Michael Kenny and Myriam Doyle from The Department of Adult and Community Education at Maynooth University were in Moate on October 25th for the Closing Meeting of Enhancing Competitiveness of Microenterprises in Rural Areas (MICRO), a Project co-funded by the Erasmus+ Programme of the European Commission, Key Action 2, Strategic Partnerships for Vocational and Educational Training. The Transnational Consortium met for the formal closure of the Project and to explore future exploitation of MICRO results and outputs. The MICRO project was led by Irish Rural Link . The meeting offered a unique opportunity to illustrate the results achieved and to explore the possibilities for further implementation.
MICRO was implemented by 7 Partners from 6 countries (Belgium, Greece, Ireland, Italy, Macedonia and Spain).
The idea behind MICRO was to sustain the growth and competitiveness of rural microenterprises by developing practical training resources and a dedicated Open Educational Resource (OER Platform).
After a structured need analysis the Consortium developed tailored training modules on the needs of microenterprises in rural areas, to help them building capacity and new skills.
The training is freely available in multilingual versions on the dedicated Open Educational Resource Platform: www.microsmetraining.eu.
During the meeting, Partners revised all Project Outputs: the OER Platform, the Capacity Gap Assessment, Training Content and Test & Validation activities.
An important issue discussed during the meeting was targets achieved during Dissemination activities. Partners are strongly committed to give great visibility to the Project, a dedicated Multiplier Event was held in each Project country in addition to daily online and offline Dissemination activities. Further, the MICRO website will be maintained for two years after the Project completion.
The Capacity Gap Assessment Report led by the The Department of Adult and Community Education at Maynooth University was prepared arising from the online feedback analysis of one hundred and fifty six (156) micro and craft-type rural based enterprises across the six project partner countries.
The MICRO project has collected primary research to identify the propensity of rural micro-entrepreneurs to engage in training to sustain and grow their micro-enterprises. From the research much has been learned about the reasons why rural micro-entrepreneurs do/do not engage. The research has also identified training topics that are priorities for rural micro-entrepreneurs.
For further information on the MICRO Project, please contact:
Michael Kenny at michael.kenny@mu.ie
