The collaboration project Higher Education Students' Digital Skills+, as part of the of the strategic Study+ development of ULapland and Lapland UAS, will draw to a close at the end of March. Concurrently, the English version of the digital toolkit produced by the project is published and launched extensively.

The ESF-funded project was started in autumn 2021 with an aim to support students' digital skills and their well-being and communality in online study environments. It stemmed from experiences of declined well-being and feelings of detachment from the community during the COVID-19 pandemic.

A student-based approach was used in the project. In the beginning, student workshops charted students' needs and wishes, and as the construction of tools progressed, they were tested several times with various groups of students. Finally, the tools were also checked in terms of accessibility.

"Project experts from both universities and the LUC Services built their expertise into the tools for the benefit of our students. I am very pleased with the end result," says project manager Paula Korteniemi from Lapland UAS.

The project produced tools for university students to improve, for instance, their presentation and group working skills, their scheduling skills, and their use of personal digital strengths. Students can also use the tools to examine their own digital well-being.

"It is important that the development of students' digital well-being skills supports the experience of communality among the university consortium's students in digital environments as well," points out Professor Satu Uusiautti, the vice rector for education at the University of Lapland.

In addition to partners from the FSHS and Nyyti ry, the project's steering group had representatives of the universities and the student unions of ULapland and Lapland UAS.

The outcomes of the project also support international students. Furthermore, Digibagi is available to everyone on a ULapland web page and it may benefit, for instance, upper secondary-level students and those engaged in continuous learning.

To the toolkit in English
The toolkit is also available on the universities' web pages as follows: Lapland UAS and ULapland

Higher Education Students' Digital Skills+ is an ESF-funded project carried out between 1 September 2021 and 31 March 2023. The project is part of the strategic development of the LUC to support learning and studying and the construction of well-being and communality in diverse learning and work environments.

Further information:

Project manager Paula Korteniemi, paula.korteniemi (at) lapinamk.fi
Vice-Rector Satu Uusiautti, satu.uusiautti (at) ulapland.fi