About the Project
DIRECT unites EU partners to embed digital responsibility into learning, work and tech innovation across Europe.
about us
Empowering Responsible Digital Futures
DIRECT is an Erasmus+ alliance that unites universities, VET providers, research centres and policy actors to embed Digital Responsibility into learning, work and society. We co-create a competence framework, open resources, an online platform and pilot courses that blend ethical insight with practical AI innovation. Our goal: empower people to shape tech for good.
Uniting education, industry and research to turn ethical principles into actionable digital skills.
Join us on our journey to ensure AI and digital innovation serve people, planet and prosperity—responsibly.
PROJECT VISION
A Comprehensive Approach to Digital Responsibility
Digital Responsibility (DR) is a recently emerged concept that highlights the values, norms and principles that guide organizations and individuals in the ethical design, development, implementation, and use of digital technologies. Far from being abstract, ethical issues of the widespread digitalization are already impacting our everyday lives in private and professional contexts.
The DIRECT project aims to address the pressing need for a systematic, inclusive, and accessible approach to Digital Responsibility (DR) education and training. As digital technologies become deeply embedded in all aspects of life and work, there is an urgent demand for both developers and end-users to possess the competences needed to engage ethically, critically, and sustainably with these technologies. Current frameworks and educational offerings on digital responsibility remain fragmented, often limited to technical domains, and lack the concreteness and adaptability required by decision-makers and small and medium-sized enterprises. Moreover, existing EU competence frameworks only partially reflect the societal and environmental dimensions of digital responsibility, leaving a significant gap in addressing the broader impact of digitalization.
The DIRECT project responds to these challenges by developing a validated and comprehensive digital responsibility competence framework, supported by a flexible, case-based learning approach, enabling individual learners and educators to pursue tailored learning pathways, fostering digital responsibility self-efficacy and supporting the development of ethical, inclusive, and responsible digital practices across sectors.
