"<< Background >>The COVID 19 crisis has had a major impact on the labour market . While the number of jobseekers has increased considerably, the results from the joint international survey “Career Guidance policy and practice in pandemic” (Cedefop; European Commission; ETF; ICCDPP; ILO; OECD; UNESCO, 2020) highlighted that “the pandemic has provoked social and economic uncertainty for people of all ages, leading to increases in career guidance service demand, especially for careers and labour market information, individualised career counselling, and psychosocial support”. Therefore, the role of lifelong guidance in Europe today is now more important than ever. According to a note from CEDEFOP, “Guidance can support employment transitions with predicted shifts in the labour market and with extreme increases in unemployment, upskilling and reskilling needs. During this time, guidance is also well positioned to support individual wellbeing, providing emotional support, counselling and case management for individuals with multiple needs” (Cedefop (2020). Note on lifelong guidance and the COVID-19 pandemic: Responses from Cedefop’s CareersNet). The ability to reach these challenges not only depends on the counsellors and the counselling services; but also in a large part on front desk services and its professionals. Reception must ensure that the user feels welcomed and supported at a time when COVID is having a strong psychological impact on individuals. Furthermore, the front-desk reception is the central point that connects all the services and resources of the Lifelong Guidance Centres. It is from the desk reception that the first contact is made with the user. The reception officer identifies the user's needs and directs users towards the services most suited to their needs. The importance of front-desk reception has been confirmed by a survey conducted by the Cités des métiers International Network among 38 European professionals. The survey showed that for 68% of the professionals questioned, the desk-reception area is as important as the other services in lifelong guidance centres (it is even more important for 21% of respondents). It also highlighted that among the different services offered by lifelong guidance centres, the access of the users to the services most adapted to their needs and situation depends above all on quality information and referral by the reception officer (57 % of respondents strongly agree and 39% agree with this idea). In conclusion, 81% of respondents think that the quality of the reception, the initial information provided and the referral of the users by the reception officer to the services and resources of the organisation can have a significant impact on the construction of the project and the professional life of the users. However, lifelong guidance professionals including desk-reception officers are now experiencing profound changes in their practices. If the pandemic has accelerated remote counselling and guidance, it has also led professionals to adapt their overall practices and strengthen the quality of their services in order to respond with more quality and adequacy to the numerous new needs of users. In view of these challenges, several recent studies and reports have highlighted the strong need to develop professionalisation actions for lifelong guidance professionals and strengthen the quality of the services such as : - the European Commission report ""Lifelong Guidance Policy and practice in the EU: trends, challenges and opportunities"" (2020) and CEDEFOP report ""Note on lifelong guidance - Cedefop (2020). Note on lifelong guidance and the COVID-19 pandemic: Responses from Cedefop’s CareersNet.In conclusion, while few studies and projects have been carried out on the subject, it seems necessary to tackle the need for professionalisation of reception officers and improve the quality of desk reception information services in lifelong guidance.<< Objectives >>Main purposes of the project are to :- Strengthen the quality of front desk reception services in Lifelong guidance centres- Upskill the function of reception officer in Lifelong guidance centresMore specifically the project will aim to ease the development by lifelong guidance centres of new reception practices adapted to the needs of the public. The project will also aim to train lifelong guidance professionals in delivering reception and information services in a covid and post covid world. The goal of the project will be also to increase knowledge and awareness among european stakeholders regarding the major role of the reception officer in lifelong guidance centres.<< Implementation >>The partners of the project will organise five local consultations with users of lifelong guidance centres in order to better understand their needs regarding the desk reception area and their uses within the desk reception area. A report of the five consultations will be written in order to highlight the key elements emerging from the consultation.It is expected that the local consultations gather a total of 50 users.In the same time, the partners will set a European community of desk-reception professionals in order to share practices, issues and problems related to reception in lifelong guidance but also to ensure the good transferability of project results of the project. A total of twelve innovative desk reception practices in Lifelong Guidance will be promoted via 360° video tools. It will allow the front-desk reception officer to discover new innovative practices and draw inspiration from innovative practices. A total of local 10 workshops (two workshops in each country of the consortium) with Lifelong guidance desk-reception professionals and an additional european workshop will be organized by the partners of the project. The aim of these workshops is to find innovative methodology for better sharing with reception officers up-to-date information and resources provided by the organisation but also provided by the other stakeholders in the territory. It will lead to the creation of a Methodological guide for better information sharing with the reception officers in lifelong guidance. The partners will also design a Guidebook of every day front-desk practices in Lifelong Guidance. All the deliverables developed as part of the activities described before will be integrated into the Portfolio of 21st reception practices in Lifelong Guidance (Project Results 1). This portfolio will be available on the project website. In parallel, the partners will develop a “Skills Repository and Non-formal Validation Framework” ‘Project Result 2). As part of it the partners will identify the key competences and skills of the desk-reception officer in lifelong Guidance in order to define later in the project a Repository of skills and European job profile for professionals in front-desk reception. At the same time, the partners will create a skills validation framework of the desk reception officers in lifelong guidance and also a self assessment toolkit. Lastly, the partners will develop the “Training programme materials and design” (Project Results 