TIROCINI FORMATIVI ALL’ESTERO con il programma ERASMUS+

Intervento: EXmo – Excellence on the MOve

Sede di svolgimento: Spagna, Francia, Malta

Durata dell’intervento: 32 giorni

Settore di riferimento: industriale, artigianale, agricolo, turistico-alberghiero

Posti disponibili: 48

Destinatari: studenti dai 16 ai 18 anni frequentanti il terzo anno dei percorsi di formazione e istruzione professionale nelle città di Alba, Bra e Asti 

Certificazione:

Certificato Europass Mobilità 

Riconoscimento ECVET delle competenze acquisite nei percorsi formativi dei partecipanti

Costo complessivo del corso:

Gratuito - finanziato dal programma comunitario Erasmus+

Programma del progetto:

160 ore di stage curricolare

Tirocinio in azienda, non retribuito

Modalità di partecipazione: Gli interessati all’iniziativa partecipano a un bando di selezione promosso da Apro Formazione. (clicca qui per scaricare il bando)

Dopo aver letto attentamente il bando, se vuoi partecipare, clicca qui per inviarci la tua candidatura

The partnership was formed in the Leonardo da Vinci Contact Seminar The discovery of the professional world: a tool for pupil's guidance, organised by the French National Agency of the LLP Programme in the month of November 2008 at Bordeaux. 
The partners defined together the project aims, objectives and activities to develop in order to cope a series of common problems pointed out in the Contact Seminar. The partners left Bordeaux with a first agreement on the project framework. The Italian partner took over the coordination of the partnership in the common definition of the project, stricly following the Participative Approach and the Project Cycle Managment techniques. 
The project was submitted to the National Agencies of Italy, Finland, France, Greece, Romania, Poland and Turkey. Every partner got the approval of the project by his National Agency. 
This project has been funded with support from the European Commission. This publication reflects the views only of the author, and the Commission cannot be held responsible for any use which may be made of the information contained therein.
The partners started to develop the project in the month of September. Summary of the project:
The target groups of the project are the students in Initial Vocational Training (including special needs students), the guidance operators and the trainers of the partners. The main problem expressed by the target groups is the poor passion for the job demonstrated by the students involved in initial vocational training. 
The objective of the project Co-building a good guidance is to improve personal development, employability and preparation of the students for integration into the Labour Market. In order to reach the purpose of the project, three results have to be achieved: to improve motivation and involvement of the pupils in guidance and training; to improve skills/tools/materials of the trainers for a better guidance; to improve gender equity in guidance.

The partnership defined three strategies to achieve the expected results: 
- 1st strategy: training of the partners staff; wider analysis about problems and difficulties of guidance in VET; sharing of a common method of work;
- 2nd strategy: inventory of tools/instruments/regulations/local partnerships of guidance in VET;
- 3rd strategy: international contest about guidance; definition of a common method to describe professions.

Problems and difficulties

The partnership wants to solve a series of problems analysed with the students, trainers, guidance operators of the participating schools in the focus groups and interviews carried out by each partner.
 

