THE NEED FOR SYNERGIES BETWEEN THE EDUCATIONAL AND INDUSTRIAL COMMUNITIES

While the labour market is undergoing a major transformation under the influence of new technologies, the industry reaffirms its role as a driving force of the economy. Technical and industrial innovation surrounds us and continuously redesign jobs.

Today, however, the education system struggles with making industrial activities attractive enough to students. The technical and industrial culture is yet to be integrated to general education, which leads to misconceptions and stereotypes about the industry.

This is why the educational and industrial communities are partnering to produce digital resources based on authentic learning and adapted to general, technical and vocational education.

Offering teachers and trainers the opportunity to rely on these resources is likely to make the industrial sector more attractive to students and thus encourage them to willingly turn towards industrial training. 

THE ROOTS OF THE PROJECT

“Des territoires, une voie” is a serious game created with Cosea and coproduced with the National Federation of Public Works (FNTP), BTP+ and other partners of the construction industry. The goal is to determine a route for the high-speed line connecting Tours to Bordeaux, while taking into account the wishes and opposition of stakeholders. This game offers the opportunity to be used for different grades and disciplines, including economics, geography and project management.

Screenshot of the serious game “Des territoires, une voie”.

Partnerships between the educational and industrial communities resulted in the production of digital resources introducing students to an authentic vision of the industry, from Year 7 pupils to 2-year higher education students. Some resources are also created for apprentices, such as “Terrassor,” a building site simulator meant for higher education students in the technical and vocational fields.

Screenshot of “Terrassor”, building site simulator developed within the scope of the high-speed line project (“LGV project”)

All the resources produced in the framework of these partnerships are in the public domain for the education and made available to teachers and trainers on the platform named ETINCEL. They come with a pedagogical script, which is entirely editable.

RELYING ON A PROVEN METHOD

The first national platform gathering all the digital resources related to the industry

Screenshot of ETINCEL, granting access to various pedagogical material

At the heart of this project lies a strong partnership between the educational and industrial actors to produce digital resources, both representative of the sector and meaningful to students.

The method chosen to create these resources ensures that the needs and constraints of every actor are taken into account at every stage of the production process. The project team gathers representatives from the industrial sector, teachers and the school inspectorate. Discussing the specific needs of a given branch of industry in improving its image paves the way for the definition of themes and the drafting of deliverables.

Further in the production process, the resources are subject to a two-level validation:

  • By the steering committee, to make sure that they are in keeping with the expectations of industrials partners
  • By the school inspectorate, to guarantee their relevance with regard to the curriculum 

The promotion of these resources is a key step in the coproduction process. It implies a close collaboration between educational and industrial actors, materialized in the form of videos released on industrial partners’ websites or training for the educational communities.

The relevance of this approach is reasserted for each new project and needs to move up to a new dimension, hence the creation of the Foundation for Education and Industry.