Work-related experience for students has become more and more popular and important for any increased future employability. The project aims to provide post-16 Language students in Spain/Germany/England to gain invaluable insight into the European job market by completing a week-long work placement in a local business of the host country as well as increase their linguistic skills, which will benefit them in their exams and encourage the study of languages beyond A -level . Each school is looking to send up to two staff with ten post-16 students (in case of the English school they will include 10 students for Spanish and 10 for German) on the work placement visits and will seek to accommodate the students in private housing on an exchange stay basis, or, where necessary, in alternative appropriate accommodation. This work experience will be carried out in 2015 and 2016, thus implying the participation of 80 students in the mobilities. The fact of repeating the work experience has the clear aim of improving the collaboration system with the companies, as well as having the opportunity to compare results and analyse them. The main activities will involve: work experience placement in Germany/Spain/England for one week in local businesses, completion of a variety of tasks within each company under the close supervision of a dedicated member of staff, completion of a log book by the students about their experiences each day, meetings with staff in the companies to discuss educational and cultural particularities and differences between the countries, educational and cultural visits to local attractions in the evening and at weekend, monitoring and evaluation meetings during and after the visits. Students will also learn about the language at work, necessary skills to write a CV, European standards related to academic recognition, and the differences among the educational systems of the partners involved, so as to broaden their knowledge and make them aware of the importance of getting to know other systems to gain confidence and attain success. Before the Work Experience experience all the post 16 students will have the opportunity to acquire language and employability skills as they will be taught about how to do research of a foreign company, how to manage in a work experience abroad, etc. as we pretend that the project has an impact in as many students as possible, not only those participating in the mobilities. The work-experience project will improve students’ linguistic skills, their interpersonal skills and their awareness of the international employment market. During the project students will practise their CV writing skills in a foreign language, they will improve their research skills of foreign companies, improve their interpersonal skills when communicating with the foreign employers and their host families and will gain vital working skills in a foreign company. All of this will impact positively on the students’ exam results and increase their employability in the future. The expected long-term benefit would be a successful work-related project between the three partner schools sustained in the future which will impact on the whole-school and local community. The post-16 provision in each school will be enhanced and lead to a wider appreciation of language learning in a global world. The Guideline for both students and teachers about how to start a work experience at school and why might be useful tool for our schools, and we hope that also for other schools in Europe, who are willing to start such an experience. The school material developed for the didactic unit may also proof to be of great value, and it can be improved every time it is used at any school. The project will also have an impact on the local businesses’ exposure within the wider (European) community through the dissemination and evaluation publications produced by the students upon completion of the project. We would also hope to extend the project to include other countries and partner schools to increase the mobility options of the students. Finally, the name chosen for the project pretends to concentrate the whole spirit of the project: Commuting across Europe for Work Experience (CEWE).
Work-related experience for students has become more and more popular and important for any increased future employability. The project has provided post-16 students in Spain/Germany/England with an invaluable insight into the European job market by completing a week-long work placement in a local company or organisation of the host country which will broaden their knowledge and make them aware of the importance of knowing about other European countries in order to gain confidence in themselves, open their minds to employability possibilities abroad. Moreover, it has also increased their linguistic skills, which will benefit them in their exams and encourage the study of languages beyond A -level. The main activities involved: work experience placement in Germany/Spain/England for one week in local businesses, completion of a variety of tasks within each company under the close supervision of a dedicated member of staff, completion of a log book by the students about their experiences each day, meetings with staff in the companies to discuss educational and cultural particularities and differences between the countries, educational and cultural visits to local attractions in the evening and at weekend, monitoring and evaluation meetings during and after the visits. Students also learned about the language at work, the necessary skills to write a CV, European standards related to academic recognition, and the differences among the educational systems of the partners involved. Before the Work Experience all the post 16 students in the participating schools were given the opportunity to acquire language and employability skills as they were taught about how to do research of a foreign company, how to manage in a work experience abroad, etc. as we pretended that the project had an impact in as many students as possible, not only those participating in the trips. Each participant school sent one or two teachers accompanying a group of students to work placement mobilities (two visits per country) and accommodated the students in private housing on an exchange stay basis. This work experience was carried out in 2015 and 2016, thus implying the participation of 57 students in the mobilities. The fact of repeating the work experience had the clear aim of improving the collaboration system with the companies, as well as having the opportunity to compare results and draw conclusions. We can confirm now that the work-experience project has improved students’ linguistic skills, their interpersonal skills and their awareness of the international employment market. During the project, students practiced their CV writing skills in a foreign language, learned research skills investigating about foreign companies, improved their interpersonal skills when communicating with the foreign employers and their host families, and acquired vital working skills in a foreign company. All of this has impacted positively on the students’ exam results and increased their employability expectancies in the future. The long-term benefit can be said to be a successful work-related project between the three partner schools sustained in the future which will impact on the whole-school and local community. The post-16 education in each school has been enhanced and the project has led to a wider appreciation of language learning and employability skills in a global world. As a partnership we have attained a valuable knowledge about how to start a work experience abroad for under 18 students, and we hope it might be a useful tool for other schools in Europe too, who might be willing to accept the challenge and start such a rewarding experience. The school material developed for the didactic units may also proof to be of great value, and it can be improved every time it is used at any school. These lessons are uploaded in the website so that any school interested may have a look and use them, and they are also visible in the European Platform of Results. Its use in lessons for post-16 students is a guarantee of the sustainability and usefulness of the project outputs. The project has also had an impact on the local businesses’ exposure within the wider (European) community they are included in our website as collaborating entities, and they have been named in press articles and social networks (schools’ facebook, newspaper articles) references to the project. We hope to keep the collaboration with our partners and extend the project in the future, starting a new one which may include other countries, partner schools and companies to increase the mobility opportunities for the students. Finally, the name chosen for the project has proved to summarize the whole spirit of the project: Commuting across Europe for Work Experience (CEWE), along with the logo that we chose so that the main idea of the project was seen in just one image, that is, a European star with interconected dots representing our students commuting for work experience.