The main problem to cope is the poor passion for the job demonstrated by the students involved in initial vocational training, which is caused by their lack of motivation when they had to choose the training career, mostly because of guidance errors. Sometime the pupils receive a wrong guidance. The causes appeared to be linked with the criteria of evaluation of the possibilities of the students, which are mainly based on the progress at school of the students. When the students finish the lower secondary school, they usually know in which school they should go, but they do not know which profession they can do. 
Furthermore, it is difficult to interact with the students for the guidance operators of the upper secondary schools because it is difficult to find and develop specific tools for guidance settled for each target of students. With the students with special needs the guidance plays an important role as they are moving towards the transition to the vocational education. The guidance at comprehensive school gets often continuation in form of the preparatory education lasting from one year to even two years. Otherwise, it is difficult to organise individual meetings with students. There is not school time scheduled for this purpose. 
It is hard to organise guidance in the classrooms because the expressed needs vary from student to student. For this reason, it is not easy to involve each student in the guidance activities. Every partner expressed a common problem concerning the different levels of participation and motivation of the students of each class. While some students participate to the proposed activities, another part of the class is not interested. Furthermore, the pedagogical approach, used in the individual meetings, cannot be used in the classroom. 
The students do not have enough information about: the training profiles, the risks of the professions and the criteria of selection of the job. They have a wrong perception of some job because many professions are subject to stereotypes and prejudices.  The trainers do not guide girls and boys in the same way. They do not encourage them when they would like to choose a job which is made traditionnally by the other sex. 
The students reject guidance because it is diffult to understand the offer and the channels of guidance. There is a difficulty to know the services of guidance of the territory and in some area of the partnership there is a poor diffusion of them.
The students find difficult to imagine what they want to do in their future because they do not know their personal wishes/attitudes, having a poor attitude to analyse themselves. They  do not will to play the game  because the  tools/instruments used in the guidance activities are not very effective. 
The guidance with special needs students phases similar challenges. More intensive, personalized and holistic approach to guidance and assistance in the second transition would carry the student to the next level i.e. to vocational studies. The risk in the transition phase is that students (mainstream or special needs students) drop out entirely from school. 
Furthermore, the families do not stimulate their pupils and sometimes they are not interested in the school progress of their sons. 
The problems analysed in the guidance sector have a strong influence also in the didactic field, analysed by the partners but not included in the partnership activities which focus mainly in guidance. The poor passion for the job makes more difficult to involve the students in the classroom and laboratories activities, improving the difficulties to make classes for the trainers.

Objectives

The specific objective (purpose) of the partnership is to improve personnel development, employability and preparation of the students for integration into the Labour Market.

In order to reach the purpose of the project, three results have to be achieved: to improve motivation and involvement of the pupils in guidance and training; to improve skills/tools/materials of the trainers for a better guidance; to improve gender equity in guidance.
 

The achievement of the objectives and results of the project leads, as general objectives, to the improvement of the  involvement in training of the students and to the improved quality of the school environment of teaching.

The main aim of training students with special need is to increase their ability to complete their activities with the minimum help of the staff and to work as part of a team for their integration.

Short term impact:

The project wants to have a direct impact on the participants involved in the partnership and an indirect impact over the local communities, trainers, families and students not involved in the partnership's activities.

The schools involved in the partnership gained the following direct benefits:

- innovation in the guidance practices;

- improving the school climate;

- raising the number of students;

- increasing popularity in the local community and strengthening the school image;

- increasing the number of partnerships at local, regional, national and international level;

- raising the continue need to upgrade the quality of education and training;

- improving the European dimension of the school;

- increase interest for combating poverty an social exclusion;

- increase interest to promote creativity.

The partners shared the tools/instruments/methods of guidance among themselves. The guidance operators and the trainers improved their skills and find different materials/methods to use for a better guidance of the pupils.

The benefits of the guidance operators and trainers can be described as follow:

- readiness to work in interdisciplinary teams;

- improving the motivation towards the work of the guidance operator/trainer;

- improve the knowledge in the professional guidance domain;

- exchange of good practices;

- analysis of bad practices with a critical approach;

- acquire knowledge about school education in different European countries;

- continue training for guidance operators and trainers involved;

- increase interest for combating poverty an social exclusion;

- increase interest to stimulate students' creativity;

- to reduce the inadequacy between pupils' job's representation and the reality

Furthermore, the partners exchanged the education and guidance knowledge and experience with their European colleagues. The definition of a common tool/instrument to be used in guidance enhances the benefits of the students and the guidance operators involved in the project.

The students improved their personality, motivation and preparation for their integration into the Labour Market due to the participative approach used to involve them in the project activities. The strategies developed by the project improved their involvement in guidance and training in the following dimensions:

- increasing the passion for the job;

- learning to learn;

- improving sense of initiative;

- raising cultural awareness and expression;

- raising motivation for learning;

- upgrading of skills;

- knowledge and awareness of different cultures;

- improve intercultural awareness;

- deal with diversity;

- enhancement of interest in foreign languages;

- improving language proficiency in English;

- improving knowledge about European Union;

- raising self-confidence;

- increase the social competencies;

- improve the knowledge about the characteristic of each job described by the project;

- increase interest for combating poverty an social exclusion;

- improve creativity.

