On 8th October 2025, the final multiplier event of the EMPLOGAME project has been organised in Sofia, Bulgaria by the Bulgarian Inclusion Support Team. More than 70 students from marginalised communities and those with learning difficulties together with their teachers and pedagogical counsellors have participated.

The main project deliverables – the Serious educational game “It’s time to work” (Desktop and mobile version), info cards as well as the Pre-employment support & guidance handbook for teachers have been presented as well as the results from the pilot implementation phase in Bulgaria.

Teachers and students who participated in the pilot implementation phase shared their opinion about the impact, which the project made to them. Definetely, the career guidance process has been improved in the participating schools and several of students, who are at their last grade, already implemented labour market skills into conducted interview with career advisors to ensure their smooth labour market inclusion upon graduation.

The project and its deliverables were presented by Mr. Andrean Lazarov from Bulgarian Inclusion Support team at the webinar organised by the Human Resources Development Centre (the Bulgarian National Agency of Erasmus+ programme) and the accompanying activity “National VET Expert Team” . The event was attended by an exceptional interest from over 220 teachers and educational experts from all over Bulgaria, including representatives of the Regional Departments of Education, educational mediators, representatives of the non-governmental sector, NAVET, etc.

During the event, key innovations and good practices for the development of digital competences in vocational education and training (VET) were presented and discussed. Mr. Lazarov presented thematic aspects related to the preparation of teachers and students for work in a modern digital environment through implementing gamification as an approach for inclusive and motivating education. The serious educational game and the career guidance handbook were throughly presented and potential exploitation negotiations were expressed by the participants, including those from Regional educational directorates from different regions in Bulgaria.

The webinar stimulated dialogue and exchange of experience between educational institutions, IT specialists and business representatives. At the end of the event, future topics for appropriate events were also discussed, including the ethical and responsible use of artificial intelligence, GDPR regulations, etc. The serious educational game “Emplogame” was presented as a good practice for supporting students with fewer opportunities and disadvantaged people on their path to career guidance and preparation for the labor market, in direct connection with Europass documents.

The project was promoted during networking sessions, individual talks and workshops at the 35th Annual International Conference and Fair – EAIE 2025 organised by the European Association for International Education. The event was held in the period 9-12 September 2025 in Gothenburg, Sweden, where more than 7000 educational professionals and students from all over the world have participated.

We were able to extend the dissemination and promotion of the project to an international level during series of individual meetings with rectors, vice-rectors and directors of international officies of universities from Abu Dhabbi, Qatar, Dubai, Saudi Arabia, India, Bangladesh, Vietnam, China. The interest towards the project results was significant. Thanks to that, the partners received new invitations to speak at international events.

On 15th and 16th of May 2025, the fifth Istanbul transnational partners’ meeting took place with the participation by all partners. Core aspects discussed were about the status of the realisation of the pilot implementation phase in Spain, Bulgaria and Turkiye as well as the new versions of the game for mobile devices – Android and iOS.

The partners reviewed the preliminary results from the feedback gathering tool based on Kirckpatrick’s methodology. Overall we have very good results towards validation of the pre-employment skills of marginalised students in the partners’ countries – students with Roma origin, refugees as well as students with learning difficulties and disabilities.

The partners also discussed the preparation of common articles and presentations during EU and international conferences as well as discussed the organisation of the final multiplier events in September-October 2025.

Common workshop for recent and future teachers was organised as part of the First CITEM International congress organised by UAM in cooperation with AMPAT, BIST and 94 SU (project partners). During the workshop session, we have presented the project deliverables and trained the participants how to use them in their daily practices. We were able to collect feedback as well as to negotiate future participation in dissemination and exploitation activities.

On 21st and 22nd April 2025, the fourth transnational partners’ meeting were held in Madrid, Spain. It was hosted by both UAM (project coordinator) and AMPAT (local partner).

The partner went through all work packages, where they have discussed the progress and planned the next steps. Special attention was put on the new version of the serious educational game for validation of pre-employment skills of marginalised countries. The partners took into account the feedback provided by both teachers and marginalised students aged 14-18 in Spain, Bulgaria and Turkiye, which were implemented into the new version.

The partners presented their involvement in recent dissemination and exploitation activities as well as discussed future plans.

Marginalised students aged 15-18 from Bulgaria are continuing their pre-employment preparation via individual and group sessions with their teachers and pedagogical counsellor as well as by exploring the 4 levels of the serious game produced by the project. In total 60 students so far participated from 94 SU “Dimitar Strashimirov”.

The team of AMPAT was invited to deliver special training for future teachers (recent students at Pedagogical and Social studies programmes) at the Catholic University of Paraguay. The training event was held on 4th and 5th of April and was delivered by Prof. PhD Pilar Gutiez Cuevas and Prof. PhD Castellar Lopez Guinea from AMPAT. They have presented the serious educational game as well as the Pre-employment toolkit. Exploitation agreement was signed between AMPAT and the organisers.

The project was presented as best practice example during International conference organised by National agency of Republic of North Macedonia. The conference was held in the period 5-7.03.2025 in Ohrid. The aim of the event was to bring together career counselors from across the educational spectrum — from primary education to universities — who are actively working on issues of career guidance, inclusion and support of vulnerable groups in the educational process. The discussions focused on new trends in career counseling, the specifics of approaches for different professional and social groups, good practices and ways for sustainable inclusion of vulnerable groups.

Special focus was done on the presentation of the Pre-employment supportive handbook and the serious educational game.