Mundus celebrates the arrival of a group of Nigerian students in Zaragoza for a one-month training stay at SAAM's partner centre: CPIFP Corona de Aragón.

This week, and for the first time in history, a group of Nigerian Vocational Training students landed in Spain with a scholarship to complete a month of training in their specialty (mechanics and engineering). Thanks to SAAM Mobility, 8 Nigerian students, accompanied by a teacher from their center (Jobitech), will spend a month training at CPIFP Corona de Aragon while discovering the city of Zaragoza and the Spanish culture with the help of the VET center and Mundus.

The SAAM project, with San Viator as promoter and coordinated by Mundus, fosters mobility for Vocational Training between Africa and Europe. Specifically, 16 African countries and 8 European countries. After two years of hard work and excellent collaboration between the 35 partners participating in the project, student mobility is now a reality. During the first two years, the work of the SAAM team has consisted of getting to know the reality of the centers and the VET system in the African partner countries. The European teachers have traveled to Africa to discover first-hand how they teach the educational programs for each of the 3 specialties on which SAAM focuses: engineering, agriculture and hospitality-tourism. And, also, African VET professionals have made stays in European centers to learn how an international department of a school works.

The first student mobility took place in August this year. Tunisian students completed a month-long training in Finland. After this experience, students from Cabo Verde have arrived in Azores (Portugal) and now this group from Nigeria has already started their mobility in Spain. These are the first of many combinations that will continue until 2024 and that the SAAM partners hope will continue once the project is finished. The desire of the partnership is that in the future this possibility will be opened to all VET centers interested in an experience in the neighboring continent for any speciality.

Mundus and the SAAM team are confident that this Nigeria-Spain mobility will be, like all SAAM experiences, much more than just one-month training experience. The goal is that during this time they also discover the culture, language and customs of the country that welcomes them, in this case Spain. For this reason, they will also enjoy cultural visits and recreational activities that complement the hours of training in their specialty at the VET center.

The first of these activities took place yesterday in the Mundus office. Sergio Lagarde, technical coordinator of SAAM, organized a workshop in which the students and the teacher were able to explain their fears, their expectations and everything they have to offer during their mobility. At the end of the session, they were also shown the most touristic places in the city and some monuments that they cannot miss. A good way to break the ice and gradually get to know the human team behind the project.

To know more about the project, visit the official project website: saam.global/