Europe’s transition towards a digital and circular economy is not just a technological shift, it is a human one. It requires a workforce that can continuously adapt, reskill, and build new competences across disciplines. However, current education systems are still largely structured around rigid degree pathways, making it difficult to support flexible and scalable upskilling. At the same time, micro-credentials are gaining traction as a promising solution, yet their limited integration with formal education reduces their long-term value. Within this context, this paper addresses this gap by focusing on interoperability between micro-credentials and accredited degree programmes, rather than proposing new learning models. It argues that the key challenge is not the availability of flexible learning formats, but their alignment and recognition within a coherent educational system. Drawing on European frameworks such as ECTS and EQF, the paper explores how modular learning units can be structured, accumulated, and transferred across different educational contexts. The findings suggest that interoperability is a system-level design issue, requiring alignment between skills, curriculum, and credit systems to enable scalable and lifelong upskilling pathways across Europe.

The rapid transition toward a circular economy (CE) requires not only new curricula for students, but also systematic capacity building for trainers who design, deliver, and assess such curricula. While CE education has expanded significantly in higher education (HE) and vocational education and training (VET), insufficient attention has been paid to the structured preparation of trainers themselves. CE teaching is inherently interdisciplinary, competence-oriented, and practice- based, demanding from trainers not only subject-matter expertise but also innovative pedagogical skills and the ability to design and evaluate learning outcomes aligned with sustainability transitions. This paper addresses this gap by proposing the development and pilot validation of a structured Train-the-Trainers (TtT) methodology for CE education within the CERES European project. Employing a design-based research approach, the methodology integrates European qualification standards, modular instructional design, staged certification, and active learning strategies to equip trainers from higher education (HE) and vocational education and training (VET) institutions. Empirical validation with 18 trainers across five European countries assessed methodological coherence, instructional clarity, and perceived applicability. Results indicate high satisfaction with course structure, content alignment, and pedagogical support, while highlighting areas for refinement, including explicit framing of learning objectives and calibration of content density. The study demonstrates that systematic trainer development enhances scalability, quality assurance, and sustainability of CE curricula and provides a transferable framework applicable to other thematic domains. Findings underscore the strategic value of formalized trainer pathways for educational innovation, bridging policy frameworks, professional standards, and institutional capacity building. Future research should assess long-term effectiveness and scalability through longitudinal, cross-regional studies using objective performance metrics, enabling the methodology to evolve into a generalizable framework for educational innovation.

The accelerating green and digital transitions require learners to develop integrated competences that combine sustainability awareness, digital fluency, and responsible engagement with emerging technologies. Although the European Sustainability Competence Framework (GreenComp) and the latest DigComp 3.0 (2025) provide robust European reference models for sustainability and digital competence, they are often implemented as separate domains. This paper proposes a unified competence framework that integrates GreenComp and DigComp 3.0 through AI-enhanced learning environments. The proposed model aligns sustainability values, systems thinking, futures literacy, and action competence with data literacy, collaboration, content creation, safety, and digital problem solving. Artificial intelligence acts as the pedagogical integration layer by enabling adaptive learning, intelligent feedback, predictive simulations, generative creativity, and learning analytics. The framework supports curriculum design, teacher professional development, interdisciplinary learning, and competence assessment across multiple educational contexts. The study contributes a coherent educational architecture that bridges sustainability competence, digital competence, and AI literacy for ethically responsible participation in the green and digital transition.

This study investigates the interconnectedness between circular economy and deep technologies. Research papers and Horizon project have been reviewed for the last 5 years to determine deep technologies enables for circular economy. Leximancer software has been used to identify dominant concepts, clusters, and their relationships. The results show circular economy as the central hub, strongly connected to technologies and data-driven enablers such as IoT and AI, alongside prominent pathways related to waste management, value chains, and industrial practices. Additional clusters highlight batteries, machine learning, and automation, as well as blockchain enabled transparency and traceability. Overall, the findings provide an integrative overview of where deep technologies most clearly support circular economy strategies and indicate priority directions for future research and implementation.