DIGITAL-VV: Formación digital para Mujeres Migrantes

We have presented this project to address the need for migrant women to enhance their language skills in the host society and improve their digital abilities. Among the migrant population in general, and migrant women in particular, there is a widespread use of mobile phones and a broad knowledge of applications, especially for social interaction. The types of mobile phone use among the immigrant population do not differ from the rest of the host country's population in terms of consumer purposes: social relationships, orientation and geolocation, everyday management, leisure, and entertainment. However, when it comes to utilizing technological resources for personal and professional development, differences are observed among participants related to their educational level, purchasing power, or technological competence, in line with other research findings. In this project, we adopted a new curriculum format designed for the digital education of migrant women, with a particular focus on women with a history of social exclusion. We used participatory methods and interactive tools.

The initially established objectives for the DIGITAL-VV project were as follows: O.E.1 - Improve knowledge and understanding of digital education tools and data-intensive technologies through the exchange of best practices. O.E.2 - Foster digital literacy, skills, and competencies of migrant women and address misinformation through education and training. O.E.3 - Encourage and empower migrant women to play a more active role in the digital era. O.E.4 - Strengthen cooperation in digital education at the EU level and beyond. During the course of the project, new objectives were identified related to the following aspects: - Objective related to the networks of mutual support created among women participating in the training activities, which proved to be very helpful for those who were newly arrived in our country and had limited social connections. - Objective related to motivation to continue developing digital skills and participate in new socio-occupational integration pathways developed by the participating social entities in the project and other related network initiatives.

The main activities of the DIGITAL-VV project were as follows: 1. Preparation meeting between INCREDERE and NGO SENVALOS for project development in July 2022. 2. Specialized training session on digitization for migrant women, targeting trainers from social entities, held in August 2022. 3. Digital training course for migrant women at risk of social exclusion in Spain and Italy, who faced language difficulties or had challenges in communicating effectively with the host society. The course took place between October 2022 and February 2023. 4. DIGITAL-VV online learning platform for digital education of migrant women, including a dedicated section with support materials for trainers conducting digitization courses for migrant women or vulnerable groups. The platform was developed between September 2022 and February 2023. 5. Good practices guide on digitization for migrant women, compiling the project's learnings on the digitization processes for migrant women. The guide was developed between January and February 2023. 6. Final project evaluation conducted between February and March 2023. 7. Project closure meeting held in March 2023.

The results of the DIGITAL-VV project have been established at two levels: 1. Process outcomes: - Digital training provided to 24 migrant women at risk of social exclusion and with language difficulties. - Improvement of digital training capacities for 6 trainers from the project's promoting entities. - Practical open-access content adapted to the training needs of migrant women at risk of social exclusion and with language difficulties for European social entities. 2. Impact outcomes: - Increased ability for participating migrant women to interact in the digital world, particularly in areas of digitization that bring them the greatest benefits. This includes accessing digital government services or related services (such as accessing healthcare or municipal services), as well as using applications that facilitate their daily lives without having to depend on others, such as mobility-related apps, household budgeting apps, or communication apps with people in their environment. - Increased motivation to continue building digital education skills and skills in other areas.