Building European Nuclear Competence through continuous Advanced and Structured Education and Training Actions

Periodic Reporting for period 2 - ENEN2plus (Building European Nuclear Competence through continuous Advanced and Structured Education and TrainingActions)

Reporting period: 2023-12-01 to 2025-05-31

Nuclear power and non-power technologies are technically very complex facilities that operate in the increasingly challenging regulatory framework and market conditions.

Development, construction, operation, decommissioning, waste management and oversight of these facilities require personnel with excellent education, skills and motivation: nuclear specialists, that are equipped to work in multidisciplinary, multicultural and competitive environments.

ENEN2plus stands for the largest and most integrative nuclear Education and Training (E&T) efforts up to date in nuclear E&T.

Attraction of excellent new talents followed by outstanding development through E&T, cross-cultural and cross-disciplinary activities are the overarching objectives.

Excellent workforce should remain the basic enabler of safe long-term operation of existing and development of advanced facilities. A detailed insight into the EU supply and demand of nuclear human resources for power and non-power applications are being developed. This includes industries, academia, technical safety organizations and regulators.

Higher number of nuclear talents are being achieved through dedicated career-related events and competitions for high school pupils and teachers, students (BSc, MSC, PhD), postdocs and lifelong learners.

A strong mobility program supports over 100 person-years of nuclear career-enhancing experience to about 1.000 learners with over 2,5 million EUR.

Cross-border and cross-disciplinary mobility within and beyond EU are being promoted in cooperation with JRC, OECD/NEA and partners from USA, Canada, China, Korea and Japan.

A single hub will be established to provide information on available educational, training and job opportunities.

Appropriate connections with the complementary project facilitating access to research infrastructures will be maintained.

WP2 – Informing and attracting new talents
•development of HUB-T 2.1
•fourth career event organised-T2.2
•18th and 19th ENEN PhD contest 2024 and 2025 organised-T2.3
•BSc and MSc nuclear competition and summer school organised-T2.3
•STEM award for secondary school teachers awarded-T2.3
•second workshop for teachers-T2.4
•list of facilities available for secondary school visits updated-T2.4
•three national summer schools organised-T2.4
•second Scientific dating workshop organised-T2.5
•draft D2.6 ‘Report on the organization of the scientific dating workshops’ distributed forreview-T2.5

WP3 – Enhancing nuclear competencies: continuous E&T programs
D3.1 Report on analysing and benchmarking existing E&T programs – submitted (SCK CEN). Benchmarking activities by the Quality Committee will continue as soon as the ENEN2plus HUB becomes fully operational for data extraction.
D3.2 Report on the organization of one-week courses, webinars, and scientific bulletin – submitted (CIRTEN).
T3.2: Courses completed:
-“Innovative Radionuclides and Radiopharmaceuticals” – IST
-“Radon and its short-lived daughter nuclides” – T3.2: Weekly webinars
T3.2: Scientific bulletins
T3.3: PhD Event&Prize in September 2024, Munich, Germany T3.3: PhD Event&Prize in May 2025, Warsaw, Poland
T3.3: 1st PhD Workshop in September 2024, Munich, Germany
T3.3: 1st BSc and MSc Nuclear Competition in July 2024, Bratislava, Slovakia T3.3: 2nd BSc and MSc Nuclear Competition in July 2025, Budapest, Hungary T3.3: BSc summer school (UHEL)
T3.3: MSc winter school (ENEA),
T3.4: 2nd Pan-European Workshops for Young Generation, Munich, Germany, September 2024 T3.4: The podcast series online on YouTube and Spotify
Additional cross-YG events (ENS, EFOMP, IRPA, FuseNet and local organizers):
•1st BSc and MSc Nuclear Competition in 2024 (Bratislava, Slovakia)
•2nd BSc and MSc Nuclear Competition in 2025 (Budapest, Hungary)
•Cross-YGN Workshop “Nuclear Paths – Education, Networks and Career Opportunities”
•workshop at ENYGF Zagreb, Croatia on AI applications in the different fields, June, 2025
•4th Nuclear competition for Secondary schools, Bologna, Italy, July 2025

WP4 – Development of Sustainable Vocational Training Program and Network
The nuclear VET learning community (now called NUCLEATION) is working and convening regularly, the number of members is growing steadily.
The European Learning Model (ELM) was partially applied for the VET course data, providing the basis for a future interface or connection to other important European E&T as well as VET applications.
The ENEN HUB has been implemented and can be accessed on the Internet. The VET data compiled in T4.1 were further developed to allow for its import into the HUB.
The T4.3 kick-off meeting was conducted, all T4.3 partners were introduced to the required activities.
An action was launched addressing all ENEN2plus partners to allow for the completion of the VET data through information on further courses for critical jobs. The VET database was partially updated. A quantitative analysis of VET offer was carried out to fine tune the data from task 4.1 and to ease the selection of VET cases for demonstration.
A job code analysis was performed, and the used taxonomy was unified with the one of the EHRO- N.

WP5 – Mobility schemes for nuclear talents
The results are within expectations. The individual grants dispersed in the 15 two-month batches (16th currently in evaluation) have depleted the available funds and have been recently discontinued.
The remaining budget of about 400.000 € (of 2.500.000€) is devoted mostly to the events to be organized by the ENEN# project, and, to support about 10 more events organized by other nuclear stakeholders in EU.
The second (and last) Revision of the mobility manual, incorporating lessons learned during the first two years of the operation of the mobility scheme has been developed and published.
The link with the OFFERR project is established. The evaluation and selection processes of both projects differ substantially, which probably makes simultaneous applications at both projects challenging for applicants and organizers.
The mobility support obtained from ENEN and the infrastructure access support from OFFERR are considered advantages in both evaluation processes.

• A detailed overview of European human resources in the nuclear field (current needs, gaps and future prospects) was developed and submitted to the PO. This assessment is divided into three parts: for the nuclear industry; for the research, safety, and waste management; for the non-energy applications.
• Higher number of nuclear talents will be achieved through dedicated career related events and competitions for high school pupils and teachers, students (BSc, MSC, PhD), postdocs and lifelong learners. Multiple events were organized and they are fully described in the submitted reports.
• A strong mobility program will support over 100 person-years of nuclear career enhancing experience to about 1.000 learners with over 2,5 million EUR.
• Cross-border and cross-disciplinary mobility within and beyond EU will be promoted in cooperation with JRC, OECD/NEA and partners from USA, Canada, China, Korea and Japan.
• A single hub will be established to provide information on available educational, training and job opportunities.
• Appropriate connections with the complementary projects facilitating access to research infrastructures will be maintained.
• A centralized platform with coherent information on vocational training programs, developed during the project, will be established.

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Periodic Reporting for period 2 - ENEN2plus (Building European Nuclear Competence through continuous Advanced and Structured Education and TrainingActions)

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