SASSI
SASSI was a project funded in the framework of Erasmus+. Its name stands for Silver Age Silver Sage Initiative and aimed to support age-sensitive approaches to continuous professional development for older learners and workers.
The main aims of the project were to:
- empower the ageing workforce by developing innovative training strategies that can be successfully applied both in continuous professional development (CPD) for 50+ employees and in VET programmes for active adult job seekers;
- develop age-sensitive approaches to learning and continuous professional development in order to actively engage older workers and job seekers.
The project pursued its goals by:
- exploring existing approaches and state of the art on age-responsive education, in terms of awareness levels, good practices and ongoing experiences ;
- developing guidance, training and coaching products which enabled trainers, CPD and VET providers to offer innovative tools and resources to organisations and older individuals.
- setting up a multi-lingual e-platform – the SASSI Hub and Community website – where senior learners, VET and CPD providers and HR managers can ‘meet’ and share experiences
- developing and promoting a certification system, buildling up a sound process to enable educationalists to become age responsive learning providers, by embedding the SASSI approach and developing concrete learning activities accordingly.
SASSI addressed:
- VET and CPD trainers;
- HR managers
- line managers with people management;
- external stakeholders and institutions;
- the broad society.
It was coordinated by Apricot, Loughborough, UK, and involved seven partners from six countries (AT, DE, NL, PT, SK, UK). The project took place between 09/2015 and 08/2017.
SASSI – Working On
Silver Age Silver Sage Initiative – Working On (SASSI-Working On), was an Erasmus+ funded project, running between 1 September 2018 and 31 December 2020. The project built on the results of the previous project SASSI, carried out from 2015 to 2017, that developed and piloted a range of innovative training strategies and tools to apply in both Continuous Professional Development (CPD) programmes for employees aged 50+ and in Vocational Education programmes. SASSI-Working On aimed at exploiting the innovation expressed in the previous project in terms of age-sensitive training to create innovative later career guidance methodologies.
The project had three main objectives:
- Extending and enhancing the access to age-sensitive careers advice, skills updating and work experience opportunities for older workers, ‘unretirees’ and job seekers (aged 50+.
- Developing innovative approaches to guidance for older workers and job seekers, promoting the shift from a traditional hierarchical career trajectory to career growth pathways that enhance experience and motivating learning in order to maintain employability and retain employment.
- Promoting and validating the non-formal and informal learning and competence of C-VET providers, trainers, HR professionals and line managers in providing age-sensitive approaches to career management/advice.
The seven project partners, based in five European Countries (Austria, Belgium, Germany, Portugal, Slovakia) had all long-term experience in the field of adult education, employability, career and talent management, competence validation and training design