Strengthening skills relevance in cooperation with relevant partners is a central theme in the current European Year of Skills. It is precisely the aim of the Erasmus+ project Painters-Euro-Qualif: four European partners, amongst which the Walloon training centre IFAPME, are developing a common professional competence standard for the heritage restoration painters.
The built heritage sector needs skilled and qualified technicians. Yet, the professional skills of these trades are not sufficiently identified, neither at national nor at European level. There is concomitantly a gap and an appetite for training in these professions, however the existing training courses are not necessarily easily accessible. That’s why a consortium of four partners from four different countries joined forces in the Erasmus+ project Painters-Euro-Qualif. Artemisia (France), Scuola Edile di Siena (Italy) and IFAPME (French-speaking part of Belgium) are training and certification centres offering programmes in building trades. IDEC (Greece) is a centre for training and consulting with expertise in professional competence standards and quality in education.
Learning from and with each other
In the last year, three training sites have been set up: the Château de la Touche in the Côtes d’Armor (France – June 2022), the Palazzo Piccolomini in Siena (Italy – February 2023) and the Paix-Dieu in Amay (Belgium – May 2023). These workcamps are training laboratories, a collective space for exchanging know-how, craft traditions and experience. Professionals and trainees from different countries and generations gather to learn outside the classroom, to find solutions. Not only technical skills, but also interpersonal skills are trained, in a real-life setting.
These three training sites are at the core of the project. On the one hand, they revealed the skills required for the heritage restoration painters and thus served as a source of information when developing the common professional competence standard. On the other hand, they offer the possibility to test the validity of the tools constructed by the consortium.
Tools to keep on learning
Within Painters-Euro-Qualif, the consortium not only organised the training sites and developed an EQF level 4-6 professional competence standard, it also works towards other deliverables. For instance, a digital portal for heritage building sites is being developed, containing interviews, webinars and all kinds of useful documentation. An online training module will enable an international approach to the restoration sites. This training module is completed by a language training module, including a multilingual glossary. The consortium also wants to develop a system to facilitate the international recognition of skills, providing a guide describing among others procedures and model agreements, based on the common standard.
The project wants to strengthen the building restoration professions by improving qualifications and skills. At the same time, companies in the sector can benefit from a high-performance workforce. The consortium hopes that in the future, a transfer and adaptation of the results to other trades in the built heritage and/or to eco-construction will follow.
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On the partners:
ReferNet Belgium (2023). Painters-Euro-Qualif – developing and maintaining the skills of heritage restoration painters.