Aspect Works Director Jason Petrait attends end-of-project conference focused on understanding how skill systems need to develop if they are to assist people in making labour market transitions.
An unseasonably warm Maastricht welcomed 60+ attendees to the close-out of Skills2Capabilities, a project that studied how individuals will increasingly need to acquire new and updated skills if they are to effectively manage labour market transitions.
Taking place at the Bonnefanten Museum, the day began with a welcome and lessons learned with Didier Fouarge and Terence Hogarth, two project leads who detailed the ambitions of the project, including the development of analytical frameworks to underpin skills policies locally, nationally and EU-wide.
After their kick-off and a keynote from Sandra McNally of the University of Surrey, attendees heard pitches from a variety of project participants on their findings. A few of the highlights:
- Strategic policy documents are a valuable tool for gradual improvements.
- Strategy implementation is often disrupted by government changes, socio-economic shocks and changing priorities.
- Regions matter deeply in understanding the demand for VET skills.
- Analysing vacancy data with LLMs yields novel insights into VET skill demand and points the way for future research.
- EU and national policies often stress market alignment (supply and demand) but miss broader impacts on inclusive growth, fairness and well-being at work.
- Only inclusive growth secures a sense of active citizenship and political belonging.
The conference’s focus on not just an economic agenda but a social agenda, questioning how skills policies will affect not just markets but people, was both refreshing and necessary.
Before lunch, attendees toured the museum, a gem of a facility on the Meuse river, including a view from the roof and a tour through a remarkable current exhibition from Mounira Al Solh.
The conference concludes today. Read more at https://skills2capabilities.eu