20 youths train 450 hours and undertake six-month internships in Puglia, Italy; Sustainability and Corporate Social Responsibility Technician profile approved

Green Cards: from green skills to real-world change

What skills do young people really need to support businesses in their sustainability transition?

This is the question behind Green Cards , a project in Puglia (Italy) that is experimenting with a different way of developing the next generation of sustainability professionals: by connecting young people, professionals, businesses and the local community, and progressively bringing learning closer to practice.

The programme involves 20 young people aged 18 to 30 in 450 hours of training, field-based experiences and a subsequent six-month internship. Yet, while the project is still ongoing, that initial question has already led to an outcome that goes beyond the participants themselves: the experience gained through Green Cards contributed to the work carried out by Project School and AFG, project partner, to define a new professional profile, the “Sustainability and Corporate Social Responsibility Technician” , approved by the Puglia Region in July 2026 and included in its Regional Catalogue of Professional Profiles.

How can a learning experience move beyond the classroom and contribute to change within a regional skills system?

Learning sustainability means putting it into practice

Green Cards starts with training.

Around 20 trainers and professionals guide participants through a multidisciplinary programme combining environmental, social, economic, digital and organisational skills. The aim is not simply to understand sustainability in theory, but to learn how to recognise and apply it within an organisation’s decisions and processes.

During the programme, however, it was the young people themselves who helped shape its direction.

Feedback collected after the different modules showed a clear preference for practical activities. Project School responded by progressively increasing opportunities to apply the skills acquired through team-based project work, meetings with professionals and businesses, and field-based experiences.

Participants therefore did not remain passive recipients of training.

At one point, they independently decided to organise a beach clean-up day, turning what they were learning into concrete action and involving other members of the SouthHub Community , a community promoted by Project School that connects young people, professionals, businesses and organisations to foster exchange, collaboration and concrete action on sustainability.

It was a simple initiative, but one that reflects an important lesson emerging from the project: sustainability becomes meaningful when it stops being something we only talk about and becomes something we can act on together.

When the classroom becomes the territory

The same approach guided the Green Cards’ Spring Lab , a five-day immersive experience dedicated to Sustainability Storytelling , also open to young people from outside the Green Cards programme.

Across Lecce and Brindisi, participants met businesses, organisations and local communities, collected images, testimonies and stories, and worked in teams to turn what they had observed into an editorial project on sustainability.

The process followed a clear sequence: experience, exchange, reflection, storytelling.

In this way, topics addressed during the training became tools for observing organisational choices, engaging with people who work on sustainability every day, and developing participants’ own interpretation of their experience.

One of the most interesting signals came from the external participants themselves: several young people who joined the Spring Lab asked to return for the Summer Lab .

From 14 to 18 September 2026, Green Cards will once again move into the territory with a new Lab dedicated to the Just Transition, combining meetings with businesses, study visits, workshops and a Hackathon in which multidisciplinary teams will work on real challenges related to sustainability and local development.

When young people and businesses choose each other

The relationship with businesses does not begin only at the end of the programme.

Green Cards has maintained an ongoing dialogue with the business community, also through the involvement of Confindustria Puglia, creating opportunities for companies and participants to meet during the training programme and the Green Labs.

Overall, around 20 businesses have been involved in the project through meetings, training activities, Labs and internship pathways.

For the internships, each company identified a role and the characteristics of the profile it was looking for. Young people expressed their preferences and met the companies through individual interviews. Matching was therefore not an automatic placement, but a process of getting to know one another.

And in some cases, something particularly meaningful happened: the young person and the company chose each other .

The result is a set of six-month, 600-hour internship opportunities across 13 businesses in Puglia , designed to bring participants’ aspirations together with real professional needs.

The growth in knowledge and skills developed throughout the programme has emerged both through assessment activities and during interviews with companies. Some participants have already found employment while Green Cards is still ongoing.

These are signs that the transition from training to employment can be designed not as a separate stage, but as part of the same learning process.

From skills to a new professional profile

The interaction between training and the world of work raised a further question: if businesses need these skills, how can we recognise them and make them a lasting part of the territory’s professional system?

Building on the experience gained through Green Cards, Project School and AFG worked on defining a new professional profile.

In July 2026, the Puglia Region officially approved its inclusion in the Regional Catalogue of Professional Profiles: the Sustainability and Corporate Social Responsibility Technician .

The profile supports businesses in integrating ESG principles into their processes, collecting and interpreting data and performance information, sustainability reporting, stakeholder relations and ESG communication.

For Green Cards, this represents a particularly important step.

An educational experience created to address a concrete need shared by businesses and young people has contributed to a process that transformed that need into a professional profile formally recognised at regional level.

This is the pathway Green Cards seeks to build: from education to skills, from skills to professional practice, and from professional practice to institutional change.

A community that continues beyond the course

Skills alone, however, are not enough if the relationships built during a project disappear when the lessons end.

All Green Cards participants have joined the SouthHub Community, which has already started to become a resource that participants themselves can activate.

Some young people have also asked to volunteer at Southstainability , the festival that in October 2026 will bring together young people, businesses, public authorities, professionals, organisations and citizens.

These are signs of participation beginning to extend beyond the formal boundaries of the project: from the course to the community, and from the community to action in the territory.

Green Cards is still ongoing, but some results are already visible.

Participation has remained consistent throughout a demanding 450-hour programme, including among young people balancing it with work or study. Some participants have already found professional opportunities. Businesses continue to support the programme. Several young people who experienced the Spring Lab have asked to join the Summer Lab as well. Participants have started to independently activate the community they are part of.

And the experience has contributed to the process that led to the recognition of a new professional profile at regional level.

These are also the reasons why Project School intends to replicate Green Cards , through future funding opportunities or its own resources, building on the lessons emerging from this first experience.

Because the “green cards” needed to navigate the sustainability transition are not a single skill or qualification.

They are knowledge, experiences, relationships and opportunities to act .

Green Cards was created to equip young people to support businesses in their sustainability transition. It is becoming something more: a space where young people, businesses and institutions can transform sustainability from something to learn into something to do.

And, sometimes, from something we do into something that lasts .

Green Cards: from green skills to real-world change

2.1 | Education for Climate priority

develop green skills and competences

SDG (08) Decent Work and Economic Growth

SDG (11) Sustainable Cities and Communities

SDG (12) Responsible Consumption and Production

SDG (17) Partnerships for the Goals

2.4 | GreenComp: sustainability competence focus

1.1 Valuing sustainability (Embodying Sustainability Values)

1.2 Supporting fairness (Embodying Sustainability Values)

2.1 Systems thinking (Embracing Complexity in Sustainability)

2.2 Critical thinking (Embracing Complexity in Sustainability)

3.1 Futures literacy (Envisioning Sustainable Futures)

3.3 Exploratory thinking (Envisioning Sustainable Futures)

4.2 Collective action (Acting for Sustainability)

4.3 Individual initiative (Acting for Sustainability)

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