CHARTER Alliance Recommendations: Securing an innovative and enterprising heritage sector
CHARTER – European Cultural Heritage Skills Alliance is the Blueprint for sectoral cooperation on skills for cultural heritage. The project’s mission is to sustainably protect, promote and enhance European cultural heritage by creating a lasting and comprehensive sectoral skills strategy, bridging gaps between education and vocational systems and employers’ needs, and propose training and curricula for the development of new skills for heritage professionals. CHARTER works to impact and benefit the universities, higher education institutes and academics; VET centres and trainers; students; the cultural heritage industry and professionals; networks; policy makers and other Erasmus+ projects.
The CHARTER Alliance’s recommendations form a central part of the future Skills Strategy and aim to achieve the goal of a well-functioning heritage ecosystem. They are the result of the research, enquiries, consultation and cooperation with regional, national and European stakeholders carried out by the project since 2021. They provide a blueprint for the main stakeholders (European Union level, EU Member States & Regional authorities, E&T providers and Heritage institutions/ employers) on how to bridge the gaps between education & training systems and labour market needs in the heritage sector. This document is a synthesis of the Cultural Heritage Skills Strategy document where the recommendations are justified and explained in much more detail and with examples. Collectively the Recommendations support achieving the CHARTER vision: An innovative, enterprising sector that transforms the heritage resource into a driver of sustainable social, economic and environmental change, and is an attractive and rewarding career option.
This document lays out actionable steps to strengthen the heritage sector, addressing key challenges in education, skills development, and workforce needs. Highlights include:
- Establishing skills strategies for systemic change
- Counteracting the loss of heritage skills
- Complementing heritage skills with transversal skills
- Offering future-proof education and training
- Promoting lifelong learning opportunities
- Recognising non-formal and informal prior learning
- Ensuring work-based learning for professional development
- Strengthening quality assurance in education and training
- Striving for a viable, diverse and inclusive heritage workforce
- Facilitating mobility and fostering professional recognition
- Developing evidence-based policies through robust data
- Fostering cross-sector collaboration and innovation
How can these essential changes be implemented in the heritage sector? Take a look at the full recommendations document for a comprehensive overview of the specific actions proposed for each stakeholder involved.