The Department of Adult and Community Education at Maynooth University was represented in Malaga, Spain, on January 25th and 26th for the third meeting of MICRO (Enhancing Competitiveness of Microenterprises in Rural Areas). MICRO is a Project co-funded by the Erasmus+ Programme of the European Commission, Key Action 2, Strategic Partnerships for Vocational and Educational Training. MICRO is implemented by 7 partners from 6 countries (Belgium, Greece, Ireland, Italy, Macedonia and Spain) over 2015-2017. The MICRO project is led by Irish Rural Link (See http://www.irishrurallink.ie/erasmus-project/micro-project-for-rural-micro-enterprises/)
MICRO seeks to enhance the growth and competitiveness of rural microenterprises by developing practical training resources and a dedicated Open Educational Resource (OER Platform). The platform will initially contain short focused online training on topics suggested from a consultation with microenterprises in rural areas in each of the 6 participating countries.
During the meeting, partners finalised the OER Platform and pilot the training courses to be tested and validated by rural microenterprises in each country. Partners also discussed dissemination initiatives that will bring awareness of the OER and the training courses to rural microenterprise entrepreneurs and those who work in support services for rural microenterprise entrepreneurs.
Siobhan O Malley, Research Assistant at The Department of Adult and Community Education at Maynooth University attended the MICRO project meeting in Malaga, Spain
The Department of Adult and Community Education at Maynooth University is a leader in adult education research in Ireland and has an excellent international reputation for work in further education, higher education, adult guidance, community development and transformative learning. Participation in European and international research is part of the remit of the Department.
For further information about MICRO project, contact:
Michael Kenny at michael.kenny@mu.ie
or Siobhan O'Malley at Siobhan.OMalley@mu.ie
Visit our departmental website for more information on MICRO projects
MICRO Training website
Access the Irish Rural Link website