Digital competences at the heart of EU’s strategic autonomy – CSC supports the planned EU Recommendation on digital skills

In line with the skills-related targets set in the framework of Europe’s Digital Decade, the Council recommendation on digital skills must address both basic and advanced skills. It must, however, be acknowledged that the borderline between the two is not clear-cut. What is considered advanced now, may well be considered basic in the future. For example, progamming used to be considered something quite advanced but nowadays it is taught in elementary schools in many parts of Europe. In the same vein, we must be prepared to constantly update our definition of basic skills to keep up with the evolving skills requirements of the rapidly digitalising world.

One area where a certain level of skills is required of everyone is data. Education systems must be able to ensure that all Europeans have a basic understanding of how data is created, what it can be used for and what rights we have as to our own data. The more wide-spread this basic understanding becomes, the better European companies will be at seizing the opportunities of data economy. This must of course be paired with increasing numbers of specialists with advanced data skills who will be able to help the companies put their data strategies in practice. Other fields in which more specialist skills are needed include AI, quantum, High-Performance Computing and cybersecurity.

Considering the rapid technological development, people must be offered continuous opportunities to update their skills and competences at all levels of education and in work life. Not all education needs to lead to a full degree but people must be able to build individual learning paths consisting of smaller modules that offer an agile response to emerging upskilling or reskilling needs. In order to create a true competence ecosystem and to anticipate the skills needs of the labour market, cooperation between the formal education system and the private sector must be deepened. Similarly, linkages between education and research must be deepened to make sure that education systems are developed based on the input and needs of the research community.

In order to ensure that people are capable of continuous skills development, basic education must place particular emphasis on ‘learning-to-learn’ and other transversal skills, such as critical thinking and interaction. It must also be taken into account that digitalisation changes the skills needs in other fields than just technology. Law and business schools, social science faculties etc. must also adapt their curricula to ensure sufficient supply of legal, policy and business expertise required in the digital era.

Attention must also be paid to the skills and competences of teachers and other education professionals. They must be offered opportunities and rewarded for updating their competences in teaching digital skills in a continuous manner as a part of their professional growth. There must also be opportunities for mutual learning and sharing of best practices among teachers and education providers, both nationally and internationally.

In addition to the internal competence development policies described above, Europe must also boost its competence levels by attracting talent from third countries. Competence development policies must therefore be closely aligned with migration policies and migration processes made as smooth as possible by, for example, developing user-friendly digital solutions making use of automation to shorten the processing time of the applications.