The board, experts, and finance managers of ArcticSkills met in Rovaniemi last week. The purpose of the meetings was threefold. The main task of the Board was to clarify the arrangement of the competition in 2022, the finance managers met with the Kolarctic administration for a review of the reporting routines, and the experts laid the foundation for next year’s competition, online or face-to-face in one option or another.
The pandemic did not prevent representatives from most partners from attending. Only the participants from Murmansk had to follow the meetings from the screen. It was very important to involve them in the decisions since they have the main responsibility for next year’s event. As it looks after the meeting, two possibilities are open. Either an online event led from a studio in Murmansk, or a distributed face-to-face event with competition arenas at colleges in Finland. We will come back with a more detailed report as soon as the minutes are ready. One thing, however, is for sure. There will be no face-to-face event in Murmansk 2022. We are still in the grip of “queen” Corona.
Reports from the meeting between the experts tell a story of a well-equipped machinery. The tasks and regulations are well prepared, and the list of new competences should not cause any problems. Only E-gaming is a newcomer. Perhaps the most important case on their agenda was to meet new colleagues and get acquainted with the facilities at the vocational institute REDU, who hosted the meetings.
According to the Project Manager, Robert Flatli, who was responsible for travels, housing and boarding, everything went well. He was especially pleased with the update of the finance managers and the feed-back from The Managing Authority. It seems that ArcticSkills has gained a lot of esteem and respect in the Kolarctic inner circle through the two years of implementation. To quote Robert, “this gives us energy for our next interim report, and hope for an extended implementation period”.
The picture gives us an example of VR- equipment used by the car mechanics at REDU
