The Officina Emilia Initiative:Innovative Local Actions to Support Education and Training Systems

Margherita Russo (margherita.russo@unimore.it) and Paola Mengoli (paola.mengoli@unimore.it)

Department of Economics from University of Modena and Reggio E., Faculty of Economics "Marco Biagi"

Abstract: The issue of the regeneration of skills, in particular in the light engineering industry, is addressed by Officina Emilia (henceforth OE) as a crucial one in order to re-examine the interweaving of education, innovation and local development in the SMEs production systems. The project, aimed at the education and training systems, is designed to enhance the industrial culture in order to strengthen technical and scientific education. First sponsored in 2000 by the University of Modena & Reggio Emilia (Italy), over the last years OE has gathered the support of local actors dealing with the themes of training, culture, and local development. In 2009 it opened its museolaboratorio (“workshop-museum”) in which teaching activities promote an interest in the themes of work, technologies and the socio-economic development of the territory among the students and teachers of schools of all types and levels. The involvement of class groups, of teachers and other visitors takes place through active learning practices that foster motivation and develop a sense of belonging which is likely to lead to a more profitable educational experience, both secondary and tertiary, as well as to contribute to improving career prospects. Officina Emilia proposes innovative action on a local level, allowing for the implementation of effective teaching practices as well as the broadening and consolidation of best practices which might support a society-wide trend towards maintaining a high demand for a better quality of education and the ability to provide it. Ten years after the beginning of the initiative, with this paper we intend to open up the discussion on the various research issues and on the actions undertaken, focusing on the analytical tools and the main critical areas in the further implementation of the Officina Emilia initiative.

Keywords: Analysis of Education; Education Policy; Regional Development Policies; Innovation (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I21 I28 J24 O31 R58 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: pages 36
Date: 2009-05
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-edu, nep-hrm and nep-ure
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.dep.unimore.it/materiali_discussione/0613.pdf (application/pdf)
Our link check indicates that this URL is bad, the error code is: 500 Can't connect to www.dep.unimore.it:80 (No such host is known. )

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:mod:depeco:0613

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in Department of Economics from University of Modena and Reggio E., Faculty of Economics "Marco Biagi" Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sara Colombini (sara.colombini@unimore.it).