Mid term impact

If the objectives of the project will be achieved, it will be possible to submit similar small projects to Local Authorities (Municipalities, Provinces, Regions) requiring funds from their turnover to spread the results on different beneficiaries on their territories. (From small project to small projects).

Long term impact

On the base of the results achieved by the project, it will be possible to keep on promoting the innovative approach of guidance developed by the partnership. Actually, Public Authorities responsible for setting up programmes of intervention in the guidance field should be interested in promoting the approach at an upper level, by transforming the innovative tool experimented in the project into an “ordinary tool”, available for other users, implementers, operators and everybody interested in. (From project to programme).

Activities

The partnership defined three different strategies to achieve the objectives and to solve the selected problems. The partnership worked on the four dimensions of guidance: formative, informative, counselling, inclusion into the labour market. While each partner works direcly on the formative guidance, the other three sectors of guidance are developed in cooperation with the local partners of each school. 
The two partners from Finland and Greece worked on the same subjects of the entire partnership focusing on special need guidance and how these more intensive guidance practises and methods could be adjusted and utilised with mainstream students.  
The partnership planned 7 international meetings. The first two meetings were divided in two parts: a formative/training section and a project implementation section. The other meetings were defined to manage and evaluate the project, while the final conference took place in the final meeting.

Each partner developed the analysis of the problems and difficulties of the guidance means and instruments used inside his vocational school, involving students, trainers, guidance operators. The analysis focused mainly on the good and “bad” practices developed by each partner in order to find out what is working properly andwhat is not working properly in guidance. The analysis was carried out with focus groups, interviews and researches of available documents. Non-stop communication among the partners and the coordinator was essential in order to check and monitor the development of the planned activities and to point out difficulties when they spring out.

The state of work of the partnership was evaluated in the second meeting with groups of work and plenary meetings. In the second meeting the partners' staff received an advanced training on Project Cycle Managment. The partners learnt how to elaborate the data collected into the problems and objectives trees, the Logical Framework Matrix, the Strategy Analysis. The training enabled the partners to enhance the quality of the analysis following the European Commission method of work. 

Final results of the analysis

The second strategy improved the know-how about the means, instruments, regulations, local partnership used in the guidance activities of each partner.

The regulations of the Public Authorities and the organisation of the local partners who are working on guidance with each school were shared among the partners in the meetings. A specific working group was settled for this purpose. The partners shared the material using a critical approach, focusing on the good and “bad” practices developed by each regional/local system in order to find out what is working and what isnot working properly and to propose possible improvements.

 In the first meeting (implementation section), the partners defined the criteria needed to set up the inventory of tools and instruments used in the guidance activities. The approach used by the partners included meetings, working groups, laboratories, workshops and the presentation of the work done in the final plenary session.

The inventory prepared by each partner is available in the partner page of the internet site, while the partnership inventory can be downloaded here.

The first two strategies allowed the partners to share material and information about guidance in VET; to share a common method of work for the project managers, the guidance operators and trainers; to start working in team for the achievement of the project results.

The third strategy, developed in the second year of the project, allowed the staff of the partners to work for the definition of new common products of guidance in VET; to cointinue working in team for the achievement of the project results.

The third strategy enhanced the cooperation among the partners and the students of each school with the launch of the international contest about guidance "Steps to my future".

The students of each partner, in cooperation with the guidance and training staff, developed tools/instruments for the description of a profession in a specific sector using the visual arts (photography, video, posters, presentations, sculpture) as a mean of expression, creating innovative material to be used in the guidance activities of the partners.

In the fourth meeting the partners defined the regulations of the contest and prepared the information material for the launch of the initiative. The partners set up a specific didactic unit to assure the active involvement and participation of the training staff of each school into the preparatory and implementation activities of the contest. The partners prepared the material in the working groups, workshops and laboratories hold in the meeting. 

Since the beginning of the preparatory activities, the partners shared the material with the internet platform settled up for this purpose.

