European employers are concerned about the growing skills mismatches and labour force shortages in a majority of Member States. If left unaddressed, this worrying trend will have a negative impact on innovation and productivity, both in highly innovative industry sectors and other services sectors, some of which are already confronted with the challenge of attracting motivated and competent workers. To address this pressing issue, cross-industry and sectoral employers are issuing this statement to call on policy-makers and social partners at all appropriate levels to prioritise measures designed with the purpose to reduce labour shortages by improving skills matching across European Member States. Labour force shortages and skills mismatches are caused by both cyclical and structural factors, both of which need to be addressed. Positively, the cycle of economic recovery over recent years has resulted in strong employment creation.

(see link above for full publication)

Do employers in "non-STEM" occupations (e.g. Graphic Designers, Economists) seek to hire STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics) graduates with a higher probability than non-STEM ones for knowledge and skills that they have acquired through their STEM education (e.g. "Microsoft C#", "Systems Engineering") and not simply for their problem solving and analytical abilities? This is an important question in the UK where less than half of STEM graduates work in STEM occupations and where this apparent leakage from the "STEM pipeline" is often considered as a wastage of resources. To address it, this paper goes beyond the discrete divide of occupations into STEM vs. non-STEM and measures STEM requirements at the level of jobs by examining the universe of UK online vacancy postings between 2012 and 2016. We design and evaluate machine learning algorithms that classify thousands of keywords collected from job adverts and millions of vacancies into STEM and nonSTEM. 35% of all STEM jobs belong to non-STEM occupations and 15% of all postings in non-STEM occupations are STEM. Moreover, STEM jobs are associated with higher wages within both STEM and non-STEM occupations, even after controlling for detailed occupations, education, experience requirements, employers, etc. Although our results indicate that the STEM pipeline breakdown may be less problematic than typically thought, we also find that many of the STEM requirements of "non-STEM" jobs could be acquired with STEM training that is less advanced than a full time STEM education. Hence, a more efficient way of satisfying the STEM demand in non-STEM occupations could be to teach more STEM in non-STEM disciplines. We develop a simple abstract framework to show how this education policy could help reduce STEM shortages in both STEM and non-STEM occupations.

In 2018 the European Commission announced the launch of the Platforms of Centres of Vocational Excellence-initiative (PCVE)*. The objective the PCVE's is to promote the excellence, innovation and attractiveness of Vocational Education and Training (VET). The initiative aims to achieve this through the establishment of transnational collaborative platforms in which excellent VET providers (regional centres of excellence) in a specific sector (e.g. aeronautics, e-mobilty, green technologies) or related to a specific societal challenge (e.g. upskilliing, digitalisation, AI) are connected internationally. The format of the call was directly inspired by existing VET-concepts in e.g. Spain (Basque country), the Netherlands and other EU member states. 

In 2019 a first pilot-call was published under the Erasmus+ KA2 sector skills alliances call after which four pilot projects were approved (budget: max. 1 million EUR per project). A second round of 4-5 pilot projects (budget: max. 4 million EUR per project) will be launched in October 2019. The results of these pilot projects will be used to inform the definitive format of the PCVE's in Erasmus 2021-2027 programme.. 

In some of the Member States the national STEM platforms are directly involved. For example: in the Netherlands the 100+ 'Centres of Vocational Innovation' in VET are directly supported by the national STEM platform (PBT) which facilitates e.g. the establishment of the centres, periodic impact studies, peer-learning activities, etc. In coordination with the ministry of education, the VET-council and the individual Centres of Vocational Innovation it supports the Centres in the development of project ideas and business cases. As such, the platforms can play an important role in ensuring that the activities developed in the context of the PCVE-initiative complement and strengthen the broader objectives for STEM in the entire education chain (primary- to higher education) as much as possible. This is especially important given the fact that:

• Current and future shortages of technicians are often most pronounced in VET
• Insufficient availability of specific kinds of technicians (e.g. heatpump installation specialists) directly affect other policy objectives (e.g. energy transition)
• The supply of VET-level technical specialists is most affected by demographic changes (with expected declines of student populations of up to 30%)
• More than higher education, VET is organised regionally

The EU STEM Coalition will continue to monitor this initiative and the results of the first rounds of pilot projects (of which the first will be launched in November 2019) in the run-up to the new Erasmus+ programme

* The PCVE-initiative was presented by the European Commission at the EU STEM Coalition's General Assembly meeting in Paris in October 2018 (see meeting report & presentation here).

The EU STEM Coalition will continu

The European Commission approved a project proposal submitted by the EU STEM Coalition. The project, titled "Towards a European STE(A)M platform", aims to upscale the EU STEM Coalition network, implementing the EC's 2017 objective to "launch an upscaled EU STE(A)M Coalition" based on the EU STEM Coalition network.*

The project will focus on strengthening the EU STEM Coalition's instruments through which the development of new national and regional STEM strategies and approaches are supported. It will also focus on further developing the EU STEM Coalition network into an EU-level exepertise hub, mapping successful national and regional initiatives and approaches and kickstart the development of new national and regional STEM strategies.

The project will start on January 1, 2019 for a three-year period. The majority of the project activities will be implemented by 8 national STEM platforms in the EU STEM Coalition network. 

* See: Communication on a Renewed EU Agenda for Higher Education, p. 5-6.