Mobile Meetings Series Programme

mYouth and mEducation: Mobilising technology to improve education, youth employment and competitiveness

Mobile technologies play a unique role in the lives of today’s youth and could contribute far more to improving education and training to produce a highly educated and prepared workforce. The continued growth of the mobile industry also represents an enormous opportunity for career development for young people.

Mobile technologies, and enhanced connectivity, improve access to education, encourage development of innovative methods of teaching and assessment, and facilitate delivery of more authentic, appropriately situated training activities. Connected, mobile personal learning devices enable engaging and tailored learning experiences to specific individual needs and abilities – leading to reduced drop out and increased achievement.
These improvements can contribute to producing better educated, better prepared entrants to the workforce, while simultaneously creating new markets for mobile operators and other service providers. Education and training are fundamental to achieving the goals of the EU 2020 Strategy, strengthening Europe’s industrial competitiveness and creating employment opportunities.

At the same time, there is a need to ensure that young mobile users’ have opportunities to leverage their knowledge after completing their education. ICT skills, equipment and networks continue to drive productivity in Europe and providing opportunities to young people to build the digital ecosystem is essential. With help from the mobile industry, the European Commission is focused on attracting skilled youths to ICT and fostering entrepreneurial opportunities for young people.

This event will aim to showcase GSMA’s mEducation and mYouth initiatives and the contribution mobile can make to realising the vision of Rethinking Education and EU 2020.

The session will cover the following topics:

• How can mobile technologies enable innovative training and education opportunities and solutions for EU citizens? What are the barriers to deployment and how can these be overcome?
• What is the potential of mobile technologies to increase the preparedness of new workers and enhance competitiveness into the EU market?
• What employment opportunities exist for today’s mobile natives and how can the sector attract skilled youths?