EA’S KNOCKOUT INITIATIVE TO ADDRESS SKILLS SHORTFALL
In March, EA announced the start of not one but two educational partnerships. The first with Ukie’s Digital Schoolhouse, the other with EVERFI in the UK. The aim: to bring the spheres of education and industry closer together. Richie Shoemaker spoke with EA’s Chris Bruzzo and EVERFI’s Jemmi Best to see how things were moving along
L Chris Bruzzo
ate last year, a group of technology leaders informed the government that it had a duty to narrow a persistent skills gap that was costing
the economy £1.5 billion a year to plug. Simultaneously launching its Engineering Kids’ Future campaign, the Institution of Engineering and Technology (IET) estimated that the shortfall in STEM sector workers was currently over 173,000, equivalent to ten vacant positions per UK business. Unsurprising, half of those companies were experiencing acute skill shortages when recruiting. The scale of the shortfall proves it has not been
brought about by COVID or Brexit – although neither will have helped. Indeed, according to the IET, the STEM skills gap has been widening for 15 years, meaning any solution would need to address every tier of primary and secondary school education. Only by establishing and maintaining appropriate and practical long-term skills learning, we are told, could the UK hope to fully compete.
30 | MCV/DEVELOP May 2022
Businesses and other institutions have of course
been aware of the shortfall for some time, with many implementing or cooperating in initiatives that address arrears specific to their industry. EA is one such company, having worked with EVERFI in North America since 2015 to deliver its cloud-based Play to Learn course, which has so far reached more than 16,000 students. Its success has led EA to recently launching Play to Learn in the UK, targeting 11-14 year olds. A simultaneous partnership with Digital Schoolhouse is targeting dozens of primary schools. A drop in the ocean, perhaps, but if the initiatives continue as they’ve started, more will undoubtedly follow.
What have been the practicalities and difficulties in establishing these two initiatives? Chris Bruzzo: We launched our partnerships with EVERFI and Digital Schoolhouse to help a new generation of talent discover the fun, challenge and
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