Information and digital literacy in education via the digital path

The visual literacies (ViLi) research project (https://viliproject.eu/) is funded by the European Union (Erasmus+) to specifically research visual literacies from a technology enhanced learning perspective. The project team, comprising of Julie Ann Sime and Chryssa Themelis from Lancaster University (UK) has researched, developed and refined a range of open educational resources (OER) so as to deliver two massive open online courses (MOOCs) on visual literacies. Over the next few weeks, the ViLi MOOC offers a series of webinars on visual design, virtual reality, tele-proximity and online identity. In addition, the project offers recordings of past talks on Youtube.

With European elections coming up in May 2019, you probably want to know how the European Union impacts your daily life, before you think about voting. In the latest in a series of posts on what Europe does for you, your family, your business and your wellbeing, we look at what Europe does for people wanting to gain digital skills.

We live in a digital age, where the fast pace of technological development is transforming our economies and societies profoundly. Almost all jobs now require some level of digital skills, as does participation in society in general. In this context, digital literacy has become a life skill and the inability to access or use the internet seems unthinkable to many of us. However, about 44 % of adults in the EU have low digital skills and about 20 % have never used the internet, which can hamper their social integration and personal development.