The study seeks to identify international best practices for the promotion of STEAM education in primary, secondary and high school from the university level.

Naider has collaborated with Innobasque (Basque Innovation Agency) in the development of a benchmarking to identify initiatives aimed at promoting STEAM education in primary, secondary and high school and that somehow pivot around the university environment. In this way, the aim is that the study serves as inspiration and guidance for the development of the plan for the promotion of STEAM education from the university level.

It also seeks to contribute to the STEAM-STEAM Euskadi Education strategy that has been developed since 2017 and to all the initiatives that have been promoted to date (STEAM Euskadi Sariak awards, the STEAM Sare network or the STEAM Euskadi Topaketak conferences among others).

The study has focused its search on the European continent, but has not ruled out other territories in the world where there may be initiatives of interest to the Basque Country. In addition, we have tried to identify initiatives launched by the universities themselves or “singular initiatives” and also examples of educational policy design at the territorial level.

In total, 25 projects/initiatives have been identified, which in turn have been classified into six categories, depending on the field they affect. The categories identified were Public Policies, Creation of New Entities, STEAM Education Research, Teacher Training, Projects for Schools and Professional Guidance.

Through a joint working group formed by Innobasque, Euskampus, the Department of Education of the Basque Government and Naider, nine initiatives of special interest for the Basque Country have been prioritized according to their different characteristics.

Once prioritized, an interview process has been carried out with the people responsible for the initiatives to investigate and learn about different aspects of them. The result has been the elaboration of detailed files on the selected initiatives that include aspects such as their operation, governance, financing model, results obtained or their applicability in the Basque Country, among others.