FP Euskadi wins gold at Euroskills 2023

• FP Euskadi has won first place in the "CAD Mechanical Design" category of the Euroskills 2023 championship in which VET students compete

FP Euskadi has won a gold medal in the Euroskills 2023 championship. The competition known as the "Vocational Training Olympics" was held in Poland with the participation of students from 32 European countries. Garikoitz Mujika Gutierrez, a student at the La Salle Berrozpe centre in Andoain, stood out by coming first in the “CAD mechanical design” category.  Students from Belgium and Portugal followed him on the podium in this category.

Basque participation was completed by the couple Adrián Arellano, a student at the Tolosaldea Integrated VET Centre, and Emma Vélez García, a student at the Integrated VET Centre in Ciudad Jardín (Vitoria-Gasteiz), who competed in the “Network Systems Administration” category.

Euroskills 2023 was held in the Polish city of Gdansk between September 5 and 9. It is the largest professional education and skills excellence event in Europe, held every two years. Organized by WorldSkills Europe together with 32 member countries, it brings together hundreds of young people who aspire to become the best in Europe in the skill or discipline related to the VET cycle they study.

To reach the Polish Euroskills event, these students have previously had to obtain gold at EuskoSkills and later at SpainSkills, something that very few achieve at European level. After the two previous golds achieved in the competitions held in Irún and Madrid, the Basque students representatives have not stopped training, with the full involvement and dedication of their teachers.

Promotion of Vocational Training in the Basque Country too

The participation of the Basque Country developed from the celebration of Euskoskills, organised by the Vice Ministry of Vocational Training, part of the Department of Education, that was held last May. During the competition, participating students had to demonstrate their skills and abilities typical of the training cycle they were studying, by taking several tests over the course of a day and a half. A total of 250 students from 48 VET centres in the Basque Country gathered at the event hosted by Ficoba (Irún) for two days, competing in 28 categories of the "VET Olympics".

The main objective of this initiative is to promote, through championships, an awareness of the essential contribution that skills and high levels of competence make to the achievement of professional success, as well as to personal fulfilment. In turn, the EuskoSkills Championship is a magnificent opportunity to promote Vocational Training and its diversity of professional families in Basque society. Participation in these “VET Olympics” is also extra motivation for students in their studies, becoming an ideal forum to establish relationships and coexist with students from other schools in the Basque Country.