Aberdeen art school to launch EU design survey

The results of this ambitious benchmarking initiative will lead to the development of an international collaborative training database, a unique approach supported by the European Union.

Under the coordination of 'design innovation', six partners were chosen to lead the venture because of their expertise in the field, they are 'design innovation' (Belgium); Designkunst (Germany); Business Support Center for SMEs - Ruse (Bulgaria); Cirtes (France); Estonian Design Centre (Estonia); Gray's School of Art, the Robert Gordon University (UK).

More and more design and the creative Industries are regarded as key to fostering innovation in the European economy. It is important that skills, knowledge and competences meet expectations, claim the EDTI.

A series of surveys intends to highlight the environment of the design and the Creative Industries and rate how well designers and creative people are prepared to play their role in society and in the economy. In a perspective of continuing education, it will also identify the training needs of both designers and creatives and their clients, companies and public institutions.

Targeted on designers and creatives and their clients as well as those who use the services of designers, the surveys are available in English, German, French, Estonian and Bulgarian at www.edti.eu.

The European Design Training Incubator (EDTI) is a unique pan-European pilot project: putting together educational institutions and

organisations involved in lifelong learning to share resources and knowledge.

Thierry Van Kerm, EDTI coordinator says: "Design and the Creative Industries cover a wide range of intertwined domains. Nobody has enough resources to identify needs and develop all the training needed to foster development that will add value and create jobs. The core idea behind EDTI is to create a common platform for partners to pull resources together, benefiting from each other's experience and expertise. This is an excellent example of collaboration at the European level. The project is funded through the EU's Lifelong Learning, Leonardo da Vinci Programme."

The EDTI is a 24-month EU network project within the Leonardo da Vinci programme, which will run until 31 December 2009. EDTI covers the whole range of learning focused on professional practice in design and aims to support the creative industries in Europe through design training and education.

By benchmarking design education and training in the context of the lifelong learning, the core idea behind EDTI is to establish a common European platform where design-related organisations can audit existing training provision, identify needs and share and coordinate training development and its implementation.