The European commissions’ Entrepreneurship 2020 action plan focuses on “reigniting the culture of entrepreneurship in Europe and nurturing the new generation of entrepreneurs”, as an area of an immediate intervention. “Smart Specialization” is the collective process that more than 170 European regions and 16 countries are now using to identify their strengths and their opportunities (http://s3platform.jrc.ec.europa.eu/s3-platform-registered-regions). It is based on a strong partnership between business, public sector and knowledge institutions to jointly design and implements their research and innovation investment strategies. In fact, the vision of Crete's development plan under the NSRF 2014-2020 is a “dynamic and sustainable Crete”. Dynamic in the sense of having an integrated strategy to exit the economic crisis by investing and strengthening the interconnection and export orientation of the agri-food sector, which is one of the four dynamic sectors identified in the context of the smart specialization of the regional economy of Crete. The same vision is registered in “smart Specialisation” plan of DTRaIN partners regions, identifying the agri-food industry as a dynamic sector for entrepreneurship and local development. Professionals working in the agri-food sector lack the skills for the fortification of local products brand names, and to face the challenge of the constantly changing and highly competitive economic environment. The Design Thinking methodology has been used to revolutionize entire industries and establish an enviable competitive advantage for their companies. Focused on listening, user empathy, whole-brain thinking, collaboration, and experimentation, Design Thinking can be applied in any field and product development to business planning and beyond. Best of all, it is believed that it is teachable to managers and scalable throughout a company.Based on the above, the DTRaIN Project objective is to revitalize the production in the agri-food sector of partners regions, by promoting the acquisition of high-quality skills for managing staff and entrepreneurs working in the sector. To address this objective, a European “Design Thinking” professional profile will be developed, based on a qualification scheme for validating learning outcomes, according to ECVET recommendations, and in line with ISO 17024 norm. More specifically, the aims of the DTRaIN Project are: Design a VET Curriculum and develop training content (EQF 4-5) for professionals in the agri-food sector, willing to upgrade their skills in Design Thinking for innovation methodology.  Design an innovative educational model based on a learner-centered approach, in a flipped classroom ubiquitous environment. Develop training material based on the Educational Model  Produce a Qualification scheme development.Direct target group and users of the training material will be professionals managing staff in agri-food companies that act as work-based trainers in their companies as well as educators in initial and continuous Vocational Training Institutes (EQF level 4&5).The Project implementation has been articulated in sequential activities grouped in seven work packages to achieve the fixed goals, carried out in close cooperation by all the institutions involved. The expected impact of the project is:-the improvement of the occupational qualification and professional skills of professionals working in the agri-food sector, in establishing a strong brand name in markets. -the updating of the professional profile of learners being certified under “DTRaIN qualification scheme” as Design thinking, allowing easier mobility across companies and countries. -Vet institutes to enrich their training services and pieces of training including an “innovative educational model” for implementing a VET curriculum delivering training content (EQF 4-5) for professionals in the agri-food sector, that can lead to a certification.

Society is challenged by a growing number of ageing people that live longer and age in place. We also see a gaining group of elderly living alone and not receiving support from family, friends or neighbours (Putman et al, 2016). The lack of supportive relationships combined with an increasing need of support leads not only to a decrease in empowerment, but also to an increase of feelings of loneliness. Loneliness is a heterogenic problem. Many interventions have been developed to address loneliness. It is though hard to select a suitable intervention in an unique situation. It depends, for example, on the type of loneliness and the motivation to participate socially. Concurrently service providers, organizations, and the whole society are expected to make the transition to community-based services. This has an impact on the different roles professionals must play. The transition to an inclusive society, forces service providers from different fields to cooperate and learn from each other. Also, the rapidly changing society requires from professionals generic skills & attitude to function in & contribute to the future society. These are so-called 21st century skills: problem solving thinking & performing, self-regulation, collaborating, ICT-skills, and creative thinking & performing. Education nowadays, is more focused on skills & competencies than on knowledge. Innovation is going too fast and knowledge quickly becomes out-of-date. So, students learn how to search for and create knowledge. Most of the 21st century skills have been integrated in the curricula of VET, as the skills are specifically mentioned in the curricula (analyses on the implementation of 21st century skills at the request of the Ministry of Education, Culture and Science (2016)). However, putting these skills into practice remains difficult. Due to the complexity of loneliness it is not easy for professionals to identify suitable interventions and to implement them. Professionals (to be) find it hard to diagnose each unique situation and to start the appropriate actions. They need to know which interventions can be implemented to alleviate loneliness, what their role is in implementing it and what the required skills are to carry it out. Hence, we want to exchange good practices for the innovation of approaches of social inclusion, with the aim of improving the skills and competencies of students (mainly VET, but also higher education) and professionals. Many European policy priorities are related to the integration of social and (mental) health services, ‘elderly friendly communities’ (see e.g. European Innovation partnership on Active and Healthy Ageing). In this sense it is important to cooperate transnationally with different EU countries in order to translate these policies to their national operation.Secondly, it is important to move forward. Having arranged it well at a national level is not enough. One needs to cooperate transnationally and share good practices. In this way one is able to find out what methods to address loneliness (including necessary skills and competences) are generic and which ones are context specific. In order to do something about the problem loneliness, it is necessary to involve all relevant stakeholders. So, the starting point of the FILO project was to involve education, practice, policymakers and the elderly themselves. This way all different perspectives, knowledge and experiences were combined.In the FILO project several good practices have been defined. Within these good practices the content of the intervention, the role of professionals to implement and the skills to carry the intervention out have been evaluated. The evaluation of the good practices resulted in an overview of interventions for alleviating loneliness, success and fail factors of good practices, and recommendations for education to improve the curricula as well as recommendations for organisations working with elderly and policymakers of cities and regions.More information about the project can be found at the FILO website: www.rotterdamuas.com/filo