New educational project to ensure the island has qualified labour
The Education Island Bornholm project focuses on attracting and retaining more students by creating attractive and different frameworks. Photo: Lasse Petersen
In the future, businesses will have an even greater need for a trained workforce on Bornholm. Therefore, Campus Bornholm now wants to attract more students with a new project that will also brand the island as an educational hub.
Educational Island Bornholm (Uddannelses-Ø Bornholm) is the name of a new project created by Campus Bornholm, also involving the participation of KP (University College Copenhagen) and the Bornholm School of Health and Nursing. The project is supported by the Capital Region of Denmark, the European Union, and the Regional Municipality of Bornholm. The aim is to attract 100 additional pupils and students to the island's welfare and vocational education programmes.
That is according to Martin Lasse Hansen Sieben, Director of Campus Bornholm:
– Basically, the project is about securing 100 more civil registration numbers for the island's educational programmes over the next three years than we would have received anyway, and the project is not only aimed at very young students, but also young adults and adults.
When a project like Uddannelses-Ø Bornholm makes a lot of sense right now, according to the director, it is connected to the demographic future we are facing.
– There will be fewer young people over the coming years, while more older people leave the labour market. In this way, there will
there appears to be a gap between the skills people have and the number of people being sent into the labour market. Companies are simply going to lack qualified labour. That is why the project is a good idea, he states.
Wants to recruit more nationalities
Which specific study programmes are you looking for students from for the project?
It concerns vocational education and training and welfare programmes. So, for example, it could be students for programmes such as nurse, educational assistant, smith and carpenter, who are in short supply. In this way, the project is delimited in relation to education programmes.
On the other hand, the project is not limited in its search for new pupils and students, but will try to recruit from EU citizens resident in Denmark.
– The project is not only aimed at citizens with a home address on Bornholm, but also from the rest of Denmark and hopefully the EU too. So the idea is that we also need to attract students from outside the borders of Bornholm, he explains.
– Right now, it is possible for Ukrainian citizens to participate. But it could also be students from further afield to secure this workforce, says the director, explaining that Uddannelses-Ø Bornholm focuses on attraction and retention by highlighting Bornholm's special qualities and creating attractive and different frameworks.
If you want to attract more young people to Bornholm – both from Denmark and our neighbouring countries such as Sweden – it is important to highlight the island's unique qualities, he believes.
– Bornholm offers something quite special for those seeking a different pace of life, more space and magnificent scenery. If you look at newcomers, part of what attracts people to the island is that you can get outside – it is nature, the open vistas, it is a greater sense of calm. So we are also tapping into that discourse in terms of trying to market some of these study programmes, says the director, who particularly believes that the island's peace and unique nature can appeal to young adults with children who are looking for education and a job.
Education is a prerequisite for business development on Bornholm. Therefore, it is about ensuring that we still have the opportunity to have a wide range of vocational education and training programmes and education in general on Bornholm.
Want to ensure a good student life
During the project, a special ELSK Campus Community has also been established to embrace pupils, apprentices, students and course participants alike. In this way, good student life on Bornholm is to be supported by a close connection between professional development and social activities, which should make the island an attractive choice for young people, he explains.
– That also means that we must not only open up the campus from 8 to 15 when there is teaching, but that Campus Bornholm can also be open outside normal opening hours in order to contribute to creating a strong community and a vibrant study environment.
Thus, the project seeks to support the island's unique profile by combining intimate educational environments, nature and island community, whilst also offering new technological opportunities.
– The project also includes a hybrid teaching perspective. This means that course participants can receive tuition from teachers who are not necessarily located on Bornholm, but for example in Copenhagen or Esbjerg. And this is to ensure that there is a course provision on Bornholm, but that you do not necessarily have a teacher who is constantly present on the island, says Martin Lasse Hansen Sieben, who has no doubt about the importance of the island's educational profile in relation to the future of business and industry on Bornholm.
– I will go so far as to say that education is a prerequisite for business development on Bornholm. Therefore, it is a matter of us still having the opportunity to have a wide range of vocational education and training programmes and education in general on Bornholm, he says and adds:
– We can provide training in what businesses are asking for. And I believe that is a hugely important factor in business development. And by education, I also mean competence development in general. This can be in the form of shorter courses that can be offered to businesses, meaning shorter labour market-oriented courses that businesses demand when they need to develop or retrain their employees. And if we don't have that on Bornholm, it won't create development, the director concludes.
BY JOAN ØHRSTRØM