At this year's CARNET User Conference, held in Šibenik from November 6th to 8th, 2019, a round table was held titled “Development, monitoring, and evaluation of digital competencies. The results were presented at the round table. CRISS Project From the European Union's Horizon 2020 program, whose purpose was the development and implementation of an online platform for guided acquisition, evaluation, and certification of digital competencies of primary and secondary school students. The platform was tested through a massive pilot with over 490 schools, including 25,400 students and 2,290 teachers from Greece, Sweden, Italy, Spain (Catalonia), Bulgaria, and Croatia.
Croatian students and teachers participated in the project through CARNET, a partner on the CRISS project, which piloted CRISS's model for acquiring digital competence and its platform at the national level in Croatia. A total of 1000 Croatian students and 60 teachers from 21 schools were involved in the pilot project, which was conducted during the 2018/2019 school year.
Croatian students and their teachers used the CRISS platform in teaching activities across various subjects, developed and evaluated their digital competence, and ultimately earned certificates for developed sub-competencies in five areas – (1) Digital Citizenship, (2) Digital Communication and Collaboration, (3) Searching and Managing Digital Information, (4) Creating Digital Content, and (5) Digital Problem Solving. In relation to a specific area, they obtained certificates based on objective results, i.e., based on the total number of tasks solved related to specific sub-competencies. According to the certification rules built into the system, the CRISS platform automatically awards certificates.
Croatian schools have achieved an enviable result: 2309 certificates for acquired sub-competencies were awarded at the project level, of which 773 went to Croatian students. At the roundtable, the most successful teachers, Marina Vukančić from Ivo Andrić Elementary School in Zagreb, Jasmina Kljunić from Zagreb School of Administration, and Ivan Kardum from Horvati Elementary School, presented their experience working with the platform and developing students' digital skills. Among the five schools with the most acquired certificates were also Zlatar High School and Požega Technical School, which, thanks to their dedicated work on the project, were also invited to the conference and contributed to the discussion after the roundtable, sharing their experiences.
In addition to the teachers' experience and the diversity of the roundtable content, Associate Professor Igor Balaban from the Faculty of Organization and Informatics contributed. Professor Balaban presented the scientific contribution of the CRISS project and emphasized the project's uniqueness regarding the possibility of using a tool (platform) that simultaneously serves for guided acquisition, evaluation, and certification of digital competence, thus representing a unique product in European educational systems. Furthermore, Professor Balaban also highlighted the importance of developing digital competence and the platform's adaptability to various European educational contexts.
Following the panelists' presentations, a lively discussion ensued regarding the need to develop digital competence in contemporary society and the possibilities for its development through standard educational and other frameworks provided by such projects. At the very end of the roundtable discussion, certificates of appreciation were awarded to the schools that participated in the project.