The project “EDUVAC – Educating vaccination competence” was carried out in the framework of Key Action 2 (KA2) – Strategic partnerships in the field of Higher Education. The aim of the project was to build the vaccination competencies among health sciences students. The COVID-19 pandemic highlighted the need for vaccination and the acquisition of knowledge by healthcare professionals to ensure the provision of high quality care.

Who participated

The University of West Attica participated in the project as project coordinator together with another four European institutions, namely:

• Metropolia University of Applied Sciences, Finland
• University of Trnava, Slovakia
• University of Vic–Central University of Catalonia, Spain
• University of Modena and Reggio Emilia, Italy.

Objectives of the project

The objectives of the project are closely related with its thematic.

• Improving the quality and relevance of the curriculum on vaccination;
• Developing the students’ positive attitude towards vaccination at a national and an international level;
• Promoting vaccination and the population’s health by increasing vaccination coverage.

Project activities

In the framework of “EDUVAC – Educating vaccination competence” project, several activities were organized, namely:

• Kick-off meeting in Athens (26-28.11.2018); 
• Transnational meeting in Italy (11-12.11.2019); 
• Presentation of the project during the 18th  International Conference on Informatics, Management and Technology in Healthcare held between 03.07.2020 and 05.07.2020;
• Vaccination simulations;
• Participation in the Panhellenic Congress on Economics and Health Policy 2020, held between 07.12.2020 and 10.12.2020;
• Dissemination event held on 09.06.2021.

Moreover, two courses were developed; one asynchronous web-based course and one intensive live course in Athens, Greece.

The educational content used in both courses was developed on Moodle platform.

The web-based course, carried out in three semesters, was delivered to students from all the educational institutions participating in the project. The aim of the course was to evaluate, improve and produce the final learning outcome.

The intensive course was held once. It had a five-day duration and included lectures, team work, simulation scenarios, training, counseling, interactive games and discussions based on the thematic units.

Project impact

A total of 369 students participated in EDUVAC project. The web-based course was attended by 331 students and the intensive course by 38 students.

According to their assessment, the majority of the students consider that:

• the course was beneficial for their future career;
• they updated their knowledge on vaccination;
• they enhanced their language skills in English language;
• the learning methods and educational activities used were interesting and effective.

More precisely, with regard to the educational activities, students stated that they would like more educational videos to be shared and that they appreciated teamwork, face-to-face contact and cooperation with students from different countries.

Learn more about the Erasmus+ EDUVAC – Educating vaccination competence project and draw inspiration from other good practices.