Skills for the Creative Industries: Report of the UNESCO-UNEVOC Virtual Conference

Author: Paul Collard

Institution: UNESCO-UNEVOC International Centre for Technical and Vocational Education and Training

Full Reference: Collard, P. (2014). Skills for the Creative Industries: Report of the UNESCO-UNEVOC Virtual Conference. Bonn, Germany: UNESCO-UNEVOC.

Summary

The two-week virtual conference took place from 29 September to 10 October 2014 on UNESCO-UNEVOC’s e-Forum and brought together 153 participants from 64 countries. The virtual conference stimulated debate and information sharing, and increased participants’ understanding of the place of Technical and Vocational Education and Training (TVET) in creative industries. Importantly, it also provided an opportunity for UNESCO-UNEVOC to explore linkages between skilled labour and the cultural sector, one of UNESCO’s flagship programmes.

The virtual conference was moderated by Paul Collard, Chief Executive at Creativity, Culture and Education (CCE).

The virtual conference report explores questions related to, amongst other things, the required skills for creative industries, the relationship between creative economies and TVET, the role of creativity in TVET, the different vocational pathways to creative jobs and the nature of creative jobs and economies. In order to answer these questions, the report not only summarises the evidence considered and the conclusions reached during the virtual conference, but supplements these informative insights with additional information drawing on international research.

The report supports the general view that creative skills should be valued and that there is a need for such skills to be nurtured across all industries. Indeed throughout the virtual conference, participants saw creative skills as one of the central skill sets needed by all workers in contemporary employment. Participants recognised that the promotion of creative skills would also have consequences for vocational pedagogy, and this was particularly relevant to countries outside Europe where there was a greater need for such skills to be nurtured in order to generate high value employment opportunities.

Read the report here.