Once the students have done the new tools/istruments, the partnership analysed the method of definition of each new tool/instrument in the fifth and sixth meetings, in order to prepare a scheme of the steps needed to set it up. As a result of the work done with the methods, the partnership defined three guidelines to carry out the project in:
- curricula activities
- extra curricula activities
- special needs education activities

In the seventh and last meeting the partnership showed the presentation of the project results, the news tools/instruments developed by the students, the common tool/instrument defined by the partnership, the winners of the international contest. The final conference is going to take place the 19th May 2011.

The winner of the international contest "Steps to my future" is the group of students of the italian partner, with the following product:

Profession description: Mechanics

Have a look at the other profession descriptions in our YouTube Channel or in the Partners pages of the website. 

Follow up

The partners started to think about the possible follow up of the partnership project in other projects:

Leonardo da Vinci

- possibility to develop a Transfer of Innovation, having the analysis to be shared as a starting point of the project, sharing the methodology used to carry our the analysis and international contest in order to spread the project activities:

1. to other Countries

2. at regional level

3. any school of learning disabilities

4. others sectors

5. other vocational centres

6. at national level

7. other educational levels (VET, schools, Universities, etc.)

Application: 1 coordinator apply for the whole partnership to his own National Agency

- possibility to develop Development of Innovation, starting from the Inventory à exchanging tools among the partners in order to build/develop a common evaluation grid fro the tools à exchanging then tools à translating them à trying them à evaluation à build new ones

Application: 1 coordinator apply for the whole partnership to the European Commission

- possibility to develop unilateral VET.PRO Mobility projects in order to send abroad the trainers, guidance operators, staff of each partner according to the needs revealed within the analysis carried out with the partnership project, trying to solve their problems and difficulties

Application: every partner apply for his own mobilities to his own National Agency

Comenius Regio

- possibility to set up partnership between 2 Countries/Regions (minimum 3 partners) in order to work on common areas

Other project ideas:

- possibility to exchange good practices among the partners, working also on the recognition and validation of the learning results of INFORMAL, NON FORMAL, FORMAL learning results

Any partner interested to take part in the follow up of the Co Building a Good Guidance partnership can contact the partner of his own Country or the coordinator (Formazione Professionale Alba Barolo s.c.a.r.l.) at the contacts of each partner page. 

The intent to plan the TOI starts from the results achieved by the LdV Partnership project “Co-Building a Good Guidance”, awarded by the European Commission with the “Star Project 2011” label. 

The main problem analysed by the partners reveal how the students have problems to find appropriate jobs after the end of their studies. The students don't know what to do in the future and express fear to enter in the labour market. The main cause of these problems is the poor motivation of the students. A part of the target group would like to change training because the present training is not appropriate for them after a while. Furthermore, they express a general fear of not finding a job, a condition that increase their confusion about the training they are following. 

The project purpose is to improve the motivation for school of the students. In order to achieve the project purpose two main results must be achieved : decreased number of students that would like to change training and increased ability to think about career choice. The achievement and sustainability in time of the purpose can lead to the following general objectives for the students: decreased drop out, decreased problems of finding appopriate jobs, improving their insertion in the labour market; reducing fear to enter in the labour market; improved knowledge of their future career and quality of life, taking in account the respective situation of girls, of boys and both.
The italian applicant organisation coordinated the Partnership Project that generated the transferable guidance method and instruments. The Romanian Inspectorates of Education, the French international centre of education of Montpellier, the Dutch regional training centre Noorderpoort, the Latvian special boarding school development centre and the Conference for adult lifelong learning of southern Switzerland participate in the transfer of the method as core-partners. The EDU-VET Institutions of the italian and french partners support their work in the dissemination, exploitation, and sustainability of the project.
The partners involve in the project 87 schools in 5 Countries for a total amount of 2.955 students attending their 2nd year of professional and vocational training in 35 different training sectors. The project leads to the description of 35 professions made by the students with the transferred innovative method of guidance. The preliminary analysis and the experimentation of the transfer in a sample of schools anticipate the geographical and sartorial transfer of the method in the participating Countries. Students improve their transversal and key competences thanks to the transferred method. 

The partners are going to exploit the project results and deliverables for three training years after the project end. The EDU-VET Institutions and the stakeholders network of each partner are going to disseminate and exploit the project in their territories in cooperation with the partners.

You can find all information, products and results of the TOI project in the ADAM database.