A tool to improve youth employability
A project funded by the EEA Grants has developed an online tool to certify the skills developed by volunteers in their social work with the objective to improve their CV and hence, their opportunities in the labour market.
04.04.2016
Teamwork, initiative, negotiation, interpersonal communication… All these skills are included in many job offers and all of them have been developed by volunteers in their crucial social work. In order to have an official certification and, therefore, improve youth employability, Reconoce project, one of the funded by the EEA Grants within the Active Citizenship programme, has developed a very useful online tool.
“The project was born in a situation of high level of unemployment among the young people in Spain and we, as youth organizations, wanted to improve their chances of finding employment”, explained David Arduengo, president of Confederación Don Bosco, project promoter, in the presentation of Reconoce tool.
But, what exactly is this system of accreditation of volunteers’ competences? In the words of its creator, Lluis Gómez, “is an app web that you can access from any device with Internet access”. The procedure is very simple: a volunteer asks the organization in which he/she has developed the social work that a certain skill was acknowledged, a qualified expert within the organization assesses the request and in order to avoid frauds, external audits issues the final judgment creating an official certificate of competences.
The objective now is that Public Administration and companies join this initiative so Reconoce become a formal toll for certifying volunteers competences recognized at all levels.
Reconoce project is one of the developed within Active Citizenship Programme, managed by the NGO Platform of Social Action and funded by the EEA Grants with 4.6 million euros aimed at giving support to the civil society and NGOs for fostering democracy, human rights and fighting against exclusion.