Diversity in all its dimensions has to be taken into account in the learning context, at school, as it is fundamental for facilitating cultural inclusion and equality. However it is not easy for teachers to adapt their teaching to this diversity, whether it is social, economic or cultural. Gender equality is particularly essential for the inclusion of all. Perception of gender is rooted in the family tradition and social contexts but also within media practices, vectors of stereotypical representations.However teachers are poorly trained in gender representation and stereotypes conveyed through the media, especially if their students have media and cultural practices ignored by the teachers. It’s why eMERGE project (e-Media Education about Representations of GEnder) aims to empower teachers’ skills in media literacy in order to deconstruct with students the gender representations and stereotypes rooted in their media practices and pop cultures.eMERGE is conducted by a consortium of four teachers training centres/university in media literacy field issued from four diverse European countries: Media Animation (Belgium, coordinator), Mediawise Society (Romania), University of Palermo (Italy) and Athens Lifelong learning Institute (Greece). To achieve its goal, eMERGE project aims the following specific objectives: 1. To co-design a methodological approach that would allow each teacher to seek and identify students' media practices and consummation, especially with targets groups issued from diversity.2. To develop teachers’ media literacy skills about gender representation in pop culture/cultural studies.3. To empower teachers with educational approach in media education about gender stereotypes, adaptable to their student's media and cultural practices.4. To raise students' awareness (from secondary school) about gender representations in media and the effects on citizenship and living together of the class/school community including through local digital media productions. 5. To foster citizenship within local communities through the elaboration and valorization of students digital media production. 6. To spread the tested methods and approaches developed within this project into initial and in-service teachers training and to deliver the tools as open educational resources. 7. To cross at a European level the approaches and challenges about gender issues and popular media practices and its effects on gender equality, diversity and citizenship in school communities.As concrete outputs, the eMERGE project will produce (as OER): • A kit of methodological activities for teachers to seek media and cultural practices of its group of students from diversity (EN, FR, GR, IT, RO)• An e-learning module of media education about gender issues in media and pop culture (FR, GR, IT, RO) • A media education toolkit about gender issues in media and pop cultures, adaptable to any learning context of diversity (EN, FR, GR, IT, RO)• An online guide: “media education to improve gender equality at school” (EN, FR, GR, IT, RO). eMERGE project is dedicated to teachers in position, actively involved in the project as co-designers of the methodology and also as beneficiaries of training and tools. Finally students will benefit from the educational activities and be actively involved in the production of media campaigns within schools and local communities. Through this project, the consortium would like to raise awareness about gender equality and more generally diversity inclusiveness in schools and local communities. They hope to inspire practices and similar experiences in other schools contexts thanks to the methodological approach and the open access to the resources. eMERGE project offers also to in-service teachers training institutes the opportunity of new training for their professional development and invite them to innovate with methods and tools about topics too rarely investigated. The consortium expects also at a national and European level to raise awareness towards stakeholders about how media education is a relevant approach for better including diversity in schools.

<< Background >>After a successful partnership within the Speak Up Media For Inclusion project we decided we wanted to expand our collaboration with our current partners and add some new ones as well and venture in the field of Adult Education. Media Literacy Education is something that adults have less opportunities to be exposed to and at the same time we find that is essential for better navigating the world today. From our collective experience as a consortium we have seen the lack of access to Media Literacy for Adults in each of our countries (France, Italy, Portugal, Greece and Romania) and especially adults that belong to marginalised and/or sensitive groups. As media and digital media change and advance at a fast rate, the need to be media and digital literate has become more and more crucial for our role as citizens in society and participants in communal and democratic processes. This need is even more present as populism, extremism and discrimination are on the rise in many European countries, in particular in the Southern Member States. These phenomena are strongly coupled with the rise of disinformation and misinformation. During the COVID-19 pandemic the highlighted problems confirmed the need for a more concerted approach to combat disinformation and foster media literacy through education for the young and adult population. While the Covid-19 pandemic underlined the existing digital learning gaps among educators, teachers and librarians, it affected on a larger scale the adult population who have been affected more in terms of digital transition compared to younger generations, who are more tech savvy across Europe. According to the Digital Economy and Society Index (DESI) data 4 out of 10 adults and every third person who works in Europe lack basic digital skills. While the current crisis may be having the positive impact of increasing the number of internet users, the development of digital skills does not come automatically with increased usage. The percentage of people having at least basic digital skills went up slightly from 55% in 2015 to 58% in 2019. The Netherlands and Finland are the frontrunners in the EU, while Bulgaria and Romania are lagging behind. At the same time, adults have less opportunities for MIL education as well as media production as a tool to upscale their knowledge in civic education, discrimination and disinformation. The Eurostat data shows a low participation rate of adults in education and training in some countries of the project. In 2019, the proportion of persons aged 25 to 64 in the EU who participated in education or training was 10.8 %. On the other side, countries such as Romania, Greece, Bulgaria, Croatia and Slovakia (the first two being among “team-up!” project target countries) reported adult learning rates of 4.0 % or less. “Team-up!”project has been developed by the project partners to address adult education needs in the 5 target countries and, in line with the objective of this call, to enable participating organisations to gain experience in international cooperation and to strengthen our mutual capacities, but also to produce high-quality innovative deliverables.