The INCLUDE project is set in the context of the global onset of the COVID-19 pandemic that has brought immense changes to the manner people communicate and engage in professional activities. Language and intercultural communication (LIC) teachers at higher education institutions teach courses that heavily depend on communication and they have had to invest more time and effort into transforming their teaching methods and materials into ones that are applicable in online teaching. At the same time, LIC teachers are the ones who have to prepare their students for real-life communication in a virtual setting as well as to enable them to acquire the Global Competence. The main objective of the INCLUDE project is to boost students' employability on a global scale by ensuring an inclusive, progressive, high-quality language and communication course in a range of languages (English, Croatian, Portuguese, Greek) at higher education institutions across Europe. The project involves three intellectual outputs oriented towards developing a high-quality course in Intersectoral communication skills in a digital, intercultural environment. The project is operated by an international project team from three partner institutions and it involves 30 students from all partner universities, as well as a solid base of industrial partners as associated partners. The project especially aims at involving students with fewer opportunities and on boosting students' opportunities for participating in high-quality virtual exchange. As all the teaching and training activities will be organised online using videoconferencing applications, no additional Erasmus+ budget regarding Learning-Teaching-Training is required, as the project team has sufficient human and infrastructural resources to organise these events without additional funding.The project will result in a research paper based on which open source teaching materials will be developed and made available on an OER platform accompanied by a detailed course curriculum that may easily be implemented, fully or partially, at any higher education institution. The impact of the project may be observed on the institutional, local, national and especially international levels, as the project results will be made available to all LIC teachers in need of support in their teaching activities. Dissemination of the projects results includes a transnational meeting, local project presentations, project presentation at the online dissemination event and in professional and scientific conferences, as well as via a dedicated project website and the OER platform. Based on the objectives of the project and the current COVID-19 pandemic situation, all dissemination activities are planned as online events. Thus, no additional Erasmus+ budget regarding Multiplier Events is required, as the project team has sufficient human and infrastructural resources to organise these events without additional funding.The sustainability of the project even after its formal completion will be achieved in the form of setting up an informal network of partners that will continue working on the project activities with the future generations of students and update the OER platform content.

"Context:The BADGE project is set in a context of increasing globalisation for which Language and Intercultural Communication (LC) teachers in engineering schools must prepare their students to have Global Competence, or “the capacity to examine local, global and intercultural issues, to understand and appreciate the perspectives and world views of others, to engage in open, appropriate and effective interactions with people from different cultures, and to act for collective well-being and sustainable development” (http://www.oecd.org/pisa/pisa-2018-global-competence.htm). This project is motivated by a survey carried out in 2015 by the BADGE partners, who had created a network called ""Global Engineering Language Skills"" (GELS) in 2014. Approximately 200 responses were collected and analyzed. This survey showed that engineers need foreign languages often to talk on the phone or to understand information in meetings across borders and cultures, to write casual correspondence and read short documents. They need their language competences most of the time to communicate with colleagues, not only clients and suppliers. The analysis of the survey showed that language and communication classes needed to integrate more Language for Specific Purposes (LSP) competences and that engineers communicate often without being aware of intercultural contexts. They use their language skills in online meetings and through other ICT tools which LC teachers need to integrate in their language classes to get the students acquainted with these tools. The survey also showed that only 10% of the LC teachers have a specific qualification in engineering while 79% have no knowledge whatsoever or experience of the world of engineering (Annexe 1). Objectives of BADGE: * design LSP materials for intercultural communicative competence to be used by the wider community of LC teachers in engineering schools, identified below as Intellectual Outputs (IOs)* create a multilingual Open Educational Resources (OER) platform with the learning materials and lesson plans, jointly developed by BADGE members, engineering students and faculty and industrial partners, allowing LC teachers to choose lesson plans or learning units which can be adapted to local/national needs, be integrated in existing courses and even lead to new curricula* in the long-term, form engineers with digital global skills in sustainable internationalisation as a result of improved educational practices Methodology:* 8 workgroups are formed, one for each IO, to develop content related to a specific skill* Students are encouraged to learn as autonomously as possible by actively contributing to IOs design* Putting the IOs together, developing and improving lesson plans and learning units, will lead to innovative teaching material and allow this to be implemented at all partner universities * The content of the learning materials will be adapted to the needs of a large number of students from different countries, cultures and languages to make them available for other engineering schools in Europe * BADGE partners will meet regularly online and in yearly transnational meetings to share, evaluate and support each other * Engineering faculty and industrial partners will constantly assess the competences developed and compare them to the necessary skills in the engineering professionsResults and impact:* IO 01-08:01 Communication course for future engineers 02 Sustainable writing skills03 E-communication skills 04 Global competence and entrepreneurship 05 Architectural voices: student-produced podcasts and videocasts 06 Soft skills for engineering students 07 Global competence through IT and serious games08 EMI (English-Medium-Instruction) for teachers * Open badge assessment system: Each learning unit will be published on the OER platform, when students complete one of these courses, implemented by an LC teacher, they will earn a badge. Once they have collected 5 badges, students will get a certificate attesting their LSP, global competence and digital skills. This certificate will attest larger competences than a language certificate alone. Students can also earn their badges in an engineering school abroad which has implemented at least one of the courses based on the materials of the OER platform. The content of the certificate will be stated in the Europass Diploma Supplement * The developed teaching material will be presented and promoted in multiplier events, conferences and on the social media deemed most appropriate for dissemination * The partners will also work with their national administration to promote this innovative certificate. * The impact of the innovative teaching materials on students' competences development will be surveyed in a quantitative and qualitative manner throughout the project.* The OER platform will continue to be enriched even after completion of the project"