WorldSkills Europe General Assembly held in Gothenburg, Sweden

The 10th WorldSkills Europe General Assembly and Competition Preparation Meetings took place in Gothenburg, Sweden from 18-20 April. More than 170 participants attended the meetings, organized by WorldSkills Europe and the Swedish Organising Committee for EuroSkills 2016.

The meetings were held at the Svenska Mässan, the Swedish Exhibition and Congress Centre where the EuroSkills Competition will take place this December. Official Delegates, Technical Delegates, Chief Experts, Associate Members, Sponsors & Marketing Communication representatives from the WorldSkills Europe Members participated in various meetings. 

As sustainability is one of the strategic goals of EuroSkills 2016, the hosts organized a “Sustainability Tour” at the Exhibition Centre to see how its waste management and energy consumption is managed. The tour gave insight on how the Exhibition Centre achieves 0.1% waste by recycling and reusing event materials.

TWO NEW MEMBERS WELCOMED 

During the General Assembly the Members agreed unanimously to welcome Iceland and Kazakhstan as Members of WorldSkills Europe. Skills Iceland has been involved in the first two EuroSkills Competitions. After a brief absence, Iceland decided to benchmark their skills again at a European level. Both Members will compete in EuroSkills 2016, bringing a total of 28 participating countries.

EUROSKILLS 2020 IN GRAZ, AUSTRIA

Skills Austria, part of the Austrian Chamber of Commerce, won the vote for the right to organize EuroSkills 2020. Although Skills Finland also had a high quality bid, the Austrian bid was accepted by the Members of WorldSkills Europe. EuroSkills 2020 is scheduled for September 2020 in Graz, Austria. A report from Skills Austria (in German) can be found here. 

NEW INFRASTRUCTURE LIST SYSTEM

WorldSkills Europe presented a new “infrastructure list” (IL) system that makes it possible to see how many items are needed per skill, but also for the complete event. The IL system will bring more transparency and efficiency to the organizing progress. Various instruction movies on how to use the new IL-system can be found here.

NEXT WORLDSKILLS EUROPE GA IN NAMUR, BELGIUM

The next WorldSkills Europe General Assembly will be held 18 May 2017 in Namur, Belgium. One of the new features during the next GA will be a Conference Programme that will be developed with various stakeholders in Belgium and internationally. Also, the program will include meetings of the Board of Directors, meetings of the Strategy Working Group, the Competition Development Committee, Marketing & Communication’s Meeting and the General Assembly, from 15-18 May in the beautiful location of Palais des Congrès, Namur.