Multi-stakeholder ecosystems in rapidly changing educational environments

This short paper will describe two cases of educational ecosystems created to help educational institutions best adapt their teaching and learning materials to rapidly changing high school/academia/industry environments. The EduNano National TEMPUS project and the Horizons 2020 Up2University (UP2U) project both represent cases in which collaboration between industry, universities and high schools facilitates rapid response to constantly changing conditions. First, we describe how, in both cases, working together for mutual benefit can enable all stakeholders to adapt more effectively to the challenges of change. We show how similar mutual dependencies and shared interests emerge from different configurations of high-school - university - industry in both projects. Next, we discuss some essential conditions that need to be in place in order for stakeholders to overcome their traditional tendencies to work as isolated entities, instead of as mutually dependent parts of the same ecosystem. Finally, we conclude with some essential prerequisites and `lessons learned' from both projects to help other educational ecosystems find their way forward and formulate their own rapid-response roadmaps for optimal adaption to changing conditions.