<< Objectives >>Through the Pan-European project “Team-up! - Media education for Adults” we aim to foster adult digital and media civic literacy, namely Educators, Teachers and Librarians, increasing Media and Information Literacy (MIL) and producing media and digital tools in Southern Europe. In particular we want: 1. To support educators’, teachers’ and librarians’ critical competencies and skills of media consumption and production, increasing availabilities of Media and Information Literacy (MIL) digital tools for adult education; 2. To foster educators, teachers and librarians engagement with their communities within a collaborative dynamic for media production and Civic Media Literacy competencies development; 3. To increase European transnational collaboration between educators, teachers and librarians on combating discriminations, hate speech and xenophobia through non-formal learning activities contributing to civic engagement and social inclusion.<< Implementation >>The “Team Up! Media for adult education” project will implement a wide range of activities that will lead to the 4 project results detailed below. The project will start with a kick-off meeting in Athens (around Month 2 or 3 of the project) during which partners will meet to plan the project activities according to the objectives mentioned above. In order to support educators, teachers and librarians critical competencies and skills of media consumption and production, increasing Media and Information Literacy (MIL) and producing media and digital tools, we will conduct a mapping of existing MIL educational resources for teaching adults, select 20 to 30 references we deemed the most relevant to teaching MIL through Media Production and translate them into the project languages (if not yet available). This mapping will be completed by an activity of analysis, assessment and reflection resulting in the production of a 10-page guideline gathering our trainers best practices on methodologies, curriculum development and training delivery using the listed resources. Based on this toolbox, a curriculum on teaching MIL trough Media production for adult learners will be finalised and tested by our pre-identified trainers during a 7-day training of trainers in Greece where 12 trainers from 5 southern European countries (Portugal, France, Italy, Greece and Romania) will be able to share best practices on MIL education, Media Production and working with adults (including minorities and disadvantaged groups). Following this ToT, the curriculum will be put to test in a series of cascade pilot trainings starting with 15 in-country 7-day pilot trainings (up to 3 per country) with 150 educators, teachers and/or librarians (10/training) delivered by the trainers, and followed up by 75 trainings delivered by the educators, teachers and/or librarians (up to 50% of the trainees implementing at least 1 training each) to adult learners. Noting that out of the 150 educators, teachers and/or librarians trained, 20% will be working with minority and disadvantaged groups. As a way of keeping the trainers and learners connected, the trainers will launch at least 2 cycles of challenges during the training phase inviting learners to share media production on social media illustrating civic engagement and social inclusion. During and after completion of the series of cascade pilot trainings, the researchers from each organisation will carry out a monitoring and evaluation of this product result, hence producing an assessment report discussing the merits of this new curriculum, its relevance to the different contexts for adult education, and recommendations to refine the curriculum. In addition, a network of trainers which will also welcome educators, teachers and/or librarians will be created and will include several activities, such as closed meetings for trainers and webinars open to educators, teachers and/or librarians in order to better implement the curriculum at the local level. Finally, several events will be organised, including the MIL’athon which will include 1 day session with educators, teachers and/or librarians who will be able to present their media product to the group and exchange (transnational peer learning); 3 days workshop to produce a group media production on civic engagement and social inclusion; a presentation in Brussels (Month 22-24 of the project) of the selected media productions during a Study tour to meet with EU representatives working on MIL issues as well as NGOs working in the field. Similarly, a UNESCO GAPMIL event will be organised in 2023 in order to share the Curriculum as well as the learnings of the project with MIL experts in France, Europe and beyond (multiplier event).<< Results >>The “Team Up! Media for adult education” project will produce the following 4 project results:- PR 1: MIL Toolkit (under the leadership of 4Change, Portugal). The MIL Toolkit will include two components: one database of educational resources on MIL for adults publicly available, and one 10 pages guidelines gathering our trainers best practices on methodologies, curriculum development and training delivery using the listed resources. Hence the MIL Toolkit will comprise 20 to 30 references that will be made available to trainers (and the public) on the project website as well as on the Platform EPALE in the 6 languages of the project (English, French, Romanian, Italian, Greek, or Portuguese). We expect to have at least 160 trainers, educators, teachers and librarians using this toolkit during the course of the project, with the potentiality of these trainers to do more cascade pilot trainings and sensitising more trainers in their home countries.- PR 2: MIL Education through Media Production for Adults Curriculum (under the leadership of Karpos, Greece). The Curriculum on Media Information and Literacy Education through Media Production for Adults will be produced and refined throughout the project thanks to various steps involving the participation of both trainers and learners. Indeed, pre-identified trainers selected by the partners organisations will construct a new, holistic and innovative curriculum for educators, teachers and librarians working with adults to teach MIL through Media Production (such as Podcast, Video, etc.). - PR 3: Pan-European MIL Trainers Network (under the leadership of Mediawise, Romania). Under the project “Team Up!” the pre-identified trainers by the partners in the 5 countries will be able to formalise their collaboration and best-practises exchange in a more formal way. Hence, at its inception, the network will comprise the 12 pre-identified trainers. The 150 educators, teachers and/or librarians trained will be invited to join the Network after the completion of their training. The Network will rely on online regular meetings of the pre-identified trainers who will exchange experiences and best practices on the implementation of the cascade trainings in their home country (up to 8 meetings on needs-base), as well as webinars for the educators, teachers and/or librarians to accompany them in implementing their trainings (up to 5 webinars on needs-base). - PR 4 MIL'athon (under the leadership of FORMA.Azione, Italy) Produced at the end of the project, during the closing event in Brussels (Month 22-24 of the project), the MIL’athon will bring together 15 educators, teachers and/or librarians from the 5 countries to take part in a fun event for which they will have to produce a media illustrating civic engagement and social inclusion in (Southern) Europe. The MIL’athon will supplement the PR 3 in bringing together, and this time in person, educators, teachers and/or librarians from the 5 countries to exchange experiences and best practices while taking part in a participatory and inspiring event. One 10-page guideline on how to organise a MIL'athon will be produced.