Improved promotion of the Medical Laboratory Technologist profession, training quality and cross-border mobility in the Euregio Meuse-Rhin region (EMR) through the development and sharing of an ICTE tool.

Aims and objectives

The FUNFORLAB project focuses on an ICTE serious game. Several factors will ensure a wide implementation of the game in the training of Medical Laboratory Technologists (MLTs) in most of the EMR’s MLT training centers and beyond:

• Early information and massive involvement of the target audiences "MLT trainers and learners" and "MLT professionals" throughout the development of the game;
• "Open Access" status of the tool;
• Development of explanatory tutorials for the game;
• Integration of the game into a pedagogical scenario that will be provided with the game to all TLM's initial and continuous education centers.

Through the development and design of this game, several objectives will be worked on in parallel:

1. Increased employability of TLMs by activating specific skills on automatons through the "Serious Game" tool ;
2. Increased interregional mobility of students and professionals;
3. Promotion of scientific professions, including MLT, to secondary school students by disseminating the game in secondary school science classes, at information fairs, on social networks, etc.

Actions

The project starts with an euregional SWOT analyses regarding the different aspects of MLT training in the different EMR regions. The meeting brings together representatives of all target audiences.

Results of this SWOT analysis will be used for:

• Design of the serious game FUNFORLAB;
• Definition of MLT cursus’s needs in the EMR, in terms of virtual training for handling automatons;
• Sharing good and innovative teaching practices (success aid tools, international mobility).

Based on these results, a strategic plan for the wide dissemination of good practices and an euregional pedagogical scenario for the implementation of the game will be developed.

Following these specifications, a prototype of the serious game ICTE tool is developed. This prototype will be tested and critically evaluated during workshops for the different target groups.

Through the seminars and workshops, the partners will create a lasting virtual FUNFORLAB community with all participants. This community is maintained through newsletters and exchange forums available on the FUNFORLAB website (www.funforlab.eu).

Support

The FunForLab project receives support from the Interreg V-A Euregio Meuse Rhine program, the European Regional Development Fund, Wallonia and the Wallonia-Brussels Federation in Belgium, the Province of Limburg in the Netherlands, and the North Rhine-Westphalia region in Germany.