Project context/background: Working in the Automotive industry requires special knowledge that is different to other industries. Assuring quality in Automotive has grown to a huge challenge and competition factor driven mainly by the permanent cost pressure in a mass market that is increasingly confronted with the safety criticality of various mechatronic systems and subsystems. Automotive companies have realized the necessity of integrating the development and manufacturing processes significantly more than this is done today. Automotive organisations mention that there is a gap between knowledge which is needed for working as a professional in the Automotive industry and knowledge which is educated during VET. Bridging this gap is a necessity. Project objectives: The project is innovative because only few schools and universities address the special Automotive methods and techniques within their curriculum. As a consequence the Automotive industry faces a lot of challenges to find workers with the right knowledge, especially for countries outside Germany and France. A lot of basic training is needed before workers can participate on the right level within product development, process improvement and quality management. Number and profile of participants: This project targets Automotive manufacturers & suppliers, Automotive associations, and VET bodies. The following target groups have been identified: 1 - Students of initial VET (secondary level). 2 - Individuals working in Automotive manufacturing and quality support (secondary level). 3 - Engineers working in Automotive in product development, quality management or process engineering (tertiary level). 4 - Teachers and trainers of the foundation level (working for the Automotive clusters and initial VET secondary level). In total 16 teachers, 100 students (level 3-4) and 25 engineers working in Automotive will participate in training sessions organised by the consortium (Netherlands, Austria, France). Description of activities: A Need Analysis survey will be carried out among Automotive companies. Automotive Clusters from different countries, the MAC (MBO Automotive Centre), Innovam and Kenteq will be consulted and involved in the review process. Based on the Need Analysis a skill set will be composed which will be the basis for training content development. A training will be composed on the foundation level consisting of presentation content and exercises. One of the main deliverables is a book 'Working in Automotive' which will be published as ISBN in different languages. Two Train-the-trainer sessions will be organised to train teachers. This will be done by consultants/trainers with over 10 years experience in working in the Automotive. These teachers will receive the training materials which allow them to train the different target groups. The certification partners (ECQA and LSSA) will develop a uniform certification standard across Europe using the existing ECQA learning and certification platform. Methodology to be used in carrying out the project: Prince-II project management principles will be used. A dedicated project manager will be assigned to this project. Based on the application form and the project grant she will compose a project management plan that clearly describes the workpackages with deliverables, milestones and the role of each partner. She will be responsible for organizing peer reviews, progress follow up, reporting and archiving. It also implies reporting to the EU. Regular meetings will be conducted, face-to-face as by Skype. Communication between partners will include milestone reviews, phase reviews, deliverable reviews and project administration through a virtual office which allows access by EU officers, and full version control (and tracking of tasks) for all deliverables. Short description of results and impact envisaged: The results delivered within the scope of this project is an extensive and coherent training, including publishing a book (ISBN). This training will be conducted several times in the second period of this project. In total 140 students and individuals will be trained and a European certificate for the job role 'Automotive Engineer' will be achieved. Potential longer term benefits: Several ROC’s will include this training in their program. Several Automotive companies and cluster organisations have addressed the need for this curriculum. It is expected that also after this project these companies will enlist individuals for following this training. In the longer term this will contribute to find workers in the Automotive with the right knowledge and expertise.