Erasmus+: Building a Sustainable Future Together.
Developing project ideas. Erasmus Plus - building future together and promoting our new Erasmus Plus Partnership project "Green Craft up"!
The conference have brought together European stakeholders from education, youth, and sports to discuss the skills needed for a green transition and explore how the Erasmus+ program is tackling mobility-related challenges.
The agenda features roundtable discussions, hands-on workshops, and ceremonies to present prestigious European awards.
Attending provides the opportunity to gather new insides of policymakers and exchange project ideas. As I realzed from the pannels and the workshops the focus was set on solutions mainly involving young people. This is of course nessecary because the generation up to 30 will make decisions in the future. It is especially important to educate, inform and involve this group into actions for a sustainable future also taking into account that it becomes "fashionable" for first voters in Europe to support parties, that are denying climatechange and spreading climate disinformation.
But the consideration of generation 50+ as a main actor in this filed hasn´t been valued and evaluated, especially in the perception of the conference. Attending the seminars and the pannels a saw a large contribution of presentation to young people e.g. as future voters etc. But I was asking myself- how is at the moment the largest group of voters by age? When you have a look at the demography, you see the the boomer generation has the most influence on politics in regards of edonomuc development, pension, environment etc. And as politicians are maximizing the effort to the voter groups- there is a little chance for the young generation to be heared.
In the future discussions, the stakeholders of Erasmus should take more action towards the generation 50+ in order to have an impact on sustainablity and avoiding the mistake to makethis group feeling patronized. Stakeholders have to change the storytelling towards a the fact that sustainbility means social inclusion, strengthen pariticipation to civil society, promotes inclusion.
Especially the denial of anthropogenic causes of climate change and uncertainty of climate change characterize also a change in the mindset of people. Authors like Inglehart and Norris, 2016; (McCright et al., 2016; De Vries, 2018; Gidron and Hall, 2020,)state that this development typically refer to a backlash against modernization. One explanation is, that the boomer generation feels more risk averse towards new developments and technology.
Another explanation is ideological explanations e.g. the wish to maintain or regain traditional social structures. Mc right (McCright et al., 2016) stated that resistance to societal changes,may also influenced by socioeconomic factors. It is commonly believed that economic concerns can overshadow the importance of environmental issues like climate change (Scruggs & Benegal, 2012; Kachi, Bernauer & Gampfer, 2015). The concept of a "finite pool of worries" (Whitmarsh, 2011) suggests that people can only focus on a limited number of issues they perceive as threats. As a result, issues outside this narrow focus, like climate change, are often ignored or dismissed. Individuals preoccupied with current or future economic challenges may thus lack the mental space to address climate change, leading them to reject information on its existence or human causes.
At these points the ERASMUS PLUS can have the opportunity via Adult and VET (upskilling) education to foster e.g. resillience know how, civil society engagement.
The new ERASMUS PLUS Partnership project Green craft up! (2024-1-DE02-KA210-VET-000249263) by WFS Bildung and partners will make a step in the direction of educating 50+ workers on green skills in the crafts sector. Espesicially invoving companies and their workers generates a good pool of ideas to have an impact.
The partners always wellcome contribiution of ideas and proposals for new projects involving the boomer generation.
Here is the link to the video on the topic.: Erasmus+: Building a Sustainable Future Together - YouTube
