The CROSSCOMP project proposes an integrated approach (the Cross-Border Hub of Competences for the Automotive Industry) to meet the rising demand of increasing the attractiveness and practical dimension of educational offers of the three technical universities from the cross-border area in the context of labour market requirements of one of the most dynamic and promising industry in the region – the automotive engineering sector. CROSSCOMP project will provide coordination and support measures to address cost, coordination and cross-fertilisation of ideas, as an integrated set of actions:
- Planning and development of a joint educational and research strategy in the field of automotive engineering, in order to provide an adequate framework for: (a) Alignment and integration of education programmes and curricula with each other and within the larger context of regional and cross-border development of the automotive engineering sector; (b) Creation of a supportive environment for cross-sector coordination within all the automotive industry related faculties and departments; and (c) Coordination between the three technical universities from the cross-border area and other academic institutions and agencies at all levels to achieve inter-related educational goals.
- Joint design of curricular content for new or existing disciplines with applicative component related to the automotive engineering sector. The existing courses will be upgraded in order to synchronize their curricula with the current level of innovation in the knowledge-intensive sector of automotive engineering, aiming to improve their quality and relevance, in line with the cross-border area automotive sector’s labour market needs, with the support of regional companies and through dialogue that can provide exchange of experience and examples of good practice in the field.
- Joint development of new high-quality interdisciplinary study programmes at master level. CROSSCOMP intends to support the development of a new interdisciplinary master degree program “Hybrid and Electric Vehicles” at the Mechanical Engineering Faculty of TUIASI. On the Moldavian side, the Faculty of Electronics and Telecommunications of UTM will examine the possibility of developing a master degree programme in automotive systems engineering, by undergoing an exchange of experience process with the Faculty of Electronics, Telecommunications and Information Technology of TUIASI.
- Joint upgrading of the academic infrastructure. This will enable the three cross-border area universities to benefit from the use of modern technology and equipment, in order to provide students with hands-on learning experiences helping them to develop their cross-disciplinary technical skills. CROSSCOMP project targets a number of 6 laboratories to upgrade with modern didactic equipment, serving a number of 33 automotive engineering related disciplines, in all the three technical universities forming the partnership.
- Development of a common program of entrepreneurship education, in order stimulate creativity, innovation and active citizenship of the students from the three cross-border area technical universities. In this scope, CROSSCOMP will facilitate the implementation of an Automotive Engineering International Summer School (AEISS), hosted by the Technical University of Moldova, and involving students from all the three technical universities partners in the project. The focus of the AEISS will be on current trends in car development and research.
- Development of a common program to enable academic staff of the three universities from both sides of the border to acquire applied knowledge in curriculum design, project based-learning, new forms of peer and group assessments, regional networking, and teaching using the new technologies. CROSSCOMP intends to organize a dedicated cross-border regional conference on automotive engineering academic teaching in Iasi, in order to provide tools and strategies to help faculty members become fully effective in automotive engineering teaching and productive in the related research activities. The CROSSCOMP project also envisages a series of 5 webinars, involving students and academic staff from the cross-border area academic consortium members, and hosting invited speakers from regional automotive industry leaders and from the international academic partners of TUIasi in automotive engineering.