Spain.
Based on the national implementation plans in the partner countries the BUSLeague team identified, assessed and collated relevant upskilling content and resources (curricula, presentations, handbooks, demos, e-tools, schematics etc.) from previous national and European projects. An ‘Overview of applied e-Learning interactions’ has been drafted. This report contains an overview of the applied e-learning interactions and experiences with their use in practice.
For National Implementations BUSLeague provided the 6 BUSLeague national teams (NL, FR, BG, SP, IE, AT) with a common methodology to define their National Implementation Plans (NIPs) and facilitate the evaluation and monitoring of their progress over time. Effectiveness of the national implementations is evaluated both from the ethnographical and educational perspective. This in order to build up and disseminate a collection of evidence-based stimulation of demand and upskilling measures. To foster learning from each other and dissemination of lessons learned in the EU network an internal learning community is formed.
With regards to communication and dissemination the BUSLeague website was launched including scaffolding Social media channels and a video summarising the project. Other dissemination materials produced have been: a project brochure and a poster.
In order to strenghten the dialogue between EU-projects; BUSLeague joined a group of collaborating Sister projects. This group started as an initiative from Sustainable Places 2020.
As part of this several articles are written together. Including one that will be presented at Clima 2022.
As part of this several articles are written together. Including one that will be presented at Clima 2022.