The Association of Vocational Education and Training Centres FPEmpresa and Grupo Esprinet held the awards ceremony for the 5th edition of the VET Knowledge Transfer Awards on Tuesday, 9 June, at V-Valley Academy. The event once again highlighted the ability of Vocational Education and Training students to identify challenges in their surroundings and transform them into technical solutions with a real impact.
The event brought together representatives from FPEmpresa, Grupo Esprinet and the award-winning centres, from La Rioja, Valencia, Murcia and Catalonia. They all shared the same starting point: using the knowledge acquired in the classroom to respond to specific social challenges, ranging from health and accessibility to digital violence and sustainability.
A total of 64 projects from 44 educational centres across Spain took part in this fifth edition, a figure that consolidates the growth of a call aimed at connecting VET with the productive sector and with today’s social challenges. In addition, the videos submitted by the teams exceeded 84,000 views and 22,000 likes, also reflecting the interest generated among the educational community and the general public.
The VET Knowledge Transfer Awards, promoted by FPEmpresa and Grupo Esprinet, seek to foster technical and transversal skills among students, as well as to promote gender equality in professional fields where female presence remains a minority. Since their creation, the awards have encouraged projects aligned with the Sustainable Development Goals, with special attention to SDG 5, focused on gender equality.
Solutions from the classroom to real life
The first prize, worth 5,000 euros, went to Centro Sagrado Corazón – Jesuitas Logroño, in La Rioja, for a project addressing the recovery of women who have overcome breast cancer after a mastectomy. The students designed a low-cost functional exoskeleton, manufactured using 3D printing, with the aim of facilitating arm rehabilitation and helping to improve patients’ quality of life.
The second prize, worth 3,300 euros, recognised CIPFP Misericordia, in Valencia, for a proposal focused on the rise of cyberbullying, sextortion and other forms of digital violence. Their project proposes an interactive device located in private spaces to offer immediate and confidential support, information and guidance to those who may need it.
The two third prizes, worth 1,850 euros each, went to IES Gerardo Molina, in Torre-Pacheco, and Institut Escola del Treball, in Barcelona. The centre from Murcia developed a solution to improve the accessibility of domestic electrical panels for women with visual impairments or reduced mobility, through tactile Braille labelling and mobile phone alerts. For its part, the Catalan centre designed a reusable menstrual cup with a sensory ring capable of indicating changes in pH through colour variations, as a more sustainable alternative to traditional menstrual hygiene products.
Beyond the financial recognition, the awards highlight the joint work of students, teachers and educational centres. The prizes are distributed among the centre, the teaching team and the participating students, thus reinforcing the importance of collaboration and educational support in the development of innovative projects.
The awards ceremony also served to showcase how Vocational Education and Training can become a space from which to think, create and test useful solutions for society. Each of the award-winning projects combines a technical approach with a human concern: improving medical recovery, offering support in situations of digital violence, promoting autonomy at home or seeking more sustainable alternatives for female intimate health.
With this fifth edition, the VET Knowledge Transfer Awards continue to consolidate themselves as an initiative that brings companies closer to the classroom and demonstrates the potential of VET to generate applied innovation, young talent and concrete responses to today’s challenges.