3). The partners will design a program and learning materials for desk-reception officer training. At the same time the partners will design the curriculum and materials for a training of trainers in order to train them to the facilitation of the desk-reception officer training. Two training of trainers will be organized during the project. It is expected that 28 professionals will participate in the training. The future trainers will be asked to test the facilitation of the front-desk officer training during the project. Therefore, desk-reception officer training will be tested by future trainers in each country of the consortium during the project. This 3 days course for desk-reception officers will be composed of onsite and online modules. It will gather 25 desk-officer participants in each country of the consortium. Lastly, the partners of the project will develop an online training course composed of immersive virtual reality modules. A guide for mentorat will be also designed in order to ease the future trainers in supporting the desk-reception trainee. The partners will organised two on site dissemination event: one at mid term and one at the end of the project. In addition 3 online events in live stream format will be organised. At the same time a project website will be created.<< Results >>The activities implemented as part of the Project Results ""Portfolio of 21st reception practices in Lifelong Guidance"" should produce a greater interest of European Lifelong guidance professionals in desk reception practices. It should allow european stakeholders to acquire abetter knowledge of new desk reception practices implemented in lifelong guidance. At the same time, the project is expected to increase new methods, tools and resources for desk-reception officers in lifelong guidance in Europe. Lastly, the Project Results will increase the number of new innovative practices tested within the lifelong guidance desk reception in Europe. Therefore, it will allow to strengthen desk-reception services in lifelong guidance in order to better meet the new needs of users.The activities implemented as part of the Project Results ""Skills Repository and Non-formal Validation Framework"" should enable european stakeholders to acquire a better up-to-date knowledge of the skills needed to perform the function of desk reception officer today in lifelong guidance. But it is expected also that European stakeholders will acquire better up-to-date knowledge of the job profile and the missions of the reception officer in lifelong guidance. Lastly it should lead to a better recognition of the role and the professional skills of desk reception officers in lifelong guidance. The activities implemented as part of the Project Results ""Training programme materials and design"" should increase in the number of existing learning materials in Europe to train front desk officers in lifelong guidance. Lastly this Project Results will allow european desk reception officers in lifelong guidance to develop and strengthen their skills in order to better adapt to new needs of users and to the changes in practices."

Context / background of project :At the start of the project, air traffic was growing at an unprecedented rate, and airports and their neighbouring territories continued to keep on growing, benefiting from these undeniable engines of growth and jobs.At the same time, we analyse high levels of unemployment among local populations, mainly young people, while many airports faced difficulties in meeting the needs of the many businesses located on their platforms. For example, on Paris CDG, Brussels and Barcelona, the airport is located in areas with a high rate of unemployment nearby and a lower level of qualifications than the regional or national average.European airports had to face a gap between the expected skills and those of the local population, as well as the problem of attracting employees to the places and positions offered. All this is accentuated with the emergence of new expected skills and new jobs due to new uses and the increasing use of new technologies.It is clear that employment at airports has been, and will continue to be, a source of growth, development and economic impact. Thus, it is essential for local actors to anticipate changes in jobs and skills and to innovate in order to solve these problems.Objectives :1. Deploy a transnational partnership between European airports with common problems ;2. Confront the approaches, tools and practices for promotion and employment inside their territories and disseminate the results ;3. Collect analyses on employment trends in these territories and define the main causes of mismatch between the local job offer and the local population ;4. Formulate territorial recommendations based on these initial exchanges of experience, and go further by facilitating the emergence of one or more ambitious projects.Number and profile of participants :The partnership consists of 8 partners from 5 different countries:- 1 city : Beek (Maastricht, the Netherlands) ; - 1 local government : The Ajuntament of El Prat, (Barcelona, Spain) ; - 3 local stakeholders operating in the field of employment and training in airport areas : the GIP Emploi Roissy (Paris, France), Aviato, formerly called the Brussels Airport House (Brussels, Belgium) and Orly International (Orly, France); -1 Economic Development Agency, the “Wirtschaftsförderungsgesellschaft Dahme-Spreewald mbH” (Berling, Germany) ;- 1 regional government: Regional Authority FrankfurtRheinMain ;- 1 European association of regional and local authorities, the Airport Regions Conference (Brussels, Belgium).Results and impact : The project resulted in : - Developing a strong collaboration between 7 European airports areas and increasing their capacity for joint action at transnational level:- Creating tools for analysing employment contexts and good practices which were developed;- Obtaining a concrete overview of the tools and best practices of the airport areas in terms of employment and training, and to compare them in order to study their transferability;- Gathering our knowledge on the evolution of jobs in European airport areas and identify the main causes of mismatch between the local job offer and the population. Specific work has been done on the impact of COVID-19 on these highly exposed territories;- Disseminating the results, through a guide of best practices, to other airports and European local authorities;- Exploring ways for future collaboration among members. Longer term benefits : We consider this project as the first phase of more global projects : - The dissemination of our exchanges of experience and our workshops will make possible to transmit an accurate diagnosis and recommendations applicable to other European airport areas and local communities;- Other bilateral and multilateral projects may be developed in a near future . It will develop innovative solutions in order to facilitate the attractiveness of jobs in airport areas and to build a long-lasting and qualitative match between local populations and employment opportunities.