Early school leaving is a common issue to most countries in Europe which has severe social, economic and educational consequences. The European Commision aims to reduce dropout figures to 10% by 2020. As this is not an easy task, cooperation between schools, local and regional authorities, and even countries seems a priority. The different educational systems have to find ways to tackle premature school leaving. Since there is a wide range of variables which can even intertwine at times, this needs bringing into light all those discoveries and successful experiences that have already been put into practice all across Europe. Sharing best practice and providing observation among different organizations can help reducing these figures and transferring all those elements that are common to our different regions. In this sense, combining the experience of a teacher training centre in Spain, and two high schools that are commited to tackling dropout, one in Poland and another one in Sweden, can offer a broad perspective on this matter. This Project aims to provide teachers and schools with a set of tools and solutions by exchanging our successful experiences and increasing our knowledge on the following aspects: 1. School organization.2. New methodologies.3. Participation of families in school.4. Vocational education and training, including collaboration with private sectors; school leadership, co-teaching, early intervention measures addressed to preventing school dropout and school counselling.5. In-service teacher development.6. Service-learning.The number of people involved in this Project will vary according to the different organizations. All of them have different profiles that complement each other. Therefore, we will have the headmasters, ICTs teachers/advisors, teachers/advisors who are experts on methodology, foreign language teachers/advisors, pedagogues, psychologists and participant teachers.Training activities:All six training activities will be closely related to each of the objectives. Each of them will deal mainly with one of the causes of early school leaving, namely: family participation and engagement in school, methodology, school organization, Vocational Training and developing teaching skills. They will basically consist on setting goals, organizing, clarifying activities and an insight about the sociocultural context, best practice observation, workshops and feedback and follow-ups.Thus, the methodology to be implemented is basically inductive and active. We intend to explore on this issue through a close examination of case studies, best practice, some theorectical approaches, observations and mutual training. We expect the following results and impact:We estimate that the project will have influence at the local, regional, national, European and/or international levels. 1. Local level Participation in the project will affect the perception of our institutions in the local community. Decision-makers and other residents of our towns will see our institutions as places where there is a care for the high quality of work and maintaining international cooperation. The towns’ inhabitants will learn from our experience about the possibilities that are offered via the participation in a European programme. The international mobilities that will take place in our organizations will influence the local community’s level of interest in other European countries, their educational systems and views on early school leaving. It will affect the creation of open attitude towards the cultural similarities and differences.2. Regional and national levelOur organizations’ webpages we will contribute to the dissemination among many people from our countries. Cooperation with regional media and institutions may increase the range of the influence of our project. It will also take us outside the educational environment. We hope, it will allow to diffuse the values of education, and ideas on preventing early school leaving in our regions and countries. It may also interest the media with the innovative approach to education as well as with the theme of our project and our activities within the Erasmus+ programme.3. The European and international levelPosting the results of the project on the Erasmus + platform will increase the interest in the theme among the beneficiaries of other projects organized within the Erasmus + programme as well as the European Commission and other members of the European community. Sharing the results of the project with other people will become an inspiration for other teachers and people connected with education and will influence future efforts in finding partners for new projects. We hope that posting the effects of our endeavours in English and national languages of the project participants will increase the interest of the international community in the theme of the project.
Best Practice Exchange: a passport for educational continuity is a project set up by three institutions in Sweden, Poland, and Spain which aim to contribute to diminishing early school leaving figures, as well as to improving the quality of education and teacher development. This collaboration is made of an Upper Secondary school (Partille Gimnasium, Sweden), a combination of a Primary and a Secondary School (Szkola Podstawowa nr 6 im. Zdobywcow Walu Pomorskiego, Poland) and a teacher training centre (Centro del Profesorado Tenerife Sur, Spain), who acted as coordinator. Partille Gimnasium has a broad experience in integrating immigrants and refugees into the educational system, and have been carrying out a successful sports programme for students who pursue a sports career. They also have implemented effective measures regarding schedule organization, noise-cancelling policies and jobshadowing. Szkola Podstawowa nr 6 im. Zdobywcow Walu Pomorskiego care for students with Special Educational Needs by forming integrative classes or providing professional psychological and pedagogical help. Some of the classes have extra hours of scientific subjects, some have more humanistic lessons and some excel in sports skills. Due to the fact that the level of acquired knowledge is evaluated by a set of national exams at the end of the eighth year, they are very thorough in our educational efforts and try to prepare the children well. CEP Tenerife Sur is a teacher training centre with more that 25 years of experience in training teachers and designing teaching resources. Their organization is characterized by a strong sense of commitment to the educational community. They have been offering tools and aid to implement the professional development plans for the eighty-five Primary and Secondary schools in our district, by stressing the importance of focusing on Early School Leaving through the development of professional training for educators that aims to have a positive impact on school continuity. This project aims to provide teachers and schools with a set of tools and solutions by exchanging our successful experiences and increasing our knowledge in the following aspects: - School organization - New methodologies - Participation of families in school life - Vocational Education and training - In-service teacher development - Service-learning The main activities of this project involve visits and reflection on teaching practice and school organization in our respective countries. We have kept the following pattern in each of these training sessions: Day 1: setting goals/organizing/clarifying activities/sociocultural context Day 2: Best practice observation Day 3: Best practice observation Day 4: Workshop Day 5: Feedback/follow-up These observations and workshops evolved into training sessions, which aim to empower teachers and education practitioners with tools for everyday teaching practice, in order to create a positive impact in terms of students’ academic performance and promote equity inside the classroom, as a way to tackle Early School Leaving and preventing dropouts. The expertise from the different people belonging to these three institutions, and the research carried out, are now at the disposal of schools across Europe. Our final goal is to contribute to diminishing school failure figures, particularly in areas showing high numbers of school dropouts, as well as low academic achievement.