News - WIDE - Women Integration through Digital Entrepreneurship

“WIDE Conference and Workshop on Digital Entrepreneurship”

IRZ organized an event to share the WIDE project results "WIDE conference and workshop for digital entrepreneurship" in Tetovo, Macedonia. The event was attended by 23 participants with different profiles: women entrepreneurs from rural areas, staff of women's enterprises, civil society organizations, providers of adult education. This event was an opportunity to present the tools and methodologies developed during the project. The ME covered all project outputs, the WIDE OER platform (PR1), the Rural Entrepreneurial Ecosystem Manual (PR2) and the trainings (PR3). The participants were very interested in the project and the results of the project which contributes to the strengthening of digital and entrepreneurial skills. WIDE is an Erasmus+ project funded by the European Commission. The project unites 6 partners from 6 countries (Italy, Spain, Belgium, the Republic of North Macedonia, Romania and Serbia). For more information about the project WIDE, please visit the official project website: https://wideproject.eu/index.php

The consortium joined the Closing Meeting of the WIDE project

On 15th November 2023, the consortium joined the 4th and last Transnational Project Meeting of the WIDE project, which was held virtually. WIDE – Women Integration through Digital Entrepreneurship – is a project co-funded by the EU Commission through the ErasmusPlus Programme. The initiative, which officially ends in December 2023, successfully reached its objective by equipping women with the tools needed to thrive in a digital age. Partners managed to produce effective training resources, incorporating those skills and competences necessary not only to enhance employability but also to open doors to online entrepreneurship. The WIDE project has received positive feedback from women and training providers who joined the Test & Validation sessions carried out by partners, in the previous months, to test the quality and relevance of the WIDE Training Toolkit. Moreover, Multiplier Events have been organised in the different partner countries. These initiatives brought together key stakeholders, including policymakers, educators, and community leaders and helped partners in ensuring a long-lasting impact to the project’s results; indeed, they represented a platform to showcase the achievements of the WIDE project, share best practices, and foster collaboration for continued digital empowerment in rural areas. The Closing Meeting represented an opportunity to share the results of each national T&V session and Multiplier Event. At this stage of the project, the meeting was also relevant for the coordination of the final administrative and financial tasks. Partners’ contributions to the meeting proved that the WIDE project prides itself also on the successful management of all transversal activities, such Dissemiantion, Quality Assurance and overall Project Management. From inception to conclusion, WIDE demonstrated meticulous planning, efficient execution, and effective coordination. For more information on WIDE, please check: WIDE Website: https://wideproject.eu/index.php WIDE Facebook Page: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100078760990250

WIDE - Test & Validation concluded and Guidelines for users available online

The WIDE Consortium has successfully piloted the four training modules and related resources developed during the first year of project’s implementation, to exhort and support women living in rural areas to create their own online business. Each partner has reached representatives of the target group and stakeholders at local and national level to test the quality and relevance of the WIDE Training Toolkit and collect feedback. Participants expressed overwhelming satisfaction with the initiative and its concrete results, highlighting its practical approach and real-world relevance. Encouraged by the success of the pilot sessions, partners committed to expanding the WIDE Training Toolkit to reach more women entrepreneurs in rural areas. For this purpose, the Consortium developed operational and straightforward Guidelines to support trainers and educators in the exploitation of the WIDE training resources. The document is now available online and, by leveraging on the WIDE project’s experience and lessons learnt, guides users through the following topics: Training programme structure Structuring training initiatives Designing training curriculum Recruitment and enrollment strategies Attracting and enrolling participants Effective classroom management Managing training environments Final recommendations Optimizing training in diverse operational settings WIDE – Women Integration through Digital Entrepreneurship – is a project co-funded by the EU Commission through the ErasmusPlus Programme. The initiative brings together 6 partners from 6 countries (Italy, Spain, Belgium, The Republic of North Macedonia, Romania and Serbia). For more information on project WIDE, please visit: WIDE Website https://wideproject.eu/index.php WIDE Facebook Page https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100078760990250

WIDE Multiplier Event – WIDE Exploitation Workshop

The international project Integration of Women through Digital Entrepreneurship (WIDE) was presented at the Exploitation Workshop, in Kragujevac (Serbia) on October 25th 2023. The workshop for the exploitation of the results from the project Integration of Women through Digital Entrepreneurship (WIDE) was organized on 25th October 2023 in Serbia with the aim of presenting concrete results to final beneficiaries and all interested parties to promote its applicability. The workshop presented: WIDE training and tools (within result 3), the Platform as an Open Education Resource (result 1) and the Manual for the Rural Entrepreneurial Ecosystem (result 2). The Exploitation Workshop was attended by 20 participants, including: female entrepreneurs from rural areas of Central Serbia, representatives of the National Employment Service, local self-governments, secondary vocational schools, women's associations and the media. The Regional Agency for Economic Development of Šumadija and Pomoravlja hosted the event, and the workshop program was attended by representatives of partner organizations from Spain and North Macedonia, who shared their experiences in cooperation. The project is financed from the funds of the Erasmus Plus Program through the TEMPUS office in Serbia. For more information about WIDE project and REDASP: https://wideproject.eu/index.php www.redasp.rs

WIDE-Women's Integration through Digital Entrepreneurship Multiplier Event ADDE

On June 14th, 2023, ADDE organized the Erasmus + WIDE-Women's Integration through Digital Entrepreneurship Multiplier Event, attended by representatives of various NGOs involved in adult education, representatives of associations of women entrepreneurs in Romania, but also potential direct beneficiaries of the courses that constitute intellectual products of the project. The agenda of the event included the following topics: a. Overview of the project and partners b. Overview of Intellectual Products 1 and 2 ( OER platform and Rural Entrepreneurship Ecosystem Manual ) c. Presentation of the toolkit and the intellectual product 3: Online training courses, with the following structure: 1.Female entrepreneurship 2.Access to Finance 3.Shared economy 4.Digital Entrepreneurship in Rural Environment d. Presentation of the Intellectual Product 3 Validation Plan : the validation of the courses will take place in July and will have ten participants who will participate in the courses through physical presence, but also online sessions. In the hope that WIDE courses will attract as many direct beneficiaries as possible and will be the starting point for many female entrepreneurs or future entrepreneurs in rural areas in Romania, Serbia, Spain, Italy and Macedonia , we invite you to access : WIDE Website: https://wideproject.eu/index.php WIDE Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100078760990250

WIDE Training development is complete and 4 training modules are now available online in on the WIDE OER Platform

The training development as a part of project result 3 (PR3) has been completed in 6 lenguages and ONLINE & FREE Courses are open on the project website. As a basis for the development of innovative trainings, the WIDE consortium used the previously developed Manual for the Rural Entrepreneurial Ecosystem and designed 4 training modules on the following topics: Female Entrepreneurship Access to Finance Sharing Economy Digital Entrepreneurship in rural setting Moreover, each module is also available in an audio version, ppt and Word formats both ready for download. Except for English, all modules are available in 5 other languages: Spanish, Italian, Serbian, Macedonian and Romanian. After successfully completing self-assessment questions after the module, a learner can download a personalized CERTIFICATE of the course completion. A feedback form is available at the beginning of each training session so DON'T FORGET TO RATE US! Your feedback is more than welcome! WIDE – Women Integration through Digital Entrepreneurship – is a project co-funded by the EU Commission trough the ErasmusPlus Programme. It aims at exhorting women living in rural areas who are looking for their first job or are unemployed to create their own online business. More information on project WIDE, please visit: WIDE Website: https://wideproject.eu/index.php WIDE Facebook Page: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100078760990250

WIDE - IWS Networking and Dissemination Conference

WIDE - Women Integration Through Digital Entrepreneurship

Internet Web Solutions organised the Dissemination Conference in Málaga to launch the WIDE OER Platform to engage target groups, stakeholders and participants in the ecosystem of the digital entrepreneurship in Spain. The ME was held on women’s day on 08/03/2023, an extremely significant date for WIDE project as its tangible results were presented to project to users, target groups and stakeholders to empower women and integrate them through digital entrepreneurship. The attendees were representatives of the technical staff of our associate ARRABAL who work daily on gender empowerment, women employment and social development. WIDE results were presented as relevant tools for women empowerment and integration. The ME covered all Project Results and involved an audience of 22 people instead of the 10 national attendees expected! This ME was not a mere promotion event, rather a real exploitation effort aiming to mainstream WIDE and promote its adoption. The main purpose of the ME was in fact to present the WIDE Training on digital entrepreneurship for low skilled women, the concrete results of the implementation of the PR1, PR2 an PR3 and to demonstrate the impact, usability and transferability of WIDE. IWS also engaged the target group of WIDE to provide a first-hand experience of users. For more information about WIDE project and Internet Web Solutions: https://wideproject.eu/index.php https://www.internetwebsolutions.es/

WIDE - Rural Entrepreneurial Ecosystem Manual

WIDE – Women Integration through Digital Entrepreneurship – is a project co-funded by the EU Commission trough the ErasmusPlus Programme. It aims at exhorting women living in rural areas who are looking for their first job or are unemployed to create their own online business. For the development of innovative training and to ensure coherence and effectiveness of the training, project partners developed the Rural Entrepreneurial Ecosystem Manual taking stock of the available guidelines and resources at both national and international level. Mapping of women integration through digital entrepreneurship trends and resources outlined qualitative and quantitative data, information, tools and solutions, to promote women potential entrepreneurship with a bottom-up approach. The element of innovation is the benchmarking Result Description (including: needs analysis, target groups, elements of innovation, expected impact and transferability potential) against occupational competences and qualification frameworks of the Digital Entrepreneurship sector, to ensure that the training is relevant, timely and concrete. For each country of the WIDE consortium, project partners created an updated short report based on existing data regarding actions taken to tackle the issue related to women integration through digital entrepreneurship in their homeland. WIDE - Rural Entrepreneurial Ecosystem Manual and summary of the key findings in English, Spanish, Romanian, Italian, Serbian and Macedonian language are available in the WIDE OER Platform: https://wideproject.eu/analysis.php More information on project WIDE, please visit: WIDE Website: https://wideproject.eu/index.php WIDE Facebook Page: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100078760990250

Consortium joined the 3rd Transnational Project Meeting of the WIDE project

On 14th December 2022, consortium joined the 3rd Transnational Project Meeting of the WIDE project, held in Brussels (BE) and hosted by the Belgium partner IHF asbl. WIDE – Women Integration through Digital Entrepreneurship – is a project co-funded by the EU Commission trough the ErasmusPlus Programme. It aims at exhorting women living in rural areas who are looking for their first job or are unemployed to create their own online business. In the previous months, partners have finalised the Rural Entrepreneurial Ecosystem Manual already of available on the WIDE platform and developed the training modules to upskill the target group. This meeting represented an opportunity to peer-review the training material and make improvements before the uploading in the Platform. The TPM was also useful to coordinate administrative and financial tasks, monitor the proper implementation of the project's horizontal activities and set deadlines for future activities. Next steps? Partners will publish the training course in English, Spanish, Romanian, Italian, Serbian and Macedonian. Once available in the platform, the Consortium will start testing and validating the material involving potential and existing entreprenurs, VET providers, companies and other stakeholders. For more information on WIDE, please check: WIDE Website: https://wideproject.eu/index.php WIDE Facebook Page: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100078760990250

Women Integration Through Digital Entrepreneurship

The WIDE Project website is now available online

The WIDE official website represents a repository of the project’s outputs, results, news and contacts, and will be the OER platform for target groups to access WIDE resources and training materials. WIDE is a Project co-funded by the Erasmus+ Programme of the European Commission, whose specific objectives to achieve are: - Upskilling digital skills in women from rural area in order to develop an entrepreneurial aptitude. Digital technologies are a great opportunity for rural women to compensate for their environment deficiencies in order to join the labour market and/ or carry out actions of entrepreneurship. WIDE OER Platform will make digitally available all trainings notwithstanding geographical ubications and timing; - Upskilling digital skills in adult women from rural area who already have a business idea in mind but lack in ICTs skills. Therefore, WIDE ICT-based learning could foster greater opportunities for business in many ways such as accessing related information for reducing uncertainty, and participating in economic activities more competitively. - Address digital transformation through development of digital readiness, resilience and capacity reinforcing the ability of AL providers to deliver high quality training. WIDE results digital by design and up-to-date to tackle the challenges of women entrepreneurs from the rural areas to enhance their competitiveness. - Networking opportunities and build a solid consortium representing all different actors of AE ecosystem, SMEs, ICT and digital expertise as well as the third sector (NGO) and entrepreneurship facilitation system, thus enhancing common values, civic engagement and participation adopting a pan European perspective - support women entrepreneurs and entrepreneurs-to-be from rural areas by providing innovative and up-to date training to help them cope with digital upskilling to empower them and make their business more competitive; WIDE’s training will be based on a competence recognition system tested by multiple-choice tests and attested by WIDE certificates of training. - Enrich the provision of learning opportunities. WIDE resources, training and OER Platform will become operational tools to improve the tailored offer and achieve a sustainable impact on beneficiaries and policy makers. On the basis of objectives and activities, WIDE is perfectly in line with needs and priorities underlined by European Commission (Horizontal: Addressing digital transformation through development of digital readiness, resilience and capacity) and at national level with the digital needs in matter of adult women entrepreneurs in Serbia, Italy, Belgium, Spain, Republic of North Macedonia and Romania. The project officially kick-started on February 17th 2022, with the first online transnational meeting during which partners had a great opportunity to discuss the overall project implementation schedule, define timelines and respective duties in the following months. One of the very first activities was the development, testing and implementation of the Open Educational Resources (OER) Platform. WIDE Platform is the main showcase of project’s results and its largest and most tangible channel for international visibility, and is available in 6 languages (EN, MK, ES, IT, RO, SR) with all of its content completely available for free, without requiring any kind of registration/identification by the user. WIDE website is now online at https://wideproject.eu/. For the next two years, the Platform will host and integrate all the main achievements of the consortium; each section of the WIDE Platform is a stand-alone library of its corresponding output. The WIDE toolkit consists of training courses specifically designed for women, women entrepreneurs and women entrepreneurs-to-be to equip them with the necessary skills and competencies to establish, develop and run a business (digital entrepreneurship in rural setting, challenges and opportunities of female entrepreneurship, overcoming the bias in access to finance for female entrepreneurs, sharing economy opportunities and challenges for rural entrepreneurship). WIDE does not simply focus on enhancing entrepreneurial capacities, but it is aimed at accompanying the growth of female entrepreneurs to unlock female creativity and entrepreneurial potential. In addition, the "Associates" section will be relevant to the widespread impact of the project, as organisations interested in the project will be able to join the WIDE community and become associated partners. For further information about WIDE project: https://wideproject.eu/

Consortium joined the 2nd Transnational Project Meeting of the WIDE project

On June 27rd, the consortium joined the 2ndTransnational Project Meeting of the WIDE project, held in Pescara (IT) and hosted by the Italian partner IDP European Consultants. WIDE – Women Integration through Digital Entrepreneurship- is a project co-funded by the EU Commission. It aims at exhorting women living in rural areas who are looking for their first job or are unemployed to create their own online business. The TPM2 was useful to monitor the proper implementation of the project's horizontal activities and to discuss about the secondary research carried out so far which will be soon available online on the WIDE Platform. The most important question partners tried to answer during the meeting was: starting from the information and data we found while drafting PR2, which are the best training topics to develop in PR3? The best topics came up to be: Female Entrepreneurship Access to Finance Sharing Economy Digital Entrepreneurship in rural setting Work on the development of the WIDE Training Solution will formally start in August 2022, but in the meantime all partners are constantly engaged in dissemination activities of the project results...so, from all over Europe, stay up-to-date on the development of the WIDE project!!! For more information on WIDE, please check: WIDE Website: https://wideproject.eu/ WIDE Facebook Page: https://www.facebook.com/WIDE-Project-104517608840761

The Kick-off meeting of the WIDE Project

On February 17th 2022, Consortium joined the online Kick-Off Meeting of the WIDE project - Women Integration through Digital Entrepreneurship, co-funded by the Erasmus Plus Programme of the European Commission, which brings together 6 partners from 6 countries (Italy, Spain, Belgium, The Republic of North Macedonia, Romania and Serbia). The KOM, was held in online mode due to COVID-19 restrictions. During the kick-off meeting the partners defined technical and operational aspects of the Project Results and related activities. The goal of the meeting was also to define the project and financial management aspects as well as aspects pertaining to Internal Quality, Monitoring & Evaluation, Risk Management. WIDE project will produce several intangible results such as the empowerment of women digital skills and entrepreneurial aptitude in order to boost their participation in social and economic life and activities, increasing their awareness and knowledge of business intermediation thanks to the digital skills acquired, enhancement of capacity and competitiveness of the participating organisations.

Beginning of the implementation of the international project WIDE through the Erasmus Plus program

The TEMPUS offices in Serbia, the Serbian Erasmus+ National Agency, approved the WIDE – Integration of Women through Digital Entrepreneurship, jointly developed by Regional Agency for Economic Development of Sumadija and Pomoravlje and IDP European Consultants. The WIDE project brings together 6 partners from 6 countries (Italy, Spain, Belgium, the Republic of Northern Macedonia, Romania and Serbia). During 24 months of implementation the WIDE will produce a long-term impact on women entrepreneurs and adult education organizations that will benefit from sharing experiences gained during project implementation. At more systemic level, WIDE will contribute to encouraging female participation in the entrepreneurial world through the skills they promote. For further information on WIDE Project: https://wideproject